Marriage & Family Therapy Final Exam Review
Questions Fully Solved
Prescribing the Symptom - Answer A paradoxical technique that forces a patient to either give up a
symptom or to admit that it is under voluntary control
Restraining - Answer A strategic technique for overcoming resistance by suggesting that a family not
change
Family Ritual - Answer A descriptive term for redundant behavioral patterns
Circular Questioning - Answer A method of interviewing developed by the Milan Associates in which
questions are asked that highlight differences among family members
Directives - Answer Homework assignments designed to help families interrupt homeostatic patterns of
problem-maintaining behavior
Communications Theory - Answer The study of relationships in terms of the exchange of the verbal and
nonverbal messages
Double Bind - Answer A conflict created when a person receives contradictory messages on different
levels of abstraction in an important relationship and cannot leave or comment
Family Myths - Answer A set of beliefs based on a distortion of historical reality and shared by all family
members that help shape the rules governing family functioning
Hierarchical Structure - Answer Family functioning based on clear generational boundaries in which the
parents maintain control and authority
Function of the symptom - Answer the idea that symptoms are often ways to distract or protect family
members from threatening conflicts
, Paradox - Answer a self-contradictory statement based on a valid deduction from acceptable premises
Metacommunication - Answer every message has two levels, report and command;
metacommunication is the implied command or qualifying message
Invariant Prescription - Answer a technique developed by Mara Selvini Palazzoli in which parents are
directed to mysteriously sneak away together
ordeals - Answer a paradoxical intervention in which the client is directed to do something that is more
of a hardship than the symptom
positive connotation - Answer Selvini Palazzoli's technique of ascribing positive motives to family
behavior to promote family cohesion and avoid resistance to therapy
Intensity - Answer Minuchin's term for changing maladaptive transactions by using strong affect,
repeated intervention, or prolonged pressure
Structure - Answer Recurrent patterns of interaction that define and stabilize the shape of relationships
Enmeshment - Answer Minuchin's term for loss of autonomy due to a blurring of psychological
boundaries
Boundary - Answer A concept used in structural family therapy to describe emotional barriers that
protect and enhance the integrity of individuals, subsystems, and families
Enactment - Answer An interaction stimulated in structural family therapy to observe and then change
transactions that make up family structure
Subsystem - Answer Smaller units in families determined by generation, sex, or function
Accomodation - Answer elements of a system automatically adjust to coordinate their functioning;
people may have to work at it
Questions Fully Solved
Prescribing the Symptom - Answer A paradoxical technique that forces a patient to either give up a
symptom or to admit that it is under voluntary control
Restraining - Answer A strategic technique for overcoming resistance by suggesting that a family not
change
Family Ritual - Answer A descriptive term for redundant behavioral patterns
Circular Questioning - Answer A method of interviewing developed by the Milan Associates in which
questions are asked that highlight differences among family members
Directives - Answer Homework assignments designed to help families interrupt homeostatic patterns of
problem-maintaining behavior
Communications Theory - Answer The study of relationships in terms of the exchange of the verbal and
nonverbal messages
Double Bind - Answer A conflict created when a person receives contradictory messages on different
levels of abstraction in an important relationship and cannot leave or comment
Family Myths - Answer A set of beliefs based on a distortion of historical reality and shared by all family
members that help shape the rules governing family functioning
Hierarchical Structure - Answer Family functioning based on clear generational boundaries in which the
parents maintain control and authority
Function of the symptom - Answer the idea that symptoms are often ways to distract or protect family
members from threatening conflicts
, Paradox - Answer a self-contradictory statement based on a valid deduction from acceptable premises
Metacommunication - Answer every message has two levels, report and command;
metacommunication is the implied command or qualifying message
Invariant Prescription - Answer a technique developed by Mara Selvini Palazzoli in which parents are
directed to mysteriously sneak away together
ordeals - Answer a paradoxical intervention in which the client is directed to do something that is more
of a hardship than the symptom
positive connotation - Answer Selvini Palazzoli's technique of ascribing positive motives to family
behavior to promote family cohesion and avoid resistance to therapy
Intensity - Answer Minuchin's term for changing maladaptive transactions by using strong affect,
repeated intervention, or prolonged pressure
Structure - Answer Recurrent patterns of interaction that define and stabilize the shape of relationships
Enmeshment - Answer Minuchin's term for loss of autonomy due to a blurring of psychological
boundaries
Boundary - Answer A concept used in structural family therapy to describe emotional barriers that
protect and enhance the integrity of individuals, subsystems, and families
Enactment - Answer An interaction stimulated in structural family therapy to observe and then change
transactions that make up family structure
Subsystem - Answer Smaller units in families determined by generation, sex, or function
Accomodation - Answer elements of a system automatically adjust to coordinate their functioning;
people may have to work at it
