Abstract
This research uses family drawings, interactions and subsequent reflections
to elicit personal and family constructs for family therapy. Kelly (1955)
proposed that perceived constructs guide an individual’s understandings
and their actions, and later applications of this model were directed towards
families (Watzlawick et al., 1974, Procter (1981) Dallos (1991) showed
that verbal inter-actions within a family aid in the development of family
constructs. Artwork has been used for years in psychodynamically oriented
therapy (Naumburg, 1987) but has had little impact on per-sonal construct
theory and related therapeutic techniques. However, the power of using
drawings to elicit personal constructs is that it enables personal construct
theory to be deployed in therapy with persons who, because of poor verbal
abilities or other reasons, might otherwise prove inac-cessible to PCT:
The present research seeks to show how PCT can be used in various cases
and combines the above approaches to arrive at constructs within six usual
families. The presentation includes visual representations of individual
and family drawings as well as a presentation of the process whereby family
constructs can be thus developed.
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