Family Therapy: also known as couple and family therapy and family systems therapy, and earlier as marriage therapy -- a branch of psychotherapy working with families and couples to nurture change and foster growth; founded on the understanding that family relationships are significant factors in psychological health. Rather than simply trying to identify the cause, family therapy explores the systems of interaction between family members with a focus on understanding how patterns of interaction maintain the problem. Family therapy assumes the family as a whole is larger than the sum of its parts. It is a very effective support where families, or individuals within a family, experience or suffer serious psychological disorders (schizophrenia, addictions, eating disorders), interactional and transitional crises in a family’s life cycle (layoffs, divorce, death), or as a support for other therapeutic methods.
