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INTERPERSONAL CONTROL IN STRUCTURAL AND MILAN SYSTEMIC FAMILY THERAPY
Author(s) -
Friedlander Myrna L.,
Wildman Julie,
Heatherington Laurie
Publication year - 1991
Publication title -
journal of marital and family therapy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.868
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1752-0606
pISSN - 0194-472X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1752-0606.1991.tb00909.x
Subject(s) - interpersonal communication , systemic therapy , divergence (linguistics) , family therapy , psychology , control (management) , coding (social sciences) , interpersonal relationship , developmental psychology , social psychology , psychotherapist , computer science , medicine , sociology , linguistics , artificial intelligence , social science , philosophy , cancer , breast cancer
The structural and Milan systemic approaches were compared in order to determine the extent to which their major proponents behave in ways that are consistent with theory. The focus was on interpersonal control dynamics between therapist and family system. Three published transcripts of each treatment were intensively studied using the Family Relational Communication Control Coding System (Friedlander & Heatherington, 1989; Heatherington & Friedlander, 1987), a systemically based instrument that identifies interpersonal control patterns in naturally occurring language. Results were generally congruent with theory and reflected hypothesized differences in the approaches. Whereas therapists in both approaches engage heavily in complementary transactions in which they are “one‐up” and the family members are “one‐down,” a number of other relational indices show considerable divergence. The implications of these results for an integration of the two approaches are discussed.