TY - JOUR
T1 - The couple’s tree of life
T2 - Promoting and protecting relational identity
AU - Chimpén-López, Carlos A.
AU - Pacheco, Meritxell
AU - Pretel-Luque, Teresa
AU - Bastón, Rebeca
AU - Chimpén-Sagrado, Daniel
N1 - Funding Information:
This work has been supported by Spanish Federation of Family Therapy Associations (Federación Española de Asociaciones de Terapia Familiar) through the National Research Award 2019. We are grateful to Prof. James McCue for assistance in language editing.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 The Authors. Family Process published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Family Process Institute.
PY - 2022/12
Y1 - 2022/12
N2 - We present The Couple’s Tree of Life (CTOL) as a new collective narrative methodology to strengthen couple relationships and prevent conflicts. The CTOL, based on the tree of life methodology (Ncube & Denborough, Tree of Life, mainstreaming psychosocial care and support: a manual for facilitators, REPSSI, 2007), aims to reinforce the identity and strengths of the couple. We explain the CTOL implementation process and illustrate it step by step with a group of 14 adult heterosexual Caucasian couples who belonged to Protestant churches in Madrid (Spain). As a way to assess its usefulness before applying the CTOL to other groups of couples, we conducted a pre-post evaluation using the Dyadic Adjustment Scale of Spanier(1976). We found an improvement in dyadic adjustment, quality, understanding of, and satisfaction with, the relationship. The results, though not generalizable at this stage, suggest that the CTOL could reinforce the couple’s identity while maintaining individual identities. We also discuss the possible applications of couples therapy.
AB - We present The Couple’s Tree of Life (CTOL) as a new collective narrative methodology to strengthen couple relationships and prevent conflicts. The CTOL, based on the tree of life methodology (Ncube & Denborough, Tree of Life, mainstreaming psychosocial care and support: a manual for facilitators, REPSSI, 2007), aims to reinforce the identity and strengths of the couple. We explain the CTOL implementation process and illustrate it step by step with a group of 14 adult heterosexual Caucasian couples who belonged to Protestant churches in Madrid (Spain). As a way to assess its usefulness before applying the CTOL to other groups of couples, we conducted a pre-post evaluation using the Dyadic Adjustment Scale of Spanier(1976). We found an improvement in dyadic adjustment, quality, understanding of, and satisfaction with, the relationship. The results, though not generalizable at this stage, suggest that the CTOL could reinforce the couple’s identity while maintaining individual identities. We also discuss the possible applications of couples therapy.
KW - couple identity
KW - narrative therapy
KW - psychosocial intervention
KW - tree of life
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85116365947&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1111/famp.12727
DO - 10.1111/famp.12727
M3 - Article
C2 - 34613612
AN - SCOPUS:85116365947
SN - 0014-7370
VL - 61
SP - 1403
EP - 1416
JO - Family Process
JF - Family Process
IS - 4
ER -