Preview

Family Systems

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1282 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Family Systems
Family Systems and Healthy Development
Liberty University
Family Systems and Healthy Development In today’s world, families are dynamic and interdependent systems. The developmental processes of the children in the family are deeply affected by how the family system operates. However, a family’s structure does not determine whether it is a healthy family system or not. Today, families consist of single parents, stepparents, divorced parents, remarried parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles. They are all able to contribute to a healthy functioning family system by meeting each family member’s needs and encouraging positive communication (Jamiolkowski, 2008). Unhealthy family systems have negative and possibly long-term effects on a child, both physically and emotionally. An unhealthy family system affects brain development and social development. Moreover, parents hold a particularly important part in their child’s spiritual development. When a family system lacks spiritual modeling, the children do not develop a spiritual relationship and lack religious meaning in their family life (Roehlkepartain, King, Wagener, Benson, 2006).
Healthy Family Systems
A healthy family system is a family unit in which each members has their needs met. These needs include safety, security, survival, love and belonging, as well as self-esteem and developmental skills. In a healthy family structure, the family members share a love for one another, respect each other and follow a set of rules that protect and maintain the welfare and development of each family member (Jamiolkowski, 2008).
A happy and healthy family system has open communication between family members. Opinions and ideas are encouraged. Since children in a healthy family system are encouraged to communicate their wants and needs, they are confident enough to speak up in family matters. This helps develop a positive and confident self-identity. The children in the family are



References: Feldman, R. S. (2014). Development across the life span (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson. Jamiolkowski, R.M. (2008). Coping in a Dysfunctional Family. New York: Rosen Pub. Group Roehlkepartain, King, Wagener, & Benson (2006). The handbook of spiritual development in    childhood and adolescence. Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publication.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    According to Bowen (1978), the purpose of the family systems theory is to establish a better level of differentiation with your family of origin, which means you have a better level of resolved emotional issues with them. The Differentiation of Self Scale is an important concept in this theory. The two extremes of this scale are people with low levels of differentiation or people with high levels of differentiation. People who are less differentiated from their family of origin have their identities intertwined with their family, whereas people who are more differentiated have their own sense of self.…

    • 746 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Social and Emotional: Family is a big influence in a child’s development. Parents play a big role by providing care and guidance for their development .Unfortunately some families cannot promote the…

    • 932 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    ‘If you have a Family, then you have life as a whole since the rise and fall of every individual depends solely on the family also the family forms the basic unit of our society; therefore our communities are only as healthy as our families. Let us look at the family as a body of individuals who seek for unity .Each individual member of a family has the need to be accepted not by, but as part of the whole body. Simply put, if a member of a healthy family feels needed, loved and safe, then there is a great job being done in keeping a family healthy and this could be considered as a family in a good general health…

    • 389 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The society that we live in has developed because of the human nature of having a family. A family is a important figure in a persons life, but the said family can also be a detrimental to a persons health. One example of this is in the book A Place Where the Sea Remembers. Family figures are very important to a developing child and to the parents.…

    • 515 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Structural Family Theory

    • 829 Words
    • 4 Pages

    133), and like other systems theorists, he believed that a family’s contexts, including internal and external stressors, were more important than an individual family member’s symptoms (M. Reed, personal communication, July 28, 2015). According to structural theory, symptoms are best understood in the context of family transactional patterns as members respond to stressors: a healthy family maintains a balance between continuity and flexibility as it reorganizes itself in response to developmental and situational changes; a dysfunctional family is inflexible and unable to adjust obsolete transactional patterns in response to change (Goldenberg & Goldenberg, 2013, p.…

    • 829 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Family stability can be described in many ways. Traditionally it is defined in terms family structure (for example, single parenthood, extended families, working families, foster care etc) Exploring the various family processes that pertain to stability may be a useful means of understanding the specific characteristics of family stability that support healthy child development. For example, parental mental health, stable relationships among caregivers, and positive parenting are cited as markers of family stability. Characteristics of the home environment, such as warmth, emotional availability, stimulation, family cohesion, and day-to-day activities, have also been implicated in the notion of family stability. Children who experience family stability have caregivers who remain constant, consistent, and connected to them over time; caregivers who are mentally healthy and engage in appropriate parenting practices; a cohesive, supportive, and flexible family system; and a nurturing and stimulating home environment.…

    • 1537 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    References: Feldman, R. S. (2014). Development across the life span (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ:…

    • 563 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Structural family theory

    • 479 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Family dysfunction results from a combination of stress and failure to realign themselves to cope with it. Stressors may be environmental (a parent is laid off, the family moves) or developmental (a child reaches adolescence, parents retire). The family’s failure to handle adversity may be due to flaws in their structure or merely to their inability to adjust to changed circumstances. All families face situations that stress the system. Although, there is no clear dividing line between healthy and unhealthy families, healthy families modify their structure to accommodate to changed circumstances, whereas dysfunctional families increase the rigidity of structures that are no longer effective. Structural assessments take into account both the problem the family presents and the structural dynamics they display. And they include all family members (Nichols & Schwartz, 2004).…

    • 479 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Family Systems Theory

    • 1382 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Similarly, the concept of gift giving and receiving can lead to ethical concerns where some counselors and clients are not open to accepting gifts of any sort. Depending on cultural values, some clients might view counselors’ rejection of gifts as being disrespectful and may tarnish the counseling relationship that was built.…

    • 1382 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Family Theory Paper

    • 1487 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Attempting to understand family life can be done through many different perspectives. The most central theory in the study of family sciences is the Family Systems Theory. The perspective of Family Systems Theory can be summarized through the phrase “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts”. Family Systems Theory attempts to understand the series of connections between the individual parts of a family and how these interactions and connections affect the family as a whole. A family system is made up of the connections between individuals in a family. Family systems interactions with outside systems determine the openness and permeability of the boundaries surrounding a family system. The goals of a family system affect the behaviors and patterns that become the family structure. Subsystems within the family interact with each other and affect the relationships between individuals. Of course family units are not static and therefore the rules, traditions, and day-to-day behavior of a family system must constantly be changing in order to keep the course of reaching their goals in equilibrium. Family systems are united in their desire to achieve goals formed from a [unified] family paradigm or ideal. In this paper I will use family systems theory to interpret how my own family goals motivate the structures and processes that make up our family system. Family Systems Theory allows me to understand my family’s processes as working towards the family goals to have fun, create togetherness, work together towards accomplishment, and be spiritually strong.…

    • 1487 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Family Health Assessment

    • 2175 Words
    • 9 Pages

    When it comes to defining family many people have many different ways to define family because it means something different to everyone. Overtime the typically family has changed and is much more diverse when it comes to the individuals that make up the family because of beliefs and values. The way that it is defined currently is a family is a set of interacting individual is related by blood, marriage, cohabitation, or adoption who interdependently perform relevant functions by fulfilling expected roles (Edelman & Mandel, 2012). When it comes to health promotion and disease prevention the family is the primary source in which individuals learn how to deal with these issues and influence the individual. When it comes to family care and support the best approach is to make it as family centered as possible. According to Gordon, functional health patterns encompass human growth and development, represents bio psychosocial expressions of the whole person, and allow for developmental assessment of client-environment interaction (Krozy & McCarthy, 2002).…

    • 2175 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    References: Feldman, R. S. (2014). Development across the life span (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.…

    • 954 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    -To increase engagement with the family/children/neighbor and work to strengthen the existing social support. Families have viable, complex and supportive exchange and caregiving pattern. Whenever one member of a family is in trouble, all are in trouble. Therefore, the practitioner should assess and treat the family as an organisational structure that is a functioning whole within a societal context and thus system theory is an integrating tool that is essential to accomplish this end (Greene,…

    • 1426 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Feldman, R. S. (2011). Development across the life span. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.…

    • 4355 Words
    • 18 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Feldman, R. S. (2014). Development across the life span (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ:…

    • 2762 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays