Critical Analysis of Solution-Focused and Mindfulness Therapies

This essay provides a comprehensive analysis of family and couple counseling, focusing on two key therapeutic approaches: solution-focused brief therapy and mindfulness therapy, both rooted in cognitive behavioral therapy. The introduction highlights the growing significance of these therapies in fostering healthy relationships and addressing relational challenges. The essay then delves into the theoretical underpinnings of each approach, drawing connections to structural family theories and cognitive behavior theories. It examines the therapeutic goals, processes of change, and provides recent research evidence supporting the efficacy of these therapies, including their applications in addressing issues like autism, medical settings, female stress, and dementia. Furthermore, the essay offers recommendations for utilizing these therapies in various settings, such as financial difficulties, addiction, intercultural marriages, and military families. The conclusion underscores the effectiveness of both solution-focused and mindfulness therapies, stemming from family structural and cognitive behavioral theories, respectively.

Running head: FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 1
Family and Couple Counseling
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 2
Family and Couple Counseling
Introduction
Family and couple counseling has become a major concern today and different
therapeutic approaches are in use which helps the families and couples to develop those
behaviors which are appropriate. These therapies also help in the development of good relations
and remove all the hurdles which deteriorate the relations. Different approaches are also
integrated to get better clinical results (Devlin, et al., 2019). This essay sheds light on the
detailed critical analysis of the solution-focused brief therapy and mindfulness therapy under
cognitive behavior therapy. Recent theoretical and research pieces of evidence along with the
recommendations to use these therapies are also provided. “Family and couple counseling
therapies help in the improvement of clinical results as these therapies are aimed to stabilize and
regulate the normal thinking and act patterns of the individuals in family and couple settings”.
Explanation
Therapeutic Approaches
Solution Focused Brief Therapy helps the individuals to concentrate on the current and
future and while considering this, they make a change in their thoughts and actions by setting
goals to change themselves positively. No experiences or learning from the past is used (Walter
& Peller, 2013).
Mindfulness-based on cognitive behavioral therapy depends on the positive thoughts and
actions and helps the persons to manage their feelings and views towards life incidents and they
become able to use mindfulness to combat the negative feelings. Hence, individuals become
better able to get rid of the stressful thoughts in their lives (Dobson & Dozois, 2019).

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 3
Theories informing the Development of the Approaches
Structural Family Theories give rise to Solution Focused Brief Therapy. A structural
Family Therapy is the one in which a family is guided and helped through a pattern which
changes the structure of the family and does not alter the family members. This approach is used
to make the relationships normal and healthy rather than the distorted ones. The whole family is
focused as a unit and no person is aimed to be changed or mold his behavior because the overall
collaboration of the family is aimed to be enhanced (Draper, 2018).
Cognitive Behavior Theories give rise to mindfulness therapies and one becomes able to
differentiate between the positive and negative emotions and also learns how to deal with the
right kind of emotions to be normal in life (Segal & Teasdale, 2018).
Couples use mindfulness to transform themselves from the aggressive to the calmest ones
and this transformation helps them to develop a highly coherent family structure and they get to
know each other. They understand the problems and issues of the other family members and do
not feel overwhelmed in those situations where they are prone to stress. They use CBT and
mindfulness helps them to be calm and happier. Hence, CBT helps to reduce stress in the
relationships among family members and couples (Murray, 2019).
Therapeutic Goals
The goals of Solution Focused Brief Therapy are to seek a solution for a particular
problem which a family is facing. Then a particular solution to that problem is used to address
the problem and to make the relations smooth. Its main goal is to shape the behaviors of the
particular family members and they perform desired behaviors in a particular setting and they
learn how to behave in a particular setting to make the interpersonal relationships better. Hence,
the foals of the Solution Focused Brief Therapy are to seek short term quick solutions to the

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 4
problems in the present and this tends to develop long term commitment of the family roles in
which positivity and the solutions which are used in the present are also learned and practiced in
the future (Parry, 2019).
The goals of the mindfulness therapy are to combat with the depressive thoughts and to
overcome the problems that are encountered in the daily life matters and addresses even those
depressions which show high resistance while giving treatment to the patients with depression
(Sipe & Eisendrath, 2012).
Mindfulness therapies are used in the counseling of families and couples because long
term relationships are required to be developed among the family members and this therapy
promotes positive thinking and reduces negativity to strengthen the thoughts and actions of the
family members and they live a normal pattern of life. This is based on the long-term positive
relationships of the family and they focus their future to be happy and stress-free (Gehart, 2013).
Therapeutic Processes of Change
The therapeutic process of change in the case of Solution Focused Brief Therapy are
aimed to make the overall processes of communication better and hence the families develop
better emotional, social, interpersonal and purpose-built goals and the changes are seen as a
result among the family members (Kim, Jordan, Franklin & Froerer, 2019).
The therapeutic process of change is seen in mindfulness therapy when cognition and
behavior are involved. In those circumstances, when the families are facing severe problems,
they are dealt with the mindfulness therapy. They understand the whole situations and then they
are made ready to face the realities. Then, their actions are directed according to the thought
patterns which have been developed. These processes of change are majorly seen in the families
when a family member is facing a health, illness or any such issue in the family (Rolland, 2019).

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 5
Theoretical and Research Evidence for Couples and Family Counseling
Recent research suggests the efficacy of the Solution Focused Brief therapy as it is used
to counsel those parents who have a kid with autism. This happens when parents raise a kid with
this disease and their marital relationships become at stake because they feel stressed and the
normal course of living gets affected because the kid needs additional attention and hence, the
couple goes through mental and physical stress. The lack in the mental and physical growth of
the kid affects the parents and to cater to this problem, couples have started taking the help of
professionals and the use of therapeutic interventions in the clinical practices is helping them.
Solution Focused Brief Therapy has been effective in this regard and now the couples are taking
advantage of this therapeutic approach to solve the present problem and make themselves able to
deal with this problem in the coming future (Turns, et al., 2019).
Another research focuses that Solution Focused Brief therapy is highly appreciated and
used widely among the medical settings. This therapy is used when medical issues are seen and
to deal with the problems, the specific issue is measured and focused. This is done to make the
families and to provide counseling to the family members who go through emotional and mental
fatigue. Their roles are performed as stress bearers and if the Solution Focused Brief therapy is
provided as a counseling tool, they feel far better than before and are better able to handle the
situations in which their family members are going through certain issues, This not only focuses
on the current problem, but family members also develop insights about the future and the future
results become known to them as they are prepared for the future as well through the use of
Solution Focused Brief therapy (Sung, Mayo & Witting, 2018).

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 6
According to recent research, Mindfulness therapy is effective and the efficacy is seen
when females experience conflicts with their partners during intimacy and their male partners
use violence and the stress among these females is prevalent. To make them stable in their
relationships and to remove the stress levels, the women go through psychological interventions
and the mindfulness therapy highlights all those issues which are to be addressed. This study
suggests that this mindfulness therapy has reduced the outcomes of the female stress and they
can be out of the problematic situations by focusing on the cognitive patterns and to shape their
behaviors according to the thoughts which come to them positively if they use mindfulness
therapy (Tan, 2018).
The importance and efficacy of mindfulness therapy are highlighted through another
recent research. It has been found out that those families where one individual is suffering from
dementia, the stress is seen to be higher in those families and the person responsible for taking
care of that patient experiences high stress. This may be worse for the whole family as the stress
gets multiplied. So, special care is given to the care-providers of patients who are suffering from
dementia. Mindfulness therapy is used to give relief to these people who are providing care to
dementia patients. This is a cognitive-based therapy and helps in the development of the thoughts
and these thoughts are then transformed into positive actions. This results in the psychological
wellbeing of the care-providers and they make their behavior positive towards the dementia
patient and also act positively in their normal life by facing low levels of stress (Kor, Liu &
Chien, 2019).
Recommendations

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 7
Application of the two therapeutic approaches, Solution Focused Brief Therapy and the
Mindfulness therapy are recommended to be used for the couples and families in the multiple
settings during their counseling.
Those people who face financial problems, Solution Focused Brief Therapy is termed as
the best to provide counseling to those individuals because financial problems are the reason of
creating stress among the bread earners of the family and the direct effect is seen to be exerted on
all the family members. If the Solution Focused Brief Therapy is implemented to provide
counseling, the negative effects of the financial problems become controlled and positive
solutions may also be suggested to the bearers (Archuleta, Asebedo, & Palmer, 2019).
Solution Focused Brief Therapy is also seen to be helpful for the counseling of those
parents who are in a habit of addiction and substance abuse make them cruel and harsh. This may
leave a negative effect on the wellness of their kids and hence, the family structure gets
disturbed. When these couples want to take counseling, Solution Focused Brief Therapy provides
them the best solutions to meet with this challenge. This has become an effective measure to
improve the wellbeing of these kids where substance use is common among their parents (Kim,
Akin & Brook, 2019).
A lot of problems were viewed in those families where females were married in
intercultural settings. The differences in the values and norms of the families created problems
and an intervention was designed for such families where the mindfulness therapy was used to
change the thinking patterns of the females and after the intervention, they showed positive
results when the results were tried to be collected through a questionnaire (Isfahani, Bahrami,
Etemadi & Mohamadi, 2018). This research was made in Iran and this counseling can be used to
make the thought positive in other countries of the world.

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 8
Mindfulness therapeutic approaches are also used to provide mindfulness to the army
personnel. In America, when army personnel returns to their homes after long periods, the
parental approaches that they need to use are often used negatively. This happens because of the
unknown deployment period and the stress associated with the social interaction after returning
to home. The Mindfulness therapy helps these parents and they develop cognition which results
in positive consequences while experimenting parenting techniques. Hence, it is recommended
for the military and army experts to use this therapy for the distant parents who will return to
their homes and can avoid stress if the mindfulness therapy has been provided to them (Gliske,
Richmond, Smischney & Borden, 2019).
Conclusion
Briefly, it has been established that Solution Focused Brief Therapy and Mindfulness
Therapy are found to be useful as a result of development from the family structural theory and
cognitive behavioral theory respectively. A critical analysis of these therapeutic approaches
informs that Solution Focused Brief Therapy is used for short term problem solving and for the
specific address of the problem whereas Mindfulness therapy is used for the long-term
mindfulness in which cognitive and behavioral positive changes are made. The implications for
these two approaches are also discussed and both of them are used to provide effective
counseling in the family and couple settings. Recommendations are provided based on the recent
researchers and different populations are also identified where the application of both the
therapies can be made. Overall, the purpose of both the therapies is to make improvements in the
cognition, behaviors, emotions, and feelings for the betterment of the families and couples.

FAMILY AND COUPLE COUNSELING 9
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