Published 1/29/21

Authoritarian families are focused on maintaining order, control, and compliance. Coercion, bullying, abuse, and violence are common in these families. This workshop provides an eco-systemic framework for understanding these families, the caregivers who head them, and the types of problems they typically encounter with their children. Common traps therapists make when working with these families are identified, as are strategies for avoiding them. An in-depth discussion of a classic PCGC training video, Family With a Little Fire, is used to highlight methods for introducing more softness into interactions between authoritarian caregivers and their children, as well as fostering greater tolerance for imperfection. This online course is an edited version of an extended live training presented on November 7th 2019 at the Pennsylvania Counseling Services conference center.

Objectives:

As a result of participating in this educational activity, participants will be able to:

1. Identify the structural characteristics of authoritarian families
2. Identify authoritarian parenting patterns and their impacts on children
3. Recognize coercive interactional patterns and how to interrupt them
4. Identify personality and social context variables that leave parents vulnerable to authoritarian parenting
5. Describe common traps when working with authoritarian families and how to avoid them

This is a beginning level course, introducing therapists to complex developmental trauma and its implications for treating families.

Course Outline

• Unit 1: Family Structure (40 minutes)
  • Webinar: What Makes a Family Structure Dysfunctional?
  • Webinar: What Makes a Family Structure Authoritarian?
• Unit 2: The Perspectives and Actions Associated with Authoritarian Parenting (60 minutes)
  • Webinar: The Authoritarian Mindset
  • Webinar: Authoritarian Parenting
• Unit 3: Recognizing Coercive Patterns of Control (40 minutes)
  • Webinar: Recognizing Coercion
• Unit 4: Caregiver Motivations and Child Adaptations (35 minutes)
  • Webinar: How Authoritarian Parenting Shapes Child Development
  • Webinar: What Motivates an Authoritarian Parenting Style?
• Unit 5: Treatment Considerations (60 minutes)
  • Webinar: A Case Study

This course uses an online distance-learning self-paced format.  It includes recorded audio, recorded video-based webinars, and selected readings.  There are post-tests to ensure comprehension of the material. Participants can communicate with the instructors via the online moodle interface. Real-time communication with the instructor in our online, self-paced distance learning courses is not possible. However, participants can send an email to the instructor via the online moodle interface within the course and expect to receive a response within 48 hours. All course content, including post-tests, should take approximately 4.0 hours to complete.

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit our Self-Paced, Online Continuing Education Policies & FAQs for additional information regarding the CFBT online learning center, accommodations for disabilities, reporting problems with the course, instructions for viewing webinars, etc.

Published 3/1/20

Under-organized families are marked by inconsistency and chaos.  Life in the home can feel random and leaderless.  Children living in these families are at risk for abuse and neglect, and a wide range of behavioral and emotional problems within the family and community.  This workshop provides an eco-systemic framework for understanding under-organized families and the caregivers who head them.  Common traps are identified that helping professionals need to avoid when working with these families. Treatment guidelines are provided for addressing problems of caregiver engagement, maintaining a treatment focus, coordinating with multiple community agencies who may be working at cross purposes, and strengthening the caregivers’ executive functioning.

This is an Intermediate Level course. The target audience is all behavioral health professionals working with children and adolescents.

Objectives

As a result of participating in this online course, you will be able to:

1. Recognize fragile couple relationships and patterns of family under-organization
2. Describe the impact of family under-organization on the development of children’s emotional competencies
3. Describe five important treatment tasks in helping under-organized families
4. Identify the most common mistakes professionals make when working with under-organized families and how to avoid them

Course Outline

• Unit 1: The Relationship Between Family Structure and Externalizing Problems (30 minutes)
  • Webinar: A Comparison of four Maladaptive Family Types
  • Webinar: Countering the Troubled Treatment Histories of Children with Externalizing Problems

• Unit 2: The Core Features of Under-Organization in Families (100 minutes)
  • Webinar: The Structure of Under-Organized Families
  • Webinar: The Impact of Unpredictability and Inconsistency

• Unit 3: Interventions Focused on Supporting the Ambivalent, Overwhelmed Caregiver (105 minutes)
  • Webinar: Addressing Parental Ambivalence
  • Webinar: Matching Treatment Expectations to Caregiver Capacity

• Unit 4: Interventions Focused on Strengthening Fragile Relationships (70 minutes)
  • Webinar: Roots of Under-Organization: Fragile Couples
  • Webinar: A Case Study: Building On-Ramps to Parenting

About the Presenters

Click here for information on C. Wayne Jones, PhD.

This course uses an online distance-learning self-paced format.  It includes recorded audio, recorded video-based webinars, and selected readings.  There are post-tests to ensure comprehension of the material. Participants can communicate with the instructors via the online moodle interface. Real-time communication with the instructor in our online, self-paced distance learning courses is not possible. However, participants can send an email to the instructor via the online moodle interface within the course and expect to receive a response within 48 hours. All course content, including post-tests, should take approximately 5.5 hours to complete.

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit our Self-Paced, Online Continuing Education Policies & FAQs for additional information regarding the CFBT online learning center, accommodations for disabilities, reporting problems with the course, instructions for viewing webinars, etc.

Updated 7/8/19

Enmeshment is one of four structural patterns most associated with serious emotional disturbance (SED) in children. This course describes the characteristics of enmeshment and how this interactional pattern shapes children’s development of social-emotional competencies and their response to treatment. Treatment guidelines are highlighted, as well as common clinical traps that therapists are likely to encounter when working with enmeshed relational patterns. This course is an edited version of a live workshop presented for intensive, in-home family-based therapists in February 2019.

This is an Intermediate Level course. The target audience is all behavioral health professionals working with children and adolescents.

Learning Objectives 

1. Identify the characteristics of enmeshed parenting and enmeshed family structure
2. Identify four basic emotional competencies and how enmeshment impacts their development
3. Recognize four maladaptive coping strategies enmeshed families use to minimize conflict
4. Recognize signs of induction into enmeshment and identify strategies for avoiding it
5. Identify strategies for pushing the conversation and increasing distress tolerance in enmeshed families

Course Outline

• Unit 1: Recognizing Enmeshment (100 minutes)
  • Webinar: An Introduction to Enmeshment and Family Structure
  • Webinar: The Characteristics of Enmeshed Relationships
  • Webinar: Differentiating Enmeshment from Co-Dependency and Emotional Fusion

• Unit 2: ESFT Core Concepts (30 minutes)
  • Webinar: ESFT Case Conceptualization
  • Webinar: How Enmeshment Impacts Development of Core Emotional Competencies

• Unit 3: Four Faces of Enmeshment (90 minutes)
  • Webinar: The Overly Sensitive Caregiver
  • Webinar: The Anxious, Impulsive Caregiver
  • Webinar: Hostile-Chaotic & Rigid Types

• Unit 4: Strengthening Family Distress Tolerance (60 minutes)
  • Webinar: Pushing the Conversation: Case Study
  • Webinar: Pushing the Conversation: Case Study 2

About the Presenters

Click here for information on C. Wayne Jones, PhD.

This course uses an online distance-learning self-paced format.  It includes recorded audio, recorded video-based webinars, and selected readings.  There are post-tests to ensure comprehension of the material. Participants can communicate with the instructors via the online moodle interface. Real-time communication with the instructor in our online, self-paced distance learning courses is not possible. However, participants can send an email to the instructor via the online moodle interface within the course and expect to receive a response within 48 hours. All course content, including post-tests, should take approximately 5.0 hours to complete.

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit our Self-Paced, Online Continuing Education Policies & FAQs for additional information regarding the CFBT online learning center, accommodations for disabilities, reporting problems with the course, instructions for viewing webinars, etc.