Family Therapy: Concepts, Process and Practice

This is a unique text that brings together theory, research evidence and clinical treatment of major problems in family life. It offers a critical evaluation of the major schools of family therapy, an integrative model for the practice of marital and family therapy, and examples of how this model may be used with a range of common child–focused and adult–focused problems. Findings from research on the effectiveness of family therapy are reviewed and the implications of these for evidence–based practice are outlined.

• Features chapter plans at the start of chapters and a summary of key points at the end
• Presents case examples throughout the text
• Provides suggestions for further reading in each chapter, plus a glossary of new terms in theoretical chapters
• Includes a section on resources for professionals training in family therapy

Advance students, trainees and practitioners of Family Therapy will welcome this comprehensive, critical and integrative textbook which offers a systematic account of the practice of family therapy and also the conceptual approaches which enlighten and guide best practice.

Family Therapy: Concepts, Process and Practice offers a critical evaluation of the major schools of family therapy, an integrative model for the practice of marital and family therapy, and examples of how this model may be used with a range of common child–focused and adult–focused problems.

Alan Carr examines findings from research on the effectiveness of family therapy and shows the implications for these for evidence–based practice . The author′s integrative approach to therapy focuses on both problems and exceptions to problems. It also addresses family behaviour patterns and beliefs systems and narratives, as well as the broader contextual factors, which make family problems,and their treatment, so complex. The book shows how this approach to family therapy may be used to address problems of childhood and adolescence such as child abuse, conduct problems and drug abuse, as well as problems of adulthood such as marital distress, anxiety, depression, alcohol abuse and schizophrenia.

Resources and aids for the student and professional are included throughout, including chapter plans and conclusions with a summary of key points, case examples, and suggestions for further reading, and the theoretical chapters include a glossary of new terms.

A section on information resources in family therapy is also included. This gives details on training tapes, assessment instruments, ethical guidelines and major journals in the field.

"In its comprehensiveness this volume will prove to be a valuable source book for beginners and experienced therapists alike. This book′s discussion of different schools of therapy is clear, concise and non–dogmatic. Its elaboration of a model of therapeutic skills development distils the best from a number of approaches and is based on sound common sense. Its discussion of family therapy with particular clinical groups is exceptionally helpful and appropriately pragmatic. The book is very good. It will serve its readers well.

Dr Eddy Street, Editor of the Journal of Family Therapy and University of Wales, UK.

"Alan Carr′s Family Therapy: Concepts, Process, and Practice, is the best and most comprehensive general family therapy text on the market. Its combination of sound academics and clinical material makes it useful as a graduate text, a professional review (for example for licensure), and as a clinical guide. The book provides a sound overall presentation of the history of the field and the theories of family therapy, offers an extremely useful research–based model of family therapy, and applies family therapy to the treatment of most of the common behaviour disorders. This is truly the general family therapy book of the new century".

Terry S. Trepper, Ph.D., Editor, Journal of Family Psychotherapy and Professor of Psychology and Marriage & Family Therapy, Purdue University, USA.

From the Foreword

"There are "two for the price of one" in this volume. The "first book" in this book is a highly readable introductory accounting of the major approaches to Family Therapy. the second "book–within–a–book" is Alan Carr′s singular contribution, The Formulation Model of family therapy treatment planning and intervention. This is an eminently teachable and learnable clinical model. I like to think of Carr′s book as news you can use, rather than views that confuse. It will be accessible on "the other side" of the Atlantic"

Alan S Gurman, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry and Director of Marital and Family Therapy Training, University of Wisconsin Medical School, USA.