Scene-Based Psychodramatic Family Therapy With Troubled Adolescents and Parents: A Pilot Study

Scene-Based Psychodramatic Family Therapy (SB-PFT) is an innovative treatment used with troubled adolescents and their parents to improve family relationships and reduce adolescents’ problematic behavior. It integrates the principles of family therapy, psychodrama, and multiple-family group methodology. This research is a pilot study to obtain empirical evidence on the SB-PFT therapeutic process by gauging the perception of change of troubled adolescents and their parents, and assess the perceived helpfulness of its methodology and techniques. Ten multiple-family intervention groups were drawn up, with 110 participants (63 adolescents and 47 parents), and we adopted a qualitative methodology with focus groups, using an inductive analysis of 290 active constructions of participant narratives. Concerning perception of change, the adolescents reported mainly gaining in social support, prosocial attitudes, keys to problem solving, and expression of emotions due to the treatment. The parents perceived improvement in social support, keys for educational practices, emotional well-being, and expression of emotions due to the treatment. Regarding the perceived helpfulness of methodology and techniques, both adolescents and parents highlighted the usefulness of the group methodology for gaining social support, relativizing the problem, and expressing emotions. Additionally, participants referred to role-playing and mirror techniques as the most useful techniques. In conclusion, this first study on SB-PFT presents and describes its treatment for troubled adolescents and their parents. The participants’ positive perception of their personal and relational change after treatment should serve to promote further studies with quantitative methodology in order to verify the effectiveness of SB-PFT treatment.     

Exploring the Recovery of Non-offending Parents after a Child’s Sexual Abuse Event

A variety of factors influence a child’s recovery from a child sexual abuse (CSA) event including the non-offending parent’s role in the healing process of their child. The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of how non-offending parents recuperate from a CSA occurrence. By better understanding non-offending parents’ perspectives related to the healing process, health professionals can provide effective supports, programs, and services. We recruited and conducted in-depth qualitative interviews with 16 non-offending parents to explore their risk factors, protective factors, stressors, coping strategies, and perceptions of healing following their child’s sexual abuse event. We also invited parents to contribute specific ideas to improve programs and services offered to families of sexual abuse served by a child advocacy center located in an urban pediatric hospital. Our findings included five themes: (1) a variety of emotions are present; (2) family context influences recovery; (3) coping is different for everyone; (4) navigating the justice system is frustrating; and (5) healing is a process. The results of our study revealed that the non-offending parents that were managing their child’s sexual abuse event more productively were further along in the healing process (as compared with their counterparts) and had successfully processed their emotions, described less chaos in their family unit, employed positive coping strategies, and had found a way to move forward and accept a “new normal”. The findings of our study can be used to promote recovery and provide better services to non-offending parents following a CSA event.

     

The Emotional Lexicon of Individuals Diagnosed with Antisocial Personality Disorder

This study investigated the specific emotional lexicons in narratives created by persons diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) to test the hypothesis that individuals with ASPD exhibit deficiencies in emotional language. Study participants consisted of 60 prison inmates with ASPD, 40 prison inmates without ASPD, and 60 men without antisocial tendencies who described situations involving love, hate and anxiety depicted by photographs. The lexical choices made in the narratives were analyzed, and a comparison of the three groups revealed differences between the emotional narratives of inmates with ASPD, inmates without ASPD, and the control group. Although the narratives of the individuals with ASPD included more words describing emotions and higher levels of emotional intensity, the valence of these words was inappropriate. The linguistic characteristics of these narratives were associated with high levels of psychopathy and low emotional reactivity.     

Vicarious and post‐memory practices in adopting families: The re‐production of the past through photography and narrative

In this paper, we explore how adoptive parents manage and order visual information relating to their adoptive child's birth or foster family. More specifically, our task is to make sense of the ways in which the memories that children have of their past families are (re)constructed and managed within the context of present adoptive parental concerns. Life story books have become a dominant way in which narratives of the child's past family are formed. The aim of this book is to provide the child with relevant information, objects, possessions and images of the past and to create a coherent narrative between the past and the present. Parents are encouraged to make use of visual images, consisting mainly of photographs of birth families and foster carers to order the autobiography of the child. To date, there is no research that has examined how the process is experienced by parents and children. In order to examine how parents made use of visual information in particular, we carried out two focus groups with adoptive parents who participated in an adoption agency support group. A social remembering approach informed the questions asked, and a discursive analysis of the data was developed. The main analytical focus in this paper is on how photographs, objects and places serve as active participants in the production of the adoptive children's memory. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Young Women’s Experience of Anorexia,Family Dynamics and Triangulation

The study explored the experience of triadic family relationships of six young women with a diagnosis of Anorexia Nervosa alongside a consideration of their attachment strategies. The research methods employed semi-structured individual interviews, a family sculpt and use of an adapted version of the Adolescent Separation Anxiety Test (SAT). This adaptation featured a unique development for this study of photographs depicting triadic family separation and conflict situations. These attempted to offer an integrated view of their experience of anorexia and of family relationships alongside a consideration of the attachment strategies evoked. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis was used to generate themes that captured the young women’s experience, and a modified version of the SAT protocol coding was used to explore attachment strategies. The main themes to emerge from the data were found to be: Relational distance to attachment figures, Barriers to emotional connection, and Perception of parents’ relationship. Attachment strategies were shown to influence perceptions of family relationships and of triadic processes and conflicts. Clinical implications of the findings are discussed alongside limitations of the study and indications for future research.     

Family criticism and self-starvation: a study of expressed emotion

The measure Expressed Emotion (EE) has been established as an exceptionally useful indicator of relapse in people with schizophrenia and depression. EE is now also being applied more broadly for the investigation of other disorders. EE is usually rated by conducting the Camberwell Family Interview, i.e. in the course of separate individual interviews with the relatives of the symptomatic individuals. This paper reports the rating of EE in adolescents with eating disorders within a semi-structured family schedule - the Standardized Clinical Family Interview. Consecutive referrals for eating disorders were assessed prior to family therapy and again at regular intervals during therapy. EE ratings for this sample, the prognostic value of EE, and the changes in EE that took place during the course of therapy are presented and their clinical implications discussed. The findings suggest that even low levels of Critical Comments from the parents to the anorexic adolescent are associated with continuing symptoms.     

Good Intentions: Exploring Narratives of Preferred Parenting in Families of a Young Person Who Has Experienced a First Episode of Psychosis (FEP)

This research used a multimethod design to explore the narratives of seven parents of young people with a diagnosis of first episode psychosis. Findings revealed narratives in which parents described a range of adverse experiences in their childhoods and attempts were made to "normalise” these events. The core narrative themes that emerged from the analysis were supported by the AAI interviews, which revealed indicators of unresolved traumas and dismissive attachment strategies.The parents intentions to do things differently from how they were parented varied in their extremity and at times appeared to have become counterproductive for their parenting.     

Positive and negative affect in parenting disabled children

Research on parents' positive and negative affect may clarify critical aspects in the emotional impact of raising a child with disabilities, as related to stress-resistance factors such as personal coping and family climate. Parental affect (positive and negative), coping strategies (active and avoidant), and family climate (relationships, personal growth, and system maintenance) among 71 families with disabled children were compared (using MANCOVA) to parental measures of 77 families with nondisabled children, revealing significant differences. Parents of disabled children reported higher levels of negative (distressed) affect, adopted more avoidant coping strategies, and differed in their familial interrelations and the opportunities for personal growth available to them in their families. The discrepancies between the fathers' and mothers' scores in avoidant coping and in the family climate areas of personal growth and system maintenance were greater among the parents of disabled children than among the control parents. Positive and negative affect were differently predicted in the two groups of parents, highlighting the different role of coping resources and family resources in mediating stress. Implications were drawn for intervention planning and family empowerment.     

Enhancing Family Resilience Through Family Narrative Co-construction

We draw upon family resilience and narrative theory to describe an evidence-based method for intervening with military families who are impacted by multiple wartime deployments and psychological, stress-related, or physical parental injuries. Conceptual models of familial resilience provide a guide for understanding the mechanics of how families respond and recover from exposure to extreme events, and underscore the role of specific family processes and interaction patterns in promoting resilient capabilities. Leading family theorists propose that the family’s ability to make meaning of stressful and traumatic events and nurture protective beliefs are critical aspects of resilient adaptation. We first review general theoretical and empirical research contributions to understanding family resilience, giving special attention to the circumstances, challenges, needs, and strengths of American military families. Therapeutic narrative studies illustrate the processes through which family members acquire meaning-making capacities, and point to the essential role of parents’ in facilitating discussions of stressful experiences and co-constructing coherent and meaningful narratives. This helps children to make sense of these experiences and develop capacities for emotion regulation and coping. Family-based narrative approaches provide a structured opportunity to elicit parents’ and children’s individual narratives, assemble divergent storylines into a shared family narrative, and thereby enhance members’ capacity to make meaning of stressful experiences and adopt beliefs that support adaptation and growth. We discuss how family narratives can help to bridge intra-familial estrangements and re-engage communication and support processes that have been undermined by stress, trauma, or loss. We conclude by describing a family-based narrative intervention currently in use with thousands of military children and families across the USA.     

Enduring Positivity: Children Of Incarcerated Parents Report More Positive Than Negative Emotions When Thinking about Close Others

ABSTRACT

Millions of children in the United States experience parental incarceration, yet it is unclear how this experience might shape social cognition. We asked children of incarcerated parents (N = 24) and children whose parents were not incarcerated (N = 58) to describe their parents. Both groups of children also rated the extent to which they agree that they feel positive and, separately, negative emotions when thinking about their parent and best friend. This approach allowed us to test between two alternative hypotheses. On the one hand, cultural narratives in the United States convey negative messages about incarcerated people, and these messages could prompt children to report negativity when thinking about their incarcerated parents. On the other hand, children’s positivity toward close others is robust. Thus, when thinking about their incarcerated parents, children may report a great deal of positivity. Consistent with the latter possibility, children were more likely to describe their incarcerated parents using positive rather than negative terms. Moreover, children of incarcerated parents were more likely to agree that thinking about close others made them feel positive emotions than they were to agree that thinking about close others made them feel negative emotions. A similar pattern of results emerged among children whose parents were not incarcerated. These findings demonstrate the robustness of children’s positivity and can inform debates regarding contact between incarcerated parents and their children.     

Relational Control Patterns and Expressed Emotion in Families of Persons with Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorder

The process of relational control, that is, the negotiation of “who's in charge,” was examined in 40 families of persons with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Verbal interaction recorded during problem-solving tasks was coded with the Relational Control Coding System (RCCS). Patterning of message and response sequences was compared by diagnosis of the patient and level of expressed emotion (EE) of the family. Results indicated that patients with either diagnosis assert control more than their parents, that high-EE families compete for control more than low-EE families, and that families of bipolar patients compete for control whatever their EE status. The most dramatic differences in control patterns were in the dual-parent, high-EE families of persons with schizophrenia, in which the patients successfully challenged parents for control, and parents often yielded. It was concluded that EE reflects transactional processes in families that vary by diagnosis of the patient.     

Making sense of self-conscious emotion: linking theory of mind and emotion in children with autism

Self-conscious emotions such as embarrassment and shame are associated with 2 aspects of theory of mind (ToM): (a) the ability to understand that behavior has social consequences in the eyes of others and (b) an understanding of social norms violations. The present study aimed to link ToM with the recognition of self-conscious emotion. Children with and without autism identified facial expressions conscious of self-conscious and non-self-conscious emotions from photographs. ToM was also measured. Children with autism performed more poorly than comparison children at identifying self-conscious emotions, though they did not differ in the recognition of non-self-conscious emotions. When ToM ability was statistically controlled, group differences in the recognition of self-conscious emotion disappeared. Discussion focused on the links between ToM and self-conscious emotion.     

What ugly and beautiful photographs reveal about COVID-19 lockdown experiences,everyday aesthetics and photography aesthetics

Against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, which restricted our daily (visual) experiences, we asked people to take an ugly and beautiful photograph from within their homes. In total, 284 photographs (142 ugly and 142 beautiful) and accompanying statements were submitted and brought to light an intimate portrait of how participants were experiencing their (lockdown) home environment. Results revealed an aesthetic preference for (living) nature. Beauty and ugliness were also connected to good versus bad views, mess versus cosiness, unflattering versus flattering portraits and positive versus negative (COVID-19) emotions. In terms of photography strategies, editing and colour were important for beautiful photographs, whereas a lack of effort and sharpness showed up relatively more in ugly photographs. A follow-up study revealed that other viewers' (n = 86) aesthetic judgements of the photographs were largely in line with the original submissions, and confirmed several of the themes. Overall, our study provides a unique photographic window on our everyday aesthetic experiences at home during the COVID-19 lockdown.     

Narrative Intervention in Interethnic Conflict

This article is rooted in a narrative approach to interethnic conflict which treats them principally as competing stories. On this basis, we examine experimental strategies for narrative intervention in interethnic conflict and potential tools for their reconciliation. Narrative intervention is understood here as a set of actions to identify and disseminate narratives that can reduce negative emotions and attitudes and promote reconciliation between members of conflicting groups. In terms of new solutions, we suggest a method of “Progressive Narrative Transformation” whose key element is the establishment of common points of contact between conflicting narratives and their gradual transformation such that they may converge into a new narrative accepted and shared by both sides. We present different kinds of narratives to evaluate attitudes and emotions among Azerbaijanis, including people displaced from their homes by conflict. Analyzing responses to a “common suffering” narrative, we registered that individuals and groups are able to keep sympathetic attitudes, even implicitly, toward their opponents. Results might enable scholars in conflict resolution and reconciliation to learn how to develop strategies that take advantage of these attributes of the human mind.     

The Role of Depression, Shame-Proneness, and Guilt-Proneness in Predicting Criticism of Relatives Towards People With Bipolar Disorder

Expressed emotion (EE) has been associated with poor patient outcomes in many different psychiatric disorders. Given its robust association with relapse, EE has become a major target of family psychoeducational interventions. Most psychoeducational interventions to date have failed to change EE levels among families of those with bipolar disorder. Better intervention strategies, then, may depend on an increased understanding of the predictors of EE. Although EE has traditionally included many facets, criticism appears to be the most robust predictor of outcome within bipolar disorder. The present study tested three primary predictors of criticism among family members of people with bipolar disorder: shame-proneness, guilt-proneness, and depression. Depressive symptoms were significantly associated with EE. Discussion focuses on limitations and implications of the study and suggestions for future research.     

Acceptance and expressed emotion in Mexican American caregivers of relatives with schizophrenia

The relation between Expressed Emotion (EE) and caregiver acceptance was tested with the use of video-recorded interactions between 31 Mexican American family caregivers and their relatives with schizophrenia. Borrowing the concept from Integrative Behavioral Couple Therapy, acceptance was defined as caregiver's engagement with the ill relative along with low levels of expectations for behavioral change. Three aspects of caregiver acceptance were measured: global acceptance of the patient, unified detachment (i.e., nonblaming but engaged problem discussion), and low aversive responses to patient behavior (e.g., criticisms and demanding change). Relative to high EE caregivers, low EE caregivers were consistently more accepting of their ill relatives across the three measures of acceptance. Unified detachment was negatively associated with emotional overinvolvement and aversive responses were positively related to criticism. Warmth was not related to acceptance. The findings suggest that the study of acceptance in family caregivers is a heuristic avenue for future research due to its potential to shed light on specifically what family members do in caring for their ill relatives with schizophrenia.     

Children's Recognition of Emotional Facial Expressions Through Photographs and Drawings

The author's purpose was to examine children's recognition of emotional facial expressions, by comparing two types of stimulus: photographs and drawings. The author aimed to investigate whether drawings could be considered as a more evocative material than photographs, as a function of age and emotion. Five- and 7-year-old children were presented with photographs and drawings displaying facial expressions of 4 basic emotions (i.e., happiness, sadness, anger, and fear) and were asked to perform a matching task by pointing to the face corresponding to the target emotion labeled by the experimenter. The photographs we used were selected from the Radboud Faces Database and the drawings were designed on the basis of both the facial components involved in the expression of these emotions and the graphic cues children tend to use when asked to depict these emotions in their own drawings. Our results show that drawings are better recognized than photographs, for sadness, anger, and fear (with no difference for happiness, due to a ceiling effect). And that the difference between the 2 types of stimuli tends to be more important for 5-year-olds compared to 7-year-olds. These results are discussed in view of their implications, both for future research and for practical application.     

Communication deviance in families of schizophrenic and manic patients

Levels of communication deviance (CD) distinguish parents of schizophrenic patients from parents of nonpsychotic patients, but the prevalence of intrafamilial CD in other psychotic disorders has not been examined. Levels of CD were compared across biological parents of schizophrenic (n = 39) and bipolar manic (n = 16) patients and across patients themselves. CD ratings were based on Thematic Apperception Test protocols (parents only) and family interactions (parents and patients). Total levels of CD did not distinguish between groups of parents or patients. However, instances of odd word usage were more frequent among parents of manic patients than among parents of schizophrenic patients on both CD measures. Also, during the interaction task, odd word usage was more frequent among manic patients, whereas schizophrenic patients made more ambiguous references. Results suggest that high levels of intrafamilial CD are not unique to schizophrenia.     

The Self- and Other-Blame Scale (SOBS). The background and presentation of a new instrument for measuring blame in families

This article presents an account of the development and reliability of an observational instrument to measure blame: the Self- and Other-Blame Scale (SOBS). Fifty-one eating disordered patients together with eighty of their relatives were interviewed using a semi-structured family interview. Videotapes were assessed by two independent raters. Inter-rater reliability was good for both dimensions of SOBS: self-blame (SB) and other-blame (OB). One of the aims in developing the instrument was to be able to explore the relationship between self- and other-blame and criticism. Preliminary data are presented showing the distribution of SOBS scores within families rated as high or low on Expressed Emotion (EE). High EE was associated with high levels of self-blame in the parents, but not in the patients. Fathers in high EE families were more blaming of the patient than those in Low EE families but this was not true for mothers' levels of daughter blaming.     

La famille face aux violences extrafamiliales : émotions et victimisation dans la narration de parents et enfants en UMJ

The traumatic impact linked to the revelation of an assault, at the time of the announcement of the abuse, but also in the daily life of the family, disrupts the family system. This study aims to compare the perception of the parent and his child when the child has been the victim of a sexual, psychological and/or physical extra-family assault, particularly around emotions, guilt and the victimization experience. The exploratory research approach is through the qualitative analysis of the content of interviews conducted with parents and children received by the Medico-Judiciary Unit (UMJ) and the Youth Victims Reception Unit. (UAJV). Our results show the presence of a strong emotional state in parents that results in anger, as well as a difficulty in naming emotions in their children. Children have difficulty to express their emotions, but everyday life seems less difficult than parents. Despite the limitations due to the small sample and the conditions for data collection, recommendations for clinical treatment of families are proposed.