Exploring and resolving some of the dilemmas arising when providing therapy to parents or children from separated familieswith through an applied functional-contextual framework.
Providing 1:1 therapy to parents or children from separated families often involves intense contextual pressures, including conflicting parental consent, "loyalty bind" confidentiality traps, differing parental expectations, and constant threats of legal subpoenas. These pressures can trigger internal reactivity with the clinician, narrowing therapist behavioural repertoires toward clinician paralysis, including avoidance and rule-governed rigidity. This often results in responses that prioritise short-term litigation avoidance over long-term prosocial adaptation for the family.
This skills-focused workshop provides the opportunity to explore and resolve these dilemmas through an applied functional-contextual framework. We will analyse behavioural functions, antecedent control, and consequence contingencies as we focus on cultivating a values-based professional stance grounded in compassionate care.
Through experiential role-plays and interactive functional analysis, participants will gain skills to:
- Tact the function of parental behaviours to prevent clinician triangulation
- Navigate dual-parent consent and feedback loops without compromising the child's therapeutic context
- Manage coercive behaviours using compassionate, perspective-taking de-escalation protocols that reduce aversive control
- Promote psychological flexibility in difficult-to-engage parents
- Use values-clarification exercises to focus parents on effective behavioural change strategies and the long-term, child-centred legacy they wish to build across two homes.
Presented by Tiffany Rochester.
Explore Speakers
Explore the Program