How Do the Professional Lives of Family Therapists Affect their Private Relationships: A Qualitative Study

This article is based on a qualitative research project about how the professional lives of family therapists affect their private relationships. The overarching research question was: How does your professional work as a family therapist affect your private relationships? To answer this question, semi‐structured qualitative interviews were conducted with four therapists from two different Family Counseling Services. Through the use of interpretative phenomenological analysis, three main findings were identified: (1) family therapists’ knowledge and values are a basis for interpersonal encounters; (2) participants describe resonance in relation to clients’ stories; and (3) therapists can be challenged in managing confidential knowledge particularly where they belong to the same communities as clients. The study also explores societal expectations and discourses that accompany the role of therapist, which can affect therapists’ freedom of movement in their private lives. These issues are discussed in relation to family therapy theory and relevant research.     

Single Mothers “Do” Family

This paper explores how single mothers both incorporate others into family life (e.g., when they ask others to care for their children) and simultaneously “do families” in a manner that holds out a vision of a “traditional” family structure. Drawing on research with White, rural single mothers, the author explores the manner in which these women both endorse their children’s attachment to other caregivers and maintain boundaries around issues of discipline and attachment vis‐à‐vis these others. The author demonstrates that single mothers are willing to share this protected realm of family life with a new man (a fiancé or cohabiting boyfriend) as they pursue the goal of what has been called the “Standard North American Family.”     

Clients’ perceptions of marriage and family therapists’ way‐of‐being: a phenomenological analysis

Previous research highlights the influence of therapist factors on treatment outcomes. One therapist factor proposed as fundamental to the process of therapy is the therapist's way‐of‐being, a relational concept that refers to how the therapist regards a client—either as a person or object (Fife et al., [2014] Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 40, 20–33). Although this case has been made conceptually, there is little empirical research on therapists’ way‐of‐being with clients. The primary purpose of this research is to investigate clients’ perceptions of their therapists’ way‐of‐being. Utilizing a common factors perspective, the study seeks to explore: (a) how clients experience their therapists’ way‐of‐being and (b) the influence therapists’ way‐of‐being has on clients’ engagement. Phenomenological methods were used to gain a nuanced understanding of the phenomenon. Qualitative data were collected through semi‐structured face‐to‐face interviews with clients (N = 10) who received individual therapy from a marriage and family therapist. Results were organized into two main themes: core tenets (attunement, congruency, and aligning with clients) and operational tenets (providing affirmation and validation, balancing flexibility and structure, and accomplishing goals). Findings are used to make a case for adding the concept of way‐of‐being as an overarching construct for several well‐established therapist factors. Clinical and training implications are discussed.     

The Daily Events and Emotions of Master’s‐level Family Therapy Trainees in Off‐campus Practicum Settings

The Day Reconstruction Method (DRM) was used to assess the daily events and emotions of one program’s master’s‐level family therapy trainees in off‐campus practicum settings. This study examines the DRM reports of 35 family therapy trainees in the second year of their master’s program in marriage and family therapy. Four themes emerged from the results: (i) Personal contact with peers‐in‐training engenders the most positive emotions during practicum; (ii) Trainees experience more positive emotions during therapy with families and couples in comparison with therapy with individuals; (iii) Positive affect increases over the course of a student’s practicum year; and (iv) Trainees experience less positive affect in individual supervision in comparison with most other training activities. Flow theory offers guidance for supervisors helping trainees face developmental challenges of clinical training.     

Embodying “tech”: Articulatory setting,phonetic variation,and social meaning

This article examines the co‐occurring realization of two sociophonetic variables within a style—the LOT vowel in English and word‐initial /l/—to explore the link between articulatory setting and stylistic practice. At an arts‐focused high school in the San Francisco Bay Area, the curricular and social practices of students in the technical theatre department centre around manual labour. Ethnographic analysis demonstrates that “tech” constitutes a locally enregistered persona, informed by tech students’ positioning as working‐class subjects through their bodily, sartorial, and technological practices. Tech students also produce higher and more rounded variants of LOT, and more velarized productions of /l/, than their non‐tech peers, and I suggest that articulatory setting is at play in the cohesive indexicality of these variants. I advocate for the continued exploration of co‐occurring sociolinguistic variables which treat the body as a broader stylistic context, and propose that studies of co‐occurring features focus on the ideological processes by which combinations of variables come to index thematic styles.     

Girls’ Family Labor in Low‐Income Households: A Decade of Qualitative Research

This article analyzes a decade of qualitative research to identify and explore an overlooked survival strategy used in low‐income families: children's family labor. Defined as physical duties, caregiving, and household management responsibilities, children’s—most often girls’—family labor is posited as a critical source of support where low wages and absent adult caregivers leave children to take over essential, complex, and time‐consuming family demands. We argue that there are lost opportunities when children are detoured from childhood to do family labor and that an intergenerational transfer of poverty is associated with those losses.     

You Have to Start from Scratch and You Need Someone by Your Side”: Perspectives of Parents and Teachers on Immigrant Students’ Adaptation to School

This article analyses the issue of immigrant students’ adaptation in Israeli schools, as perceived by their parents and teachers. The study integrates data from two qualitative, phenomenological studies: one explored immigrant parents’ perceptions of Israeli education and their children’s adaptation in school, while the other studied teachers’ perceptions of immigrant students’ education and their practices in the field. The data was gathered from in‐depth interviews with 17 parents and 20 teachers. The analysis yielded a list of themes related to parents’ and teachers’ views of the children’s adjustment, and their own roles in this process: their personal experiences in the field, the challenges and difficulties in interpersonal interactions between parents and teachers, and policy issues related to the educational integration of immigrant students. Findings emphasize the vital importance of parent‐teacher collaboration, clarification and better implementation of existing policy, and teachers’ qualifications for the successful educational integration of immigrant students.     

Social Work Student Learning Experiences of Family Therapy: Improving Competency in Pedagogy Through Qualitative Research

The purpose of this qualitative study is to evaluate graduate social work student experiences of pedagogy intended to improve competency in family therapy practice. Students from two classes (N = 37) completed open‐ended surveys assessing: perceptions of most helpful pedagogical practices; understanding of needed competencies; and perceived opportunities offered to them during their graduate training for learning about work with couples and families. Results, analysed using grounded theory methodology, revealed that students: (1) believed that experiential activities were especially critical for learning how to do clinical practice with couples and families; (2) understood important competencies related to professional development, therapeutic engagement with the family, and how to approach family practice; and (3) believed they were ‘somewhat prepared’ for practice. Implications include improving understanding of abstract skills in practice with couples and families, and emphasising relationship dynamics more in graduate social work education and training.     

“Being a Therapist Doesn't Exclude You From Real Life”: Family Therapists’ Beliefs and Barriers to Political Action

A crucial and overlooked facet of social justice in family therapy is political and policy advocacy. Family therapists have unique insight into how social policies and political discourse shapes clients’ lives and the life of our profession. Such knowledge can inform policymakers and political debate, yet few family therapists are trained to engage in political action. In this randomized, national survey of licensed family therapists’ (N = 174), we explore beliefs about and barriers to engagement in political and policy processes. The findings suggest that there are significant barriers and uncertainties surrounding family therapists’ engagement, including time, feelings of efficacy, and interest. Given these barriers we discuss practical suggestions for clinicians and family therapy training programs.     

Marriage and Family Therapy Students’ Experience with Common Factors Training

With the increased empirical and theoretical support for common factors in the psychotherapy literature, marriage and family therapy (MFT) scholars have begun discussing the inclusion of common factors in MFT training. However, there is very little empirical research on common factors training or how to include common factors in MFT curricula. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to investigate MFT students’ experience with common factors training. Seventeen master's degree students who received training in common factors participated in the study. Data was comprised of participants’ journal reflections and focus group interviews on their experience learning about common factors and how this influenced their work with clients. Participants’ responses to the training were overwhelmingly positive and highlighted the ways in which studying common factors enhanced their confidence, understanding of MFT models, conceptual abilities, and clinical practice. Additional results and discussion about incorporating common factors in MFT training are presented     

Perceived Professional Gains of Master's Level Students Following a Person‐of‐the‐Therapist Training Program: A Retrospective Content Analysis

The Person‐of‐the‐Therapist Training (POTT) is a program designed to facilitate clinicians' ability to consciously and purposefully use themselves at the moment of contact with their clients in order to connect, assess, and intervene effectively. This qualitative study explored the experiences of 54 master's‐level students who were enrolled in an accredited marriage and family therapy program in the United States and examined their perceived professional gains following a 9‐month POTT course. Content analysis of trainees' reflections which they wrote at the end of the training revealed 6 primary themes: (a) increased awareness, (b) emotions, (c) improved clinical work, (d) humanity and woundedness, (e) meta‐awareness, and (f) factors that contributed to the learning process. Findings suggest that key outcomes of this training curriculum are congruent with its stated goals. Clinical and training recommendations are additionally provided. Video Abstract     

“The troublesome other and I”: Parallel stories of separated parents in prolonged conflicts

This qualitative study aims to explore how noncohabiting parenting couples in prolonged conflict construct the other parent and themselves. Ten parents from five parent couples were interviewed. A dyadic analytical design was used, where parent's stories of conflict were analyzed in parallel with their co‐parent. Drawing on positioning theory, self‐identity as parents emerged as implicit counter positions in storylines, which construct the co‐parent as “the troublesome other.” Two typologies of conflicted storylines were prominent in the findings: storylines of violations of trust, positioning the co‐parents in relation to traumatic events in the past and, storylines of who is bad, positioning the co‐parent as either a disloyal co‐parent or a dysfunctional parent. The findings indicate that prolonged conflicts made it impossible to find available positions for cooperation. We argue that family therapists should aid each household toward promoting child and family resilience rather than continued efforts to solve chronic conflicts.     

Using Decision Analysis: Connecting Classroom and Field

This paper reports on the findings of a small‐scale research project investigating the views of social work students on the use of decision analysis. After giving the context of the research, the article reports on what was found when students, who had just completed a Decision Making and Risk module, were asked for their opinions on the component parts of decision analysis, its use as a practice tool and their attitudes to using it on placement. The research found that the respondents in general took a critical and supportive stance towards the use of decision analysis in social work and, with extra teaching and a positive approach from their practice assessor, would be happy to use decision analysis. When the same group of students completed a follow‐up questionnaire on a placement recall day, half of them had thought about using decision analysis but only three had gone on to discuss this with their practice assessors. Some issues in relation to connecting ‘classroom’ and ‘field’ are identified and the paper concludes that a number of further steps would be necessary to realise the potential of decision analysis to help students be more systematic and analytical in their approach to decision making.     

Transnational family strategies and education in the contemporary Chinese diaspora

Abstract In this article I examine the role of education in the family strategies of recent East Asian migrants, contributing to intellectual debates around transnationalism and the contemporary Chinese diaspora. Empirically, the article provides an insight into the experiences and objectives of an often‐neglected group within studies of Chinese migration – students. I also attempt to understand the particular role that children play within a wider family project of capital accumulation. Drawing upon the work of Bourdieu, I emphasize the significance of different forms of capital in underpinning the spatial strategies of East Asian families. The research for this article was conducted in Vancouver, Canada and Hong Kong, involving in‐depth interviews with university students, recent graduates and their families. In conclusion, in the article I maintain that a geographically informed theory of ‘cultural capital’ and its relationship to the family unit can help elucidate recent patterns of trans‐Pacific, transnational mobility, moving beyond more common ‘political’ and ‘economic’ interpretations of this contemporary migration.     

'It's like saying "coloured" ': understanding and analysing the urban working classes

This paper draws on data from a qualitative project exploring the engagement of working class families in London with childcare. It is a first attempt to throw some light on our usage of the term ‘working class’, and consider what forms ‘working class‐ness’ takes in relation to our respondent families. We discuss some recent sociological literature on the working class(es) in order to understand the emphasises and focuses of other research. We emphasise the heterogeneity of the working class(es), the differences in attitude and experiences based on place, gender, occupational status, education, age and family membership. Then we consider our respondents in relation to their strategies and exercise of agency, their engagement with the labour market, and their embedded‐ness in social networks. We conclude that one way of understanding the lives of urban working class families is to consider the extent to which they ‘manage or struggle to cope’, a focus which emphasises process, activity and the differential degrees of agency which the respondents are able to exercise.     

Establishing the Validity of the Affirmative Training Inventory: Assessing the Relationship between Lesbian,Gay, and Bisexual Affirmative Training and Students’ Clinical Competence

This study established the validity and factor structure of the Affirmative Training Inventory (ATI; T. S. Carlson, C. R. McGeorge & M. Rock, unpublished) as a measure of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) affirmative clinical training. Additionally, this study examined the latent associations among the subscales of the ATI and the Sexual Orientation Counselor Competency Scale ( Bidell, 2005 ) utilizing a sample of 248 master’s and doctoral couple and family therapy students. The findings from this study provide empirical support for the relationship between specific classroom‐related content associated with LGB affirmative therapy and students’ perceptions of their own ability to work competently with LGB clients. This study also found a positive association between the degree to which couple and family therapy programs adopt a LGB‐affirmative stance and students’ beliefs, knowledge, and skills associated with competent therapy with LGB clients.     

Adolescent Career Development in Urban‐Residing Aboriginal Families in Canada

The purpose of this study was to understand how urban‐residing Aboriginal adolescent–parent dyads (n = 11) jointly constructed and acted on goals and strategies with their social supports (n = 17) to facilitate the adolescents' career development. A modified protocol following the qualitative action‐project method was used. A discrete joint project was identified for each family. These joint projects can be clustered into 3 joint career development projects: (a) navigating toward a safe future, (b) negotiating school continuance, and (c) intergenerational continuity through tradition of care. A 4th project emerging from the data was family survival. Family survival projects supplanted participants' efforts to engage in career development projects.     

A Mixed‐Methods Social Networks Study Design for Research on Transnational Families

This paper advocates the adoption of a mixed‐methods research design to describe and analyze ego‐centered social networks in transnational family research. Drawing on the experience of the “Social Networks Influences on Family Formation” project (2004–2005; see Bernardi, Keim, & von der Lippe, 2007a, 2007b ), I show how the combined use of network generators and semistructured interviews (N = 116) produces unique data on family configurations and their impact on life course choices. A mixed‐methods network approach presents specific advantages for research on children in transnational families. On one hand, quantitative analyses are crucial for reconstructing and measuring the potential and actual relational support available to children in a context where kin interactions may be hindered by temporary and prolonged periods of separation. On the other hand, qualitative analyses can address strategies and practices employed by families to maintain relationships across international borders and geographic distance, as well as the implications of those strategies for children's well‐being.