Proponents of narrative family therapy believe personal experience is ambiguous and reality is shaped by language--the reality is a subjective, socially constructed truth. Narrative therapy focuses on the effects of the client’s problem, not the cause, and dissects how the problem impacts the family at large. Narrative therapists view the client’s problem as the focal problem and view the client as secondary to the problem--the person is not the problem. (Gehart, 2014).
Core concepts.
Dominant Narrative--a person’s beliefs, values, and practices based on dominant social culture
Subjugated Narrative--a person’s own story that is suppressed by the dominant story
Alternative Story--the story that is present but not noticed
Deconstruction/re-authoring--taking apart the problem-saturated story in order to externalize and re-write the client’s story
Problem-saturated Stories--the story that bogs the client down, allowing problems to persist
The landscape of action--how people behave
The landscape of consciousness--what meaning the problem has (landscape of meaning)
Unique outcome/sparkling moments--pieces of the deconstructed story that would not have been predicted by the dominant story or problem-saturated story (Gehart, 2014).
Major interventions.
Narrative therapists help the client to separate the problem-saturated stories and destructive cultural assumptions to open space for new and more constructive views of themselves. Therapists challenge the client’s views by identifying unique outcomes or “sparkling events” when the family resisted the problem or behaved in ways that contradicted the problem story. Therapists ask questions to help clients with their story development, identify the problem, extend the story into the future, externalize or deconstruct the problem, and finally reauthor the client’s narrative (Gehart, 2014).
Goals and therapeutic outcomes.
The goals of Narrative therapy are to change the way the clients view themselves and assist them in re-authoring their story in a positive light--finding an alternative, but preferred story that is not problem-saturated. Therapy aims to give clients openings to different stories that don’t include problems by helping clients to separate the problem-saturated stories and destructive cultural assumptions. Reauthorizing helps foster a sense of personal agency among the family members by using an “audience” to acknowledge their success over the problem (Nichols et. al., 2017).
Evolution of Model.
Narrative therapy was created and influenced by the works of Michael White and David Epston who believed in the advantages of narratives and viewed stories as capturing lived time. White and Epston (1978), believed that stories are complex since they are inclusive rather than exclusive and can enrich events in people’s lives. White developed his approach around how problems affect people rather than the actions people take. By creating new narratives through reauthoring, clients become separated from instead of being defined by their problems.
David Epston, a family therapist, emphasized clients maintain their new reauthored narratives with the support of the community and developed self-help “leagues,” or groups of citizens battling similar problems to provide community and support. Epston also advocated for writing letters to clients upon completion of therapy (Nichols et. al., 2017).
Critique of cultural sensitivity.
Overt and covert values.
Narrative therapy values a general approach to working with individuals and families that uses metaphors and languages associated with the narrative process in order to help clients understand the problems in their lives, separate from them, and create alternative life stories. The oral tradition of transmitting information through storytelling can be found in cultures around the world which enables Narrative therapy to be open to cross-cultural communications.
Based on social constructivism philosophy, narrative models share a belief in the power of language to oppress or liberate people. Every individual has the ability to “reauthor” their life through the process of therapeutic conversations. The narrative theory rejects the notion of universal truth in favor of multiple realities and perspectives. Thus, the client is regarded as the expert on their story (White & Epston 1990).
Experiential Family Therapy
Assumptions of problems and solutions.
Experiential therapists believe family difficulties and problems are caused by emotional suppression. Parents who regulate and control children’s feelings result in children who suppress or blunt their emotional experiences: dysfunctional families are less tolerant of emotions.
Experiential therapy aims to change families by helping them to openly express their emotions, hopes, desires, fears, and anxieties. Since emotions organize attachment responses and serve a main communicative function in relationships, denial of impulses and suppression of feelings are the root of family problems (Greenberg & Johnson, 2010).
Experiential therapists believe that the family is locked into a pattern of self-protection and avoidance and seeks security rather than satisfaction by smothering emotion and desire. When a family is fearful of conflict, they adhere rigidly to the rituals they established and cling to routines--resulting in an unhealthy family that stays together out of habit or duty (Satir, 1972).
Alienation
Battle for Structure
Battle for Initiative
Blaming
Being irrelevant/irreverent
Being super reasonable/Placating
Communication
Creativity
Experiential
Family Reconstruction
Growth thru immediate shared experience
Honest emotion
Suppression/repression
Family myths
Mystification
Intergenerational themes
Self Worth
Experiential techniques are aimed at promoting communication and interaction to open individuals to new experiences in order to change the family dynamic. Creating personal therapeutic encounters through structured exercises and techniques, therapists aim to liberate impulses for individual growth and family cohesion (Whitaker, 1973):
Family sculpting: one member of the family arranges others in a scene
Conjoint family drawing: members draw a picture as they see themselves in the family
Family puppet interviews: the family makes up a story using puppets
Role-playing: past events and events hoped for and/or feared are made more immediate
Gestalt empty chair: an individual talks to an empty chair to personify the subject and promote effective expression
Psychology of the absurd: taking clients’ statements to the extreme
The goals of Experiential family therapy are to promote individual and family growth through shared experience and emotional expression. Therapy aims to improve family relationships by increasing personal integrity and enhancing growth and self-awareness--enabling family members to be more authentic. This can allow the family to establish a sense of belonging within the family unit. Additionally, learning to interpret anger as hurt or by explaining the purpose of pain reduces individual and family defenses. Educating clients about their roles in the family can increase self-control and accountability (Nichols, et. al. 2017).
Experiential family therapy, which grew out of existential and humanistic psychology, peaked in the 1970s and is one of the seminal first-generation family therapy models. Experiential therapy focuses on the needs of the family and has roots in psychodrama, Gestalt therapy, and encounter groups. Experiential family therapy was created by Carl Whitaker and Virginia Satir.
Carl Whitaker focused on an intuitive approach to therapy and was among the first to conduct therapy with families. Whitaker believed in “Therapy of the absurd,” highlighting unconventional and playful wisdom to connect individuals and families (Nichols, et. al., 2017). Virginia Satir, one of the first prominent women in the field, began her career in family therapy at the Mental Research Institute (MRI). Satir focused on fostering individual growth as well as improving family interactions using experiential exercises, metaphors, coaching, and the self of the therapist to facilitate change. Satir focused on being highly nurturing, empathetic, and genuine using techniques of touch and sculpting and stressed the importance of quality communication among family members.
Experiential therapists believe family difficulties and problems are caused by emotional suppression by parents who regulate and control children’s feelings and view dysfunctional families as less tolerant of emotions. Children who grow up in an atmosphere of support when expressing their feelings and creative impulses are encouraged to experience life and the full range of human emotions fully. A healthy family offers its members the freedom to be themselves (Gehart, 2014).
Power and Social Justice
Narrative Family Therapy
Social context.
According to Foucault, the power of the dominant narrative, or status quo, in a society pervades all aspects of life and subjugates through language. In order for clients and therapists to establish an alliance, the therapist’s ideas, values, prejudices, etc. need to be open to the client, and transparency needs to be established. Narrative therapists need to be expert conversationalists, to engage the family and enable the family to share and then reauthor their own stories. Narrative family therapy is rooted in postmodernism and social constructivist thought and dismisses modernist views as expert knowledge, objective reality, and the need for therapist detachment (Gehart, D. 2014).
Strengths and weaknesses.
Narrative intelligibility or the idea that stories don’t just mirror life they shape it is at the core of Narrative therapy. Therapists focus on how much narrative accounts affected people’s perceptions. Narrative therapists believe that problems arise when people are indoctrinated into narrow and self-defeating views of themselves. Clients can develop alternative empowering stories if they can distance themselves from their problems and the cultural myths they have internalized. Narrative therapy relies heavily on the motivation and language of the client to uncover their problems and identify solutions that allow little room for miscommunication or a lack of follow-through (White, Michael 2007).
Experiential therapy can focus on emotional processes and family structure by relying on emotional and not cognitive logic. The use of symbolism and real-life experiences as well as humor, play, and affective confrontation are utilized to promote emotional processing. Experiential therapy was developed in response to perceived limitations in psychoanalysis and behaviorism and emphasizes freedom and the immediacy of experience. This form of therapy values the individual experience over the family structure (Satir, V. 1972).
Experiential therapy focuses on four types of destructive communication that are used as communication coping strategies: Blaming, Placating, Being irrelevant and Being super reasonable. These four types of destructive communication develop during childhood and reveal how a person communicates under stress. By identifying a client’s communication style, the therapist can focus on the perception of the problem between couples. Since experiential therapy focuses on interpretations, leaving room for discussions to be taken out of context. Since success depends on the collaboration of several people, this can lead to high dropout rates (Johnson & Denton, 2002).
Clinical Application
Modifications to the concept of deconstruction and re-authoring
Re-authoring conversations take place between a therapist and the client and involve the identification and co-creation of alternative storylines of identity. The practice of re-authoring is based on the assumption that no one story can summarize a client; there will always be other storylines that can be created from the events of our lives. As such, our identities are not single-storied--we are multi-storied. According to White (2001), narrative practices explore the intentions, hopes, values, and commitments that shape people’s actions rather than any internal deficiencies. Inviting creativity and flexibility into the therapy room can enable clients to be open to or create more diverse dominant narratives which are more culturally relevant (Gehart, D. 2014).
Modification to the concept of a battle for structure
According to Napier & Whitaker (1978), families come into therapy with their own structure, tone, and rules. The family organization and patterns have been established over years of living and are extremely meaningful and painful. The family counts on the familiarity and predictability of their world. If the family is going to expose this painful predictability and attempt to reorganize themselves, they will need firm external support.
Since individuals interpret behaviors and emotions in a variety of ways, Napier and Whitaker (1978) focus on concepts of the battle for structure and the battle for the initiative. Using collaboration, empathy, and gentle language which maintains appropriate boundaries, one can guide clients securely through treatment, as they find their culturally specific resources and relational courage.
Conclusion
Both Experiential and Narrative family therapies focus on the client’s perception of themselves and view outside factors as the problem, not something that is inherently wrong with the client. Viewing reauthoring and the battle for structure through a power and social justice lens enables families--and communities and society--to be more culturally sensitive. When individuals feel empowered to define and own their own stories/themselves, they have no reason to fear 'the other' in any context. Clients can reauthor or fully experience their emotions behind their socially constructed view of identity to change their worldviews from within.