Structural Family Therapy
An Effective Approach to Understanding and Healing Families
Family therapy is an effective way of helping families overcome psychological problems. Treating issues such as child problems, mental illness, eating disorders, conflict, and trauma are all possible for the trained family therapist. This therapy is extremely effective in overcoming many child and adolescent problems.
A well-respected early practitioner of family therapy, Salvador Minuchin, outlined a simple yet powerful approach to understanding and treating families in his 1974 book entitled Families and Family Therapy. This approach, known as Structural Family Therapy (SFT), is probably one of the most effective methods for understanding and healing troubled families.
Family Structure
In SFT, the life history of a family is viewed as a series of attempts at keeping a desirable balance between stability and change. The family is seen as one system that exists as a subset of larger social systems (such as communities and organizations) and contains smaller social subsystems (such as coalitions) within its boundary.
Family structure, subsystems, boundaries and how these inter-connect (meaning, their dynamics or rules of operation) are of particular significance in evaluating the functionality of family patterns.
Identifying the hierarchy among individuals, subsystems, coalitions, and the rules that govern all interactions is also part of understanding and helping a given family.
Family Patterns
According to Minuchin, it is through observing patterns of interaction repeated across time and situations that an understanding of roles, subsystems, coalitions, hierarchy, and rules ( family structure) can be achieved.
SFT outlines three basic subsystems:
- the spouse subsystem in which the couple relationship, its function, and roles are contained;
- the parental subsystem in which the parental relationship including its roles and function are maintained; and
- the sibling subsystem in which the children’s’ relationship, function, and roles are contained
A family may be comprised of these subsystems and operate either according to either generic (typical, expected, hierarchical) or idiosyncratic (irregular, unexpected) family rules.
A family operating under a generic hierarchical structure places the parents at the helm, in good communication overseeing the family together with mutually agreed rules and roles. A family operating under idiosyncratic structure might have the teenage children as a team running the family, making the rules. The latter is considered problematic even if it is an adaptation to parental incapacity.
Family Boundaries
According to SFT, understanding a family requires identifying the processes and boundaries that operate the subsystems and coalitions in that family. Minuchin defined three types of interpersonal boundaries (clear, rigid, or diffuse) that determine the overall ability of the family to adapt successfully to change:
- Clear boundaries around generic subsystems are ideal because they are firm yet flexible, permitting maximum adaptation to change.
- Rigid boundaries imply disengagement between family members or subsystems. The prevailing non-communicative hinders support and limits effective adaptation.
- Diffuse boundaries imply enmeshment where everyone is into everyone else’s business. In this case, no one and everyone is taking charge and effective guidance during times of change is impossible.
Either of the two latter boundary styles make it difficult to attain optimal adaptation because the family structure either lacks flexibility (it is too rigid) or has too much flexibility (it is too diffuse) to permit the successful re-adjustment of all the family members.
So, in addition to identifying the parts that make up the family’s whole, SFT defines the rules, processes, and their interconnections in ways that are more versus less functional. The goal of the family therapist is to help family members understand the current structure and the way it may be preventing effective adaptation. This is often sufficient for powerful, long-lasting change.
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