family and child

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Psych 441

UMass Boston

Spring 2022

Professor Peggy Vaughan

Week 1

Defining and Studying Families

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� Welcome and overview of class

� Expectations and your role in the class: health and safety considerations

� Preview of syllabus and attendance/participation.

� Discussion of overarching concepts, questions and approaches. � Reliance on the case study approach for thinking of children in

the family context � Role of course theory and vocabulary: Family as a system and

family concepts (structure, processes, themes, rituals, tasks, boundaries, resilience, etc.).

� Family worksheet: Defining family and families;

� Family structure and equations

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§ Actively listen

§ Focus on health and safety § Bring your voice and ideas into the “room”

§ Ask questions

§ Engage with others in breakout groups § Share perspectives and experiences

§ Develop ideas; deepen and expand your vocabulary

§ Be skeptical; write and think critically

§ Analyze cases, interventions, theories and research

§ Review theories, models and, research and family programs

§ Consider all viewpoints § Share and discuss current events and stories that resonate with Family and

Child Psychology

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§ Recommended Class Text: E-Book is on Reserve via Healey Library § F. Walsh, Ed. (2015). Normal Family Processes: Growing

Diversity and Complexity. Some chapters will be required, but you can access via Healey or the class Blackboard.

§ Note a supplemental text will be referred to in class. § Handbook of Family Theories: A Content-Based Approach. M.A. Fine,

M.A. Fine & F.M. Fincham, Eds.(2013). This is an e-book on reserve via Healey Library

§ Other required and recommended articles, book chapters, and readings will be posted and available on the class Blackboard site

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� Your definition of family and your family themes � Review of course theory, models, and key vocabulary in the study

of families. � The concept of family well being

� The continuously “new normal” for families and family processes � The realities of Covid-19 and systemic and other forms of

racism, oppression and marginalization.

� Ecological theory and ecocultural theory: the child in context; neurobiology and family processes.

� Family Research: Studying families/family psychology in the context of diversity and will full representation of lived the the broader field of psychology.

� Research trends: family structure

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� Theory: A set of hypotheses or assumptions about behavior or development. In research these help to define, describe and predict behavior. In the study of children and families, areas of focus can be: � Child and family interactions and processes � Influences on development

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Why will we focus on

theories as well as the growing diversity and complexity?

Your ideas?

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� Overarching Theories or Models: Presenting a set of diverse guiding theories � Ecological and Ecocultural/Sociocultural Theories � Ethnotheories and the Developmental Niche � Indigenous theories � Sociohistorical views � Psychodynamic views � Theories assists with analyzing, discussing and developing

deeper understandings of family life and family processes.

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§ What is family well-being?

§ What are we learning in real time about family life and the capacity to adapt in 2022 and going forward?

§ How important are safety and survival?

§ Who are the helpers and who has given support to families?

§ How are children being impacted both short and long term?

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§ A framework for understanding how various aspects of a culture guide the developmental process by focusing in on the child as the unit of analysis within his or her unique sociocultural context.

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§ The social construction of family normality or the typical functional family: A broad spectrum

§ Varied conceptions based on culture, subjective/personal experience and/or professional or research focus.

§ “Normal” families from a set of perspectives; § Normal as problem-free (asymptomatic)

§ Normal as average § Normal as healthy § Normal in relation to basic transactional processes in the family

system

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§ Psychologists and providers can provide education and guidance to couples and families, reassurance that there are multiple “right” ways to raise children (and some wrong ways too) and assistance in finding a workable balance for their particular family given their specific environmental circumstances.

§ Psychologists and providers who work with postmodern diverse families may also increase their client’s comfort and trust with simple vocabulary substitutions that replace terms like “normal” or “pathological” with “functional” or “unworkable.”

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§ As a result of unprecedented social changes fueled by rapid technological advances, the increasing diversity and complexity of families represent a new “normal,” whereby the contemporary American family is a “locus not of residence, but of meaning and relationship” (Walsh, 2012, 2015).

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§ The magnitude of the sociocultural changes in recent decades, however, seem to require a more extensive paradigm shift that considers multiple levels of the family system and acknowledges that healthy functioning will depend fundamentally on what works in the context of larger societal and cultural systems the family lives in.

§ How relevant are the models and theories? Are some aspects of family timeless?

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� Varied family forms

� Varied gender roles and relationships

� Growing cultural diversity; multicultural society

� Increasing socioeconomic disparity, even prior to the pandemic

� Refugee and immigrant families - addressing trauma and supporting well-being

� Varying work and parenting roles

� Varying and expanded family life course

� Varying experiences in terms of bias and discrimination

� Protective and safety measures as a focus

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§ https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/22883775/afghan- refugee-private-sponsorship

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§ Within a family-systems framework, families are defined as complex structures consisting of an interdependent group of individuals who (1) have a shared sense of history; (2) share emotional ties to one another; and (3) devise strategies for meeting the needs of individual family members and the group as a whole.

(Anderson and Sabatelli, 2011, p.3)

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� Themes are those elements of family experience that become the organizing principles of family life, including both conscious and unconscious elements as well as intellectual (attitudes, beliefs, values) and emotional aspects. � Themes are linked to identity tasks as well as family and ethnic

cultural heritage. � They are also linked to expectations of how family members are

supposed to interact with each other.

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� Defining families, family life and family diversity

� Family structure; family processes; the family as a system

� Well-being of children in the family context; role of prevention and intervention

� Developmental stages of family including childhood periods and the stages of parenting

� Family life cycle; processes over time: Focus on change, transition, stress, adaptation, resilience

� Family intergenerational themes

� Family case histories, issues, and special topics

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� What types of family difficulties, strengths, and questions might one study in the field of family psychology and family science?

� Is it possible to study “the family” and the child in the family context without bringing a bias to that endeavor?

� What is reflected in the idea that in U.S. society and many other societies and cultures have broadened and extended the acceptance of partner identities and roles for coupling, marriage and parenting?

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� What do we mean by family processes? How do we measure and conduct research about these processes?

� What do we mean when we say that we are defining and redefining family in terms of function and/or in terms of structure?

� Why do family psychology students, psychologists, providers, and broader communities care about families?

� How can we mindfully think about culture and diversity in families and family life?

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§ Child Perspectives – the daily life of a child in the family context. § Care-receiving, guidance, protection, learning rituals, and rules,

and family beliefs, etc.

§ Caregiver Perspectives – the daily life of the family § Caregiving, guiding, providing protection, and monitoring

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� Can children experience stress?

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§ Support from neuroscience research § providing supportive and positive conditions for early

childhood development is more effective and less costly than attempting to address the consequences of early adversity later.

§ Effective policies and programs… § identify and support children and families who are

most at risk for early intervention § reduce or avoid the need for more costly and less

effective remediation and support programs down the road § Source: Center on the Developing Child: Harvard University

http://developingchild.harvard.edu/

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n Learning how to cope with adversity is an important part of healthy child development.

n When we are threatened, our bodies activate a variety of physiological responses n increases in heart rate, blood pressure, and stress hormones such

as cortisol.

n Chronic stress can be toxic to developing brains n When strong, frequent, or prolonged adverse experiences such as

extreme poverty or repeated abuse are experienced without adult support, stress becomes toxic.

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§ Science shows that providing stable, responsive, nurturing relationships in the earliest years of life can prevent or even reverse the damaging effects of early life stress, with lifelong benefits for learning, behavior, and health.

Dr. Jack Shonkoff: Center for the Developing Child

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§ Critical importance of early care and intervention as needed for healthy development and positive outcomes.

§ Impact of stress on the child: neurologically and developmentally

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§ Family processes are influenced by our physiology and our neurobiology: the areas that we focus on are the body, the brain, relationships, and context.

§ Essentially, neuroscience, specifically “interpersonal neurobiology” shows that we are wired for relationships and connections.

§ Social rejection, loneliness, stress and trauma impact the brain and the immune system.

§ Emotion and cognition are essential to understand others and the human experience.

§ Resonance, empathy and attachment are influenced by hormones such as oxytocin.

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§ The science of behavior and the mind. § Behavior: observable actions of a person or an animal. § Mind: individual’s sensations, perceptions, memories, thoughts,

dreams, motives, emotional feelings and other subjective experiences.

§ Science: all attempts to study and answer through the systematic collection and logical analysis of objectively observable data.

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§ A field or discipline

§ As a field of research, psychology is primarily interested in the study of normal behavior.

§ As a practice or profession psychology requires specialized training linked to understanding behavior and treating or helping those in need.

§ Developmental and family psychology: focused on the behavior and needs of children and families § Child as part of a developing system

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§ Family Psychology: Division 45 of the American Psychological Association (APA). § The Society for Family Psychology is an APA division that provides a

home for psychologists interested in families in their many forms. Clinical, scientific, educational, and public policy perspectives are well represented. (Source: apa.org)

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§ Family Psychology Students § learn methods for how to care for and treat families as well as the

children and individuals within the family context; focus on safety and well-being in the context of family life.

§ acquire skills and knowledge about theories and topic areas such as family rituals and parenting, family and couples therapy, and family conflict and violence.

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Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Theory

and Approach

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§ In the United States, it is now possible for a person eighteen years of age, female as well as male, to graduate from high school, college, or university without ever having cared for, or even held, a baby; without ever having comforted or assisted another human being who really needed help. . . . No society can long sustain itself unless its members have learned the sensitivities, motivations, and skills involved in assisting and caring for other human beings.

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§ Micro: Family, child care and school settings

§ Meso: The Child’s neighborhoods and communities; recreational and other settings such as religious, medical, social service settings

§ Exo: Encompasses media, government, industry, and the parental workplace.

§ Macro: Included the dominant societal policies and ideologies that impact home and community

§ Chrono: Includes the environmental events and transitions that occur throughout a child's life, including any sociohistorical events.

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§ Child-centered theories; family theories § Family also has a developmental pathway § Intergenerational and mutigenerational § Ecological view has the child at center influenced by

systems at various levels. § Micro, Exo, Meso, Macro, Chrono

§ Bioecological Model: Adaptation of Bronfenbrenner’s original model: a theoretical model of gene– environment interactions in human development. (Proposed by Urie Bronfenbrenner and Stephen J. Ceci)

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� Parents/caregivers use caregiving practices that evolve from their cultural heritage and beliefs.

� Caregivers adapt to changing social practices and economic demands that push into the family from the outside environment.

� Children gain social and other competencies by participating in daily routines structured by adults within the home.

(Super & Harkness, 2002; Weisner, 2005).

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§ Parent-child relationships: through infancy, early and middle childhood and into adolescence

§ Sibling relationships and family life

§ Attachments in the family system context

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§ Discussion of essential concepts and family vocabulary for the first paper

§ Family research methods and strategies § Family theories and models

§ Discussion of overarching family theories; role of intergenerational transmission, societal ideas on families; and parental and child bidirectional influences

§ Note: we will review formats for brief clinical and other case study discussions.

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