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The AAMFT Annual Conference
Ethical and Legal Challenges in
Contemporary Family Therapy
Memphis, TN  t  October 30 - November 2, 2008
 

Sunday, November 2, 2008
Seminars
9:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
 

600
CRUCIBLE TRACK: Differentiation and Culture as Drive Wheels of Relationships
Susan J. Regas
Ruth K. Morehouse

The Crucible Approach proposes that the process of differentiation transcends culture. But where does culture, ethnicity, gender, religion, and sexual orientation fit into the theory and practice of this approach? This seminar will look at these important and sensitive issues from a variety of perspectives, including research findings, clinical experience doing treatment, and personal experience learning and applying this approach.

601
Ethics Case Study
Lee D. Bowen
Peter D. Bradley
Lawrence C. Porter
Tracey L. Stulberg
Dale E. Bertram

Participants will learn about ethical issues by consulting with members of the AAMFT Ethics Committee on a hypothetical ethics complaint. The presenters will follow the procedures actually used in the deliberation of an ethics complaint.

602
Ethical/Legal Issues in Team Treatment of Asperger Syndrome
Kathleen C. Laundy
Michelle A. Ciak
Magdalena Wawrzyniak

Public Law 94-142 and the Americans with Disabilities Act mandate public education for all children in the least restrictive environment possible. Students with Asperger's syndrome face constraints to optimal care across medical, educational and therapeutic systems. This presentation offers a model of crossdisciplinary team treatment that accommodates ethical/legal considerations while meeting the needs of Asperger's families.

603
How Couples Conflicts Challenge Partners Development
Jürg Willi

This seminar will explain co-evolutional theory as a developmentally oriented approach of couple’s therapy and will elaborate on the clinical and practical techniques derived from the theory. In this approach, lasting conflicts in the relationship are treated as avoided personal development. The required personal development is expressed in the partner's criticism, which is mostly valid in its content but not in its communication. The therapist tries to help the clients to communicate reproaches in a constructive form.

604
Ethics and Conversion Therapy: From Hierarchy to Inquiry
Marsha L. McDonough
Jeff Lutes

This seminar introduces a model of training and practice that reduces heterosexist bias and welcomes spirituality into therapeutic conversations. Research on conversion therapy and recommendations by health associations regarding LGBT persons will be presented. Experiences of former conversion therapy clients will be presented through videotape. Collaborative therapy will be demonstrated as an ethical alternative to conversion therapy.

605
Personality Disorders and Divorce
Emily M. Brown

A false veneer of charm and competency can mask significant personality disorders in high conflict divorces, thereby misleading decision-makers, legal professionals and mental health professionals. This workshop will focus on ways therapists and legal professionals can work together to assess these clients, design recommendations or orders, and minimize or avoid the bizarre and dangerous outcomes burdening children and parents.

606
SPIRITUALITY TRACK: Family and Faith: Challenges of Rural Faith-based Therapy
Suzanne Coyle

Multiple relational roles and limited resources characterize family therapy in rural communities. Churches often become both a referral and supporting partner in providing family services. This presentation will offer a spiritual/theological and anthropological model for understanding rural communities that will equip participants to manage ethical and clinical challenges of family therapy in this context.

 607
Virginia Tech Shootings: Professional and Ethical Learnings
Ryan M. Traylor
Sarah J. Krug
Fred P. Piercy
Annabelle M. Goodwin
Jamie E. Banker
Christian E. Jordal
Brandon Rodgers
Elise Cole

Virginia Tech MFT doctoral students and faculty will discuss the ethical, professional, and personal issues that arose following the shootings at Virginia Tech. Participants will reflect on personal experiences of the shootings, raise a range of ethical, dual-relationship, and self-of-the-therapist issues, and invite participants to engage in the process.

608
Thinking Outside the Box...and Inside the Witness Stand
Karen K. Irvin
John Jerabek
Karen Schreiber

This interactive session will help demystify subpoenas, depositions and trial testimony for family therapists. Case examples will be the basis for all demonstrations. Experience the process of being served with a subpoena, having a deposition taken and testifying in court as two adversarial attorneys attempt to use MFT testimony to “win” for their respective clients.

609
Ethical and Legal Issues with Families in Child Welfare
Andrea S. Meyer
Lenore M. McWey
Andrea Pazdera
Robert E. Lee

Therapists are sometimes involved in clinical situations involving parents who have children removed from their care. These birth parents now are non-custodial parents. Family interventions require specialized knowledge of the legal and ethical issues associated with this population. This presentation will address multiple levels of ethical and legal concerns associated with birth families involved with the child welfare system.

610
The Path to Remarriage: Clinically Appropriate Interventions
Andrew S. Brimhall
Michelle L. Engblom

Providing clinically appropriate therapy is at the core of our ethical responsibility. And yet, remarried couples are often treated similarly, irrespective of how they got remarried. Findings from 60 interviews illustrate important differences between remarriages formed after a divorce and those formed after death. This seminar will help clinicians understand types of remarriage and help them develop clinically appropriate interventions.

611
SUPERVISION TRACK: Clinical Supervision with a Pluralistic Lens: Ethical and Legal Implications of Family Therapy Supervision
Christopher P. Rodriguez

Clinical supervisors are well-positioned to support supervisees in their development as marriage and family therapists – of which cultural awareness and competence are increasingly essential. In this presentation, the supervisory relationship will serve as a context for supervisors to introduce culture and diversity as a component of MFTs' preparation for ethical and legal practice in a pluralistic society.

612
Chronic Illness and the Couple’s Intimate Relationship
Kristina S. Brown

This seminar will provide knowledge about the impact of a chronic illness, endometriosis, on a couple’s intimate relationship (the anticipatory fear cycle) and the ways in which the well partner is impacted. Therapeutic strategies and coping skills to be used with couples with a chronic illness and who are struggling with their intimate relationship will be provided.

613
Military Families and Marriage and Family Therapy
Dan A. Ratliff
Gail Heather-Greener
Robert T. Frame
Daniel L. Moll

Non-military veteran marriage and family therapists are needed to meet the mental health needs of returning service members and their families. The most prevalent emotional consequences of wartime trauma are marital distress, followed by alcohol abuse, PTSD, anxiety and depression. This seminar will instruct marriage and family therapists to adapt their best practices to meet the cultural contexts of military families.

614
Victims who Victimize: How to Overcome the Ethical Dilemma
Catherine Ducommun-Nagy

When clients who violate the rights of others are past victims, therapists cannot decide if they are victims or victimizers and their clients may face a similar dilemma: pursuing redress at the cost of hurting others, or giving up their pursuit of justice. Contextual therapy provides a framework to turn the clients' dilemma into a therapeutic opportunity.

615
Ethics of Interpersonal Relationships
Joyce Catlett

Human rights issues, values, and ethics are unavoidable when considering the attitudes and behaviors of individuals within relationships. This seminar will introduce a theoretical model and methodology that can help clinicians understand individuals attempting to change behaviors perceived as being harmful to their partner and to themselves. The presenters will demonstrate innovative cognitive/affective behavioral methodology for treating couples, including role-play.

616
Stranger in a Strange Land: Ethical Cross-cultural Work
Mary E. Hotvedt

Using concepts from both ethnographic fieldwork and systems work, and through a particular example --- an orphanage and school in Africa --- the workshop will provide participants with ways to prepare for immersion and work in another culture. The participants will work as teams to wrestle with three ethical dilemmas taken from actual situations in the African community.

617
Core Competencies Assessment Made Humanly Possible
Diane R. Gehart

Finding an efficient and effective means to measure student mastery of the MFT Core Competencies can be a daunting task. In this seminar, participants will learn how (a) to adapt current courses and assignments to teach and measure competencies, and (b) learn strategies for reliably measuring the competencies across the curriculum.

618
Firewall for Recovery: Talking Back to Addiction
Michael A. Galloway

Current neurological research by Siegel, Damasio, Schore, and others demonstrates that behavioral change comes through sustained forms of self-regulation. The firewall for recovery model examines the neurobiological structure of self-regulation when applied to addiction recovery. Without taking its eye off the disease, this approach deploys an active voice that is congruent with cognitive-behavioral and mindful-existential models of recovery.

619
COAMFTE Site Visitor Training
Angela Lamson, PhD, LMFT, CFLE
COAMFTE Commissioners

This session provides participants with a thorough knowledge of the accreditation process and the expertise to conduct a site visit for compliance with COAMFTE Standards of Accreditation. Participants will review the Standards of Accreditation, learn to conduct a site visit, and write a site visit report. All current site visitors are strongly encouraged to attend to be able to participate in scheduled site visits. This session is open to new and current site visitors and those interested in becoming a site visitor. Please call COAMFTE staff at 703-253-0459 if you are interested in participating. CE credit is not available for this session.