Presents a rationale for counseling couples in groups and illustrates how people can be taught to pair up with counselors in order to help their spouses rather than hurt them. Specific steps in forming and facilitating the group are presented. (BEF)

Suggests goal development as an effective way to set the stage for change with couples in groups. It helps to clarify issues, opens channels of communication, change behaviors in desired directions, and evaluate that change. Spouses, group members, and counselors can benefit from goal-setting. (Author/BEF)

Subjects were 27 married couples. The purposes of this study were: (a) to implement an interpersonal-skills training paradigm for training married individuals to exhibit increased self-disclosive behavior in their marital relationships; and (b) to determine the efficacy of experiential and modeling procedures in such training. (Author)

Used grounded theory to investigate women's experience of mothering. Conducted unstructured interviews with 11 mothers who had one or more children under 12 years old. Results focus on the psychological experience of mothering by considering the challenges and opportunities that childbirth and child rearing offer. Implications for marital…

Many current marriage and family trainers focus on issues related to counseling theory, special issues, and techniques. This article proposes an integrative, comprehensive model of instructional design, using concepts based in learning theory and development. When implemented, this model can provide a consistent, developmentally sensitive training…

The dual-career commuter couple is an alternative family configuration that continues to grow in number. Reviews the literature on dual-career commuter couples that has been published since 1982. Addresses the counseling issues of marital and family characteristics, commuting characteristics, and decision-making styles. Counseling implications and…

Reports on a clinical trial (N = 43 couples) that compares a hope-focused marital enrichment with empathy-centered forgiveness-based marital enrichment Hope-focused marital enrichment produced clinically relevant changes in marital communication. The forgiveness-based marital enrichment psychoeducational group is one of the first studies of…

Examined the process of marital disaffection to determine whether there is a pattern of sequential stages. Developed three-phase model of disaffection from the results of in-depth interviews with 49 highly disaffected spouses. Results suggest that marital therapy must involve different goals and interventions during each phase of disaffection to…

Responds to Cottone's "Defining the Psychomedical and Systemic Paradigms in Marital and Family Therapy." Claims acknowledgement of political and economic contexts of family therapy would be wonderful news if it betokened new sensitivity. Concludes that, although there are questions about family therapy's market share, there can be no…

Describes how Brigham Young University selects applicants to master's and doctoral programs in marriage and family therapy. Explains how traditional methods are augmented by use of highly reliable interaction-analysis instrument, a microcomputer, and large computer frame to analyze verbal interactions of applicants who conduct therapy with coached…

Examined perspective-taking differences among 259 individuals in high- and 43 individuals in low-adjustment marriages. Four hypotheses were tested that demonstrated that females in high- and low-adjustment marriages did not differ in their perspective-taking ability with others in general. Males and females in high- and low-adjustment groups did…

Describes investigation of ways in which combat decreases marital quality and stability. Results support three models: (1) factors propelling men into combat also make them poor marriage material; (2) combat causes problems that increase marital adversity; and (3) combat intensifies premilitary stress and antisocial behavior which then negatively…

Evaluated effectiveness of marital therapy designed to enhance intimacy through self-disclosure of personal constructs. Couples in therapy (n=22) and controls (n=19) showed significant reduction in symptoms of nonpsychotic emotional illness. Couples in therapy subjectively reported improvement. Found significant pattern of improvement for wives in…

Describes masters level course for marriage and family therapists that teaches systemic underpinnings of field while also addressing feminist critique of ideas. Notes goal of course is for students to understand and adopt gender sensitive view; students then have a yardstick as they study and evaluate marriage and family therapy theories, observe…

The use of early memories of the marriage relationship in counseling couples provides couples and therapists with insight into individual's convictions about present relationships. This is an extension of the use of early recollections in Adlerian therapy. The literature is reviewed and case examples are provided. (Author/EMK)