Search

Emotion regulation is central in many therapy models, including couple and family therapy models. This article draws on poststructuralist governmentality studies and processual affect theory to offer insight into how the therapeutic concept of emotion regulation may reflect and support neoliberal affective forms of self‐governance. We suggest that couple and family therapy—through using professional discourses and affect‐oriented techniques or interventions—may be another site wherein neoliberal governmentality is implemented and extended in contemporary westernized neoliberalized societies. In facilitating emotion regulation, we argue that there is a risk that therapists may implicitly promote a neoliberal worldview that encourages clients to mobilize neoliberal techniques to become self‐improving, entrepreneurial subjects, responsible for their happiness and well‐being. Conditions of precarity associated with individualist, neoliberal capitalist ideologies and policies (e.g., unemployment, job insecurity, forced migration, wealth inequalities, mass incarceration, social isolation) generate emotional burdens for people to manage that professional techniques or interventions may normalize as clients' self‐management tasks. We theorize emotion regulation as an affective governmentality tactic of power and suggest that couple and family therapy can offer points of resistance to individualization and responsibilization and opportunities for creating or affirming alternative subjectivities and affectivities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on the gendered division of household work in western political economies often neglects its emotional dimensions. This conceptual paper draws on concepts of emotion work and feminist care ethics to explore gendered and intersecting divisions of emotions and emotional work in couple relationships and their implications for couple therapy. Although emotion work has been studied in workplace settings, less attention has been paid to inequalities in the privatized realm of interpersonal relationships, including romantic and filial ones. Women and feminine partners' culturally presumed expertise in emotions typically positions them as carrying primary responsibility for managing emotions in intimate relationships. Couple therapy is an important site of interaction that can both support and, potentially, disrupt the invisibility and gendering of emotion work in intimate relationships, thus shedding light on recurring patterns of women's subordination and exploitation. We conclude by advancing suggestions for addressing gendered and intersectional dimensions of emotion work in therapy practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is the deliberate damage of bodily tissue which occurs without suicidal intent. NSSI is a common behavior among young people and a frequent focus in clinical practice. Many models of the aetiology and maintenance of NSSI are focused on emotion regulation. The role that cognition plays in the behavior is less well understood. We used thematic analysis to explore how individuals explain or attribute their engagement in NSSI. The study identified several ways of thinking that may be play a role in why people engage in NSSI. Specifically, five themes were generated: Limited Controllability, Benefits, Limited Resources, Stability, and Changing Meaning and Significance. Implications for research and practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Child mental health assessments are complex and involve the analysis of data from multiple sources to inform treatment decisions. Question sequences are central to mental health assessments; however, little research has examined the functions of questions in child mental health interactions, particularly questions that aim to elicit information from children that might be used to inform diagnosis and treatment. In this study, we utilize a large corpus of video-recorded child mental health assessments to examine the use and function of a particular kind of wh-question—circular questions—that is, questions that seek clients' views on other family members' feelings, actions, and thoughts. Using conversation analysis, we identified three "broad" functions of circular questions in child mental health assessment. Our findings provide clinicians with clinically relevant examples for using circular questions to more fully involve children in the assessment process and acquire valuable information for diagnosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Physical activity is generally regarded as imperative to good health. Given the many health benefits of physical activity and the inclusion of muscle-strengthening physical activity (MSPA) in public health guidelines, an understanding of how romantic partners might foster or inhibit MSPA may be useful in promoting health and relationship quality. This study qualitatively explored how participants (young adults in long-term, dyadic heterosexual relationships) make sense of their partner's engagement in MSPA. The data came from the social media platform Reddit. The thematic analysis suggested five ways in which participants made meaning about MSPA in the context of their romantic relationships. Specifically, participants described experiencing conflict around partner engagement in MSPA, dissatisfaction with the partner's body, concern for partner's health, insecurity in response to physical changes in the partner, and concerns related to the partner balancing responsibilities and commitments. Limitations and implications of the analysis are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Counselling & Psychotherapy / Revue Canadienne de Counseling et de Psychothérapie is the property of Canadian Counselling & Psychotherapy Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

A paradigmatic shift toward postmodern, collaborative practice in family therapy raises questions about how therapists can use professional authority to facilitate change and how clients can assert their knowledge and agency. We used conversation analysis to investigate how the authority to know and to determine here-and-now action (i.e., who does what, and how, in therapy) was negotiated and accomplished in 10 sessions of emotion-focused therapy involving chair work. Therapists were observed to rely on a particular interactional sequence structure: stepwise entry into a directive, in which directives were preceded by a question-answer sequence. We show how instances where clients' views were elicited prior to the delivery of a directive resulted in different interactional consequences from instances where therapists straightforwardly directed clients to perform some action. The study offers evidence concerning how therapists can facilitate chair work collaboratively and responsively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although minimization of blaming and denials of responsibility are key components of many approaches to couple therapy, there has been little attention paid to how partners absolve themselves of responsibility and counter attributions of blame. In this study, we used thematic analysis to examine 40 videorecorded sessions of couple therapy. The study shows that injuring partners denied responsibility for harm by shifting it to sources outside of themselves, thereby justifying their own actions and minimizing negative consequences. More subtle ways of deflecting responsibility—partial or qualified admission of fault—were also observed. The implications for couple therapy are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Couple therapy and related literature has problematized men's emotional inexpressiveness as constraining for men and as contributing to men's privileged and dominating position vis‐à‐vis women. Fostering men's emotionality in and outside of therapy has been proposed as a way to improve men's well‐being and relationships and promote gender equality. Critical masculinity scholars have noted that many men now enact vulnerable ("softer") and emotional forms of masculinity. Yet, there is lack of insight into how such enactment may intersect with gender inequality. This article presents a critical thematic analysis of 30 transcribed videotaped couple therapy sessions focusing on the performance of men's affective masculinities and the political dimensions of men's increasing emotionality within couple therapy. The study shows that vulnerable masculinities, although argued as bearing the potential to foster relational and social change, may also obscure continuing commitment to dominant masculinity norms. Implications for practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we systematically and critically review the past decade of empirical psychological research (n = 132) on masculinity and violence against women (VAW) to demonstrate an overreliance on individualist and "culturalist" (or culturally essentialist) approaches to theorizing and studying masculinity. Individualist and essentialist approaches assume that masculinity is something men are or possess based on the extent to which they identify with, conform to, or approve of traits or norms (pre)deemed masculine. We argue that these approaches cannot explain why it is men who overwhelmingly practice VAW, or account for the contextual, material, and structural power asymmetries that create conditions for gendered violence. We demonstrate the potentiality of formulations of masculinity (structuralist, poststructuralist, and especially processual) for ending VAW that move beyond individualism and essentialism. While they have helpfully situated masculinity within wider systemic forces, structuralist approaches often overlook how structures operate in constituting masculinities; and they impose false unity by theorizing masculinity through a homogenizing categorical lens. Poststructuralist approaches have accounted for fluidity in the complex construction of masculine subjects, but not for sociomaterial forces, or systemic inequities and modes of structural violence (e.g., neoliberalism, colonialism) that coproduce VAW. We argue that processual approaches, not yet mobilized in the empirical psychological masculinity and VAW literature, offer a particularly productive new way forward in that they map how the individual and social intertwine. We outline implications for theory, research, and praxis. Public Significance Statement: Psychologists tend to conceptualize and study masculinity as something that men are or possess, leaving undertheorized how the individual and sociomaterial intertwine in explaining violence. New approaches that understand and study masculinity as constantly shifting with the social and material world will help us better understand and disrupt the links between masculinity and violence against women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Psychotherapy might be seen as a site of reproduction of neoliberal capitalist ideology. Unpacking therapeutic discourse affords the opportunity to explore neoliberalism in operation. We present a theoretical case for exploring neoliberalism in the therapeutic context. Specifically, we identify and illustrate three neoliberal discourses: the normal self, the improving self, and the productive self. We discuss how therapists might orient to these discourses and identify ways to challenge neoliberal ideology. Doing so will not dismantle power systems that yield oppression; however, it may help clients reclaim and negotiate preferred subjectivities within this system while also working toward broader social justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]