Assignment Code: MCFTE-001 / TMA-8 (1) / ASST-8(1) / 2022-23

Course Code: MCFTE-001

Assignment Name: Marital and Family Therapy and Counselling

Year: 2022 - 2023

Verification Status: Verified by Professor

Note: (i) Answer all the questions in both sections.

(ii) Answers to questions of Section “A” should not exceed 300 words each.

Section A - Descriptive Questions (10X3=30 marks)

Q 1. What is the purpose of an interview in the context of family therapy? As a counsellor/ family therapist, what basic guidelines will you follow when interviewing a couple?

Ans) In the context of family therapy, the purpose of the interview is to understand the family's perceptions, feelings, and experiences in order to develop a treatment plan that addresses their specific needs and goals.

During the interview, the therapist will typically ask questions about the family's history, relationships, and current challenges. This can include questions about communication patterns, family dynamics, conflict, and coping strategies. The therapist will also ask about the family's goals for therapy, and what they hope to achieve through the process.

The interview is an important component of the family therapy process, as it helps the therapist understand the family's unique situation and develop a tailored treatment plan that addresses their specific needs and goals. It can also help the family feel heard and understood and can create a foundation of trust and cooperation between the family and the therapist. Counsellors and family therapists should follow these guidelines when interviewing couples:

1. The first step is to create a safe and respectful environment in which the couple can openly discuss their experiences and feelings.

2. During the interview, ask open-ended questions that encourage the couple to share their experiences and feelings. This can help to build rapport, increase understanding, and identify key issues that need to be addressed in therapy.

3. Active listening is a key component of the interview process. This involves fully paying attention to what the couple is saying, acknowledging their feelings, and paraphrasing their comments to show understanding.

4. It is important to ensure that both partners have an opportunity to speak and share their perspectives. This can help to promote equality and understanding within the relationship.

5. If conflicts arise during the interview, it is important to address them in a neutral and respectful manner. This can involve facilitating dialogue, mediating disagreements, and promoting empathy and understanding between the partners.

6. The therapist must respect the couple's privacy and confidentiality. This includes not sharing information about the couple with others and taking appropriate measures to protect their personal information.

Q 2. With the help of examples, discuss the importance of conceptual skills for family assessment.

Ans) A counsellor or family therapist needs conceptual skills to understand a family's interactions. Counsellors and family therapists can read both spoken and unspoken messages. The counsellor or family therapist uses this to form a picture. Counsellors and family therapists use behaviour skills to get people to talk. The counsellor or family therapist must do all three for assessment to go well. Family counsellors must understand family dynamics. Theoretically understanding families is necessary before counselling. Then, they must absorb information. This will help them comprehend the family they are seeing. The counsellor or family therapist must use behavioural skills to gather information. Examples that demonstrate the importance of conceptual skills in family assessment:

1. Identifying patterns and themes: Conceptual skills allow the therapist to identify patterns and themes within the family's behaviour and interactions. For example, a therapist may observe that a family consistently argues about money, and that these arguments are rooted in deeper issues related to power and control.

2. Understanding the impact of family dynamics on individual behavior: Conceptual skills help the therapist understand how family dynamics and relationships impact individual behavior. For example, a child may act out in school due to conflict within the family or a lack of attention from a parent.

3. Seeing the family as a system: Conceptual skills enable the therapist to view the family as a system, in which individual behavior and relationships are interconnected. This can help the therapist identify how changes in one part of the system impact the rest of the family, and how to make changes that will benefit the whole family.

4. Assessing the impact of external factors: Conceptual skills allow the therapist to consider the impact of external factors, such as societal norms and cultural expectations, on the family. For example, a family may struggle with conflict due to differing expectations about gender roles, and the therapist can use conceptual skills to understand how these external factors impact the family and develop a treatment plan that addresses these issues.

Q 3. Describe, giving examples, common areas of marital enrichment.

Ans) The marital enrichment addresses the following areas:

1. Communication:

Good communication is a key aspect of a strong relationship. Marital enrichment programs may focus on improving communication skills, such as active listening, expressing feelings and needs, and resolving conflicts in a healthy way.

For example - ‘You never listen to me' can be rephrased as ‘I feel hurt when I say something important, and it seems like you may not be attending to what I say'. Couples can also learn to avoid threats and absolute words like "always" and "never". Understanding these bad habits helps spouses improve their communication.

2. Conflict resolution:

The couple learns to resolve conflicts by learning from each other rather than winning. The couple can learn to express their "wants" rather than "needs" and state them clearly. Spouses can calmly focus on the current issue and avoid past references to resolve it. They can find a solution by comparing pros and cons. The couple should "agree to disagree" and negotiate cooperatively.

For example - The counsellor must help a couple understand both sides of marriage decision-making if they complain. A neutral view of the couple's problem from the counsellor can also help. Then, the spouses can evaluate their decision-making and process styles and work together.

3. Intimacy:

Marital enrichment can help couples enhance their physical and emotional intimacy. This may involve exploring and expressing love, affection, and sexual desires, as well as developing a deeper emotional connection through shared experiences and activities.

For example - Intimacy—not just sexual—causes marital discord. Couples must learn physical and verbal intimacy. The marital enrichment counsellor should help spouses/couples understand these different behavioural expressions for themselves and their spouses and express their intimacy expectations and desires.

4. Commitment:

Strengthening the couple's marriage and commitment should help. Encourage spouses to discuss their expectations and how to meet them. To stay together, couples should forgive minor offences. South-Asian couples show their commitment by balancing work and family life and spending time together.

For example - Spouses believe marital commitment is natural. However, many couples report being unsure of their commitment to each other and the marriage. Spouses can learn to define and communicate their marital commitment. This boosts marital satisfaction and commitment.

Section B - Short Answer Type Questions

Q 1. Write short notes (in about 150 words each) on the following: (5x4=20 marks)

i) Active listening

Ans) Active listening is a communication technique that involves paying full attention to the person speaking, understanding their message, and providing appropriate feedback. The goal of active listening is to build rapport, increase understanding, and promote effective communication. Here are a few key elements of active listening:

1. Pay Attention: This involves giving the speaker your full attention, without distractions or interruptions. This includes maintaining eye contact, nodding, and avoiding distractions such as your phone or computer.

2. Show Interest: Demonstrating interest in what the speaker is saying by using verbal and nonverbal cues, such as nodding, smiling, and asking clarifying questions.

3. Reflect Understanding: This involves paraphrasing and summarizing what the speaker has said to show that you have understood their message.

4. Provide Feedback: Give appropriate and respectful feedback, such as acknowledging the speaker's feelings, sharing your own perspectives, and asking questions to clarify misunderstandings.

5. Avoid Interruptions: Allow the speaker to finish their thoughts without interrupting or finishing their sentences for them.

ii) Characteristics of a good self-report scale

Ans) A self-report scale is a tool used to measure an individual's attitudes, behaviours, or experiences. It is typically a questionnaire or survey that the person fills out themselves. Self-report scale to be effective and reliable should have certain characteristics.

1. Validity: The self-report scale should accurately measure what it is intended to measure. This means that the questions should be relevant and directly related to the construct being assessed.

2. Reliability: The self-report scale should produce consistent results when administered repeatedly to the same individual.

3. Objectivity: The questions should be free of bias and not influenced by the person administering the questionnaire. The scale should also not contain leading questions or assumptions.

4. Simplicity: The questions should be clear and easy to understand, and the scale should be easy to administer.

5. Privacy: The self-report scale should respect the privacy of the individuals being assessed and should not ask for sensitive or personal information that is not necessary for the assessment.

iii) Principles of change in EFT

Ans) The work with emotions freedom techniques (EFT) in therapy utilizes three principles of change.

The first principle is about becoming more aware of how you feel. Being aware of the emotions in words helps clients think about their experiences, give them new meanings, and produce new stories to explain them. Techniques are used, such as refocusing on inner experience, analysing expression, and making the experience stronger.

The second principle of change is about emotional arousal and how to control it. You can do this by using techniques like stepping back, accepting yourself, and soothing yourself. By learning how to be aware of and control your emotions and by letting yourself feel healthy primary emotions, you can change a distressing emotional experience.

The third and most important change principle is to change your feelings with your feelings and change bad emotional responses. Emotional intervention includes bringing up and amplifying emotions to get people to act in new ways, emotional restructuring (bringing up the network of responses that are causing problems so that the network can be restructured) and accessing state-dependent core beliefs.

iv) Precautions in sex therapy

Ans) Sex therapy should consider cultural differences, such as not recommending nudity if neither partner is comfortable with it. Some precautions that need to be taken:

1. The language the therapist uses should match that of the client. Colloquial language, which might not say what the person wants to say and might make either the client or the therapist feel uncomfortable, should be avoided.

2. Gender issues that are very deeply rooted and may make the patient feel bad don't need to be challenged.

3. If the last step of therapy isn't done, don't rush on to the next step.

4. When a couple has problems with their relationship that are bad enough to cause sexual problems, the relationship problems need to be fixed first.

5. To make sure that sex therapy is possible in terms of space, time, privacy, work pressure, other family members getting in the way, etc.

6. Make sure to get a detailed sexual history from both partners, including the things that led up to the problem and kept it going.