Through practical experiences in social work we have found that siblings of children with neuropsychiatric disability are being left behind in family treatment. We have also identified  a knowledge gap through previous research in how siblings experience their role and relationships within the family. The purpose of this study is to establish an understanding of how neuropsychiatric disability affects the siblings in the family. The siblings referred to in this qualitative study, who we got in touch with through social media, have been interviewed through six semi-structured interviews. Furthermore, the answers have been analyzed through systems theory. The results show that the siblings have taken great responsibility for their sibling and taken a step back as the sibling with neuropsychiatric disability had extensive needs that required a lot of attention and care from their parents.

Traditional family therapy in the field of addiction primarily focuses on relapse prevention and psychoeducation. The lack of systems thinking in residential treatment facilities led to my desire to apply Bowen Family Therapy to a focus group in a residential treatment center. I used the following Bowen concepts: anxiety, differentiation of self, emotional cutoffs, and triangulation as a means to explore how addiction is a symptom of the larger emotional system of the family. I, co-facilitated a three hour group therapy session over 7 weeks with individuals in a treatment center. I addressed the following questions: RQ 1: What impact, if any did this program have on their life? RQ 2: What were the long-term effects of being in the program? RQ 3: Did participating in the group help to better understand resiliency? RQ 4: How does education on the family system impact an individual's recovery process and relationships in life? Through interviews, I followed up with clients three years later to look at the long-term effects of being in the 7-week program. This Applied Clinical Project focused on understanding resiliency and long-term effects on sobriety through a Bowenian lens. The themes that emerged focused on communication, boundaries, resiliency, relationships, and anxiety. The findings demonstrated that a multigenerational element in the study helped participants develop a way to maintain the Family Dynamics curriculum in their day to day life. The overarching theme is that healthy relationships with open communication lead to better anxiety management, resiliency, and boundaries which shows a foundation of which new approaches to substance abuse treatment can be found.

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The current study examines interrelations among family factors in a sample of married couples with children in middle childhood. Specifically, this study tested the associations between parents' mental health, marital satisfaction, and provision of a secure base through emotional sensitivity to the child. We further explored bidirectional and moderation effects between spouses. Participants included 86 heterosexual couples residing in the North Texas community. Using the actor-partner interdependence model, multilevel modeling results indicated that both spouse's mental health symptomology and relationship satisfaction are linked to parent's self-perceived ability to provide a secure base; several gender effects were also found. Additionally, actor relationship satisfaction significantly moderated the association between actor mental health symptomology and secure-base provision. In the context of low actor satisfaction, as the actor's mental health symptomology increases, secure-base provision also increases; however, in the context of high actor satisfaction, as actor's mental health symptomology increases, secure-base provision decreases. Additionally, partner relationship satisfaction significantly moderated the association between partner mental health symptomology and actor secure-base provision. In the context of low partner satisfaction, as partner mental health symptomology increases, actor secure-base provision increases; however, in the context of high partner satisfaction, as partner mental health symptomology increases, actor secure-base provision decreases. Spill-over, compensatory, and cross-over hypotheses, strengths, limitations, implications, and future directions are discussed.

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Chronic illness and invisible disability are impactful contexts during emerging adulthood and the launching stage of the family life cycle (Beatty, 2011; Capelle, Visser, and Vosman, 2016; Young et al., 2010). The parent-child relationship is important to both developmental and health outcomes in families coping with chronic illness during emerging adulthood (Crandell, Sandelowski, Leeman, Haville, and Knafle, 2018; Fenton, Ferries, Ko, Javalkar, and Hooper, 2015; Waldboth, Patch, Mahrer-Imhaf, and Metcalfe, 2016). While informed clinical competency in counseling families experiencing disablement is a diversity-affirmative ethical imperative among psychotherapists (Mona et al., 2017), little is known in family therapy about how parents and emerging adult children experience launching with chronic illness. This qualitative study explored the parent-child dyadic experience of living with a chronic illness called Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) during emerging adulthood. Seven dyads of parents and their emerging adult children with POTS were interviewed. Data analysis of in-depth interviews using Moustakas's (1994) transcendental phenomenology uncovered eight thematic clusters of meaning in the shared lived experience of POTS at the launching stage of the family life cycle. Clinical implications for family therapists were explored using Rolland's family system-illness (FSI) model of medical family therapy. Study limitations and future directions for further research were discussed. / Master of Science / More and more young adults are living with chronic illness. Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) is a little-known chronic illness that tends to begin during adolescence. Like many health problems that disproportionately affect women, POTS is often overlooked by doctors. POTS symptoms, such as dizziness and cognitive difficulty, impact a person's ability to engage in preferred activities and identities. Family therapists can play an impactful role in supporting parents and children with POTS through developmental tasks related to launching an emerging adult in the context of this complex and widely misunderstood chronic illness. This thesis presented the first qualitative study of parent-child dyadic experiences living with POTS. Clinical implications for medical family therapy were highlighted. To construct an interview framework, Rolland's Family Systems-Illness (FSI) clinical model for helping families cope with illness and disability was used in conjunction with Arnett's description of emerging adulthood as a developmental stage in life. Seven parent-child dyads were interviewed for 1-2 hours in fourteen separate interviews generating transcripts about 140,000 words long in total. Analysis of these interviews identified shared themes composing the essence of the parent-child experience living with POTS during emerging adulthood. Results were described through tables and narratives. Clinical implications for family therapists working with parents and children with POTS during emerging adulthood were proposed. Limitations and ideas for future studies were discussed.

Introduction: For children born with physical disabilities, the perspectives and actions of their parents prove significant to their childhood developmental outcomes clinically, educationally, socially, and with regard to community participation. The lived world and perceptions of parents who have children with disabilities however is not well investigated. This study sought to understand parents’ framing of theirs and their children’s disability experiences. Family systems together with family systems intervention models, and disability theory were used to provide structure to interview instrumentation and subsequent analysis. Child-centered and ecologic influences were also used to track the transformative processes over time that infuses parental themes. Methods: Methods for this study followed traditions of heuristic phenomenology. Open-ended parental interviews, written and spoken, together with field notes were used to explore the meanings given to disability. Analysis focused on collective descriptions and critical themes. Results: The nine parents in this study revealed four dominant themes around which their children’s lived lives were both understood and framed. Navigating normal for us; Our pride and joy; Anything but disability; Lived lives, looking back. Each is expressed in the words of parents who reared a child with disabilities into adulthood. Discussion and Recommendations: Parental disability frameworks differ from medical model frameworks and those of disability studies but share similarities with each. The parent themes provided holistic views of what these families have lived and learned. Their perspectives provide potentially vital markers and points of inquiry for interventionists and team members who work with children and families. Themes may also offer categorical means to explore well-being and child outcomes. Additionally, the themes were transformative and empowering for parents, both in the discussion of individual matters and in their narratives. All participants iterated that they welcomed having their voices invited and heard.

Although addiction is treated by means of different treatment programmes in South Africa, the researcher discovered that the level of self-actualization and changes in addicts relationships, are questionable. A preliminary literature review indicated that the family of origin could be the cause of addiction. The above prompted the researcher to compile a treatment programme that addresses the family of origin as a cause of addiction. The treatment programme was divided into three phases. Phases one and two were included to provide therapists with guidelines on how to assist clients to reach abstinence, as well as how to function effectively in their life-worlds, while phase three addressed the family of origin as a cause of addiction. The family systems and relations theories served as the theoretical framework of the study. Phase three of the treatment programme was implemented by therapists during an empirical investigation to determine the effectiveness of the treatment programme. / Teacher Education / D Ed. (Psychology of Education)