Case Study on the Application of Gottman Method and CBT

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Mary and Fred come from vastly different backgrounds- while Mary belongs to a typical modern family (father, mother and children), Fred is an Italian and the different generations live together and interact regularly with each other. Also, Mary's family maintains strict and structured familial decorum, discipline and etiquettes, such as parents never raising their voices in front of their children and taking due permission before asking for other's time. On the other hand, Fred's family does not accede to such rules and regulations and family members with each other freely without prior announcement and without any express reason for the frequent visitations. In colloquial terms, whereas in Mary's family "space" is given to each member and the "privacy" of each individual is respected and sacred, in Fred's family such provisions do not exist. In Fred's family relationship and bonding is an important virtue. Theirs is an expressive family. Whereas, though Mary's family does have an extended family, they live far away and hardly ever meet, save for, at times of crises.

Background of the Gottman Method

In the year 1975, researchers Levenson and Gottman commenced to study how relationships progressed longitudinally. Using a multifaceted strategy, the two researchers observed individuals in relationships in their laboratory. Some couples shared with each other how their days went; whereas some were embroiled in conflict others were enjoying each other's company. The laboratory was an apartment that allowed 24-hour recording of activities. Couples were drawn from different racial and ethnic backgrounds all over the United States. Unmarried and married heterosexual and homosexual couples formed part of the study. Some of the couples were studied from the period they just got married, right to their eighties. However, the researcher Gottman was not able to come up with any theoretically grounded method or strategy of preventing relationship break-ups, until he started working with his wife, Julie Schwartz, who was a psychologist. Gottman was able to develop a strategy to help couples stay together, despite some having experienced huge conflicts (Navarra & Gottman, 2011).

How Does The Theory Explain How Problems Develop Marital Problems?

There are 7 emotional command systems of affect for humans. Even though these 7 command affects can work independently, they frequently work in conjunction with each other. These emotional systems working together with environmental factors help form the feelings, values and attitudes of a person. In other words, they help define an individual's meta-emotion. And when a person gets into a relationship with another, it is somewhat a combination of meta-emotions. Couples who have the best relationships are often those who have similar meta-emotions, or those who have found ways to live together harmoniously, despite their different meta-emotions. On the other hand, couples who have mismatched meta-emotions often do not have very good relationships. Therefore, it can be said that the majority of the couples who go to therapy are those with meta-emotion differences (Gottman & Gottman, 2008).

Researchers Gottman and Levenson found that relationships have marked points of balance. These points are between negativity and positivity. The balance between the two is the main determinant of the future of relationships. Most of the relationships that are not working out are those whose marked points are leaning more towards the negative side of the balance; this impacts the ability of the couple to make amends or to solve conflicts. One of the most observed patterns of withdrawal or blame among couples in dysfunctional relationships starts with criticism, and then defensiveness, followed by contempt, and finally, stonewalling. This pattern is one of the most obvious indicators of relationships that are not working out. The pattern often escalates to negativity (Navarra & Gottman, 2011).

Interventions: How Does The Theory Suggest Problem Amelioration?

1. Establish positivity momentum by showing admiration and fondness in small day-to-day activities.

2. Turning towards one's partner instead of away from them by quickly identifying the partner's need to connect emotionally.

3. A partner should allow an override of positive sentiments, in other words, they should not take personally the negative or neutral actions of their partners.

4. Partners should take a multifaceted approach to solving conflicts by utilizing and presenting problems gently, taking responsibility if need be, soothing physiologically, and compromising if there is a need to. Couples should also take a look at never ending conflicts and examine the underlying problem.

5. Couples should build a linked meaning system by coming up with different forms of connection, supporting each other, coming up with shared objectives or values, and having shared views of different signs (Gottman & Gottman, 2008).

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Role of the Therapist in This Theory?

The therapist is a coach

He or she provides tools that the couple in a dysfunctional relationship can utilize to solve their problems.

Gottman's Theory Applied to the Case of Mary and Fred

The Gottman Marital Therapy can be applied in this case to understand the concept of "meta-emotions" accurately. The spouses clearly have vastly different and opposing meta-emotions consequent to their family background difference and hence, upbringing. According to the theory proposed by Gottman, the difficulty in the relationship of Mary and Fred as a married couple is borne out of these differences in meta-emotions.

In addition, the pattern of criticism, defensiveness, and ultimately obstinacy, is obvious when the couple approaches a therapist or counselor.

Redressal, according to Gottman, needs positive inputs from each of them to bring back the 'negative balance' back to 'neutral' through mutual effort. Each has to recognize others' need and connect emotionally. That would mean, Fred recognizes Mary's need for "space" and "privacy" and make efforts towards securing them. Mary, at the same time, needs to adjust to the family and respect Fred's needs and familial connections. The last of Gottman's therapeutic suggestions can also be of immense help if the couple can find common interests and shared goals privy to them.

CBCT

Behavioral Couple Therapy or the BCT came up in the late sixties as an offshoot of behavioral therapies that relied upon the utilization of learning principles (such as operant conditioning). Behavioral Couple Therapy is based on the idea that relationships are made up of two types of sequences; circular and reciprocal, and that the behavior of each partner affects the others sequences. CBCT evolved from BCT and its clinical operant conditioning therapies to involve a focus on cognitive influences. In CBCT, not only behavioral, but also emotional and cognitive influences are taken into account in therapy (Baucom, Epstein, LaTaillade, & Kirby, 2008).

How the Theory Explains How Marital Problems Develop

This theory is based on the notion that negative behavioral and emotional responses to a partner's actions are influenced by errors in information processing (whereby cognitive assessments of a partner's actions are distorted). Relationships might also, similarly, be judged by the partner based on non-pragmatic standards of what relationships ought to look like. Frequently, couples do not assess the relevance of their cognitions and they often just trust in the rationality of their own automatic thoughts, in response to the actions taken by their partners (Baucom, Epstein, LaTaillade, & Kirby, 2008). Other assumptions made in CBCT so as to explain how relationship conflicts emerge are that family behavior, emotions, automatic thoughts and relationships influence each other. Cognitive presumptions result in action and emotion; and, that action and emotion affect cognition (Nelson, 2015).

Interventions: How Does The Theory Suggest Problem Amelioration?

Possible interventions include;

1. Questioning of unrealistic or distorted assumptions (people in relationships often assess each other in an unrealistic manner).

2. Issuing of behavioral tasks

3. Training

4. Building of communication skills

The Role of the Therapist in this Theory

The main role of a CBCT therapist is to help people in relationships to transform into more active assessors and observers of their cognitive thoughts, and their long held standards and assumptions (knowledge structures), regarding their partners or relationships. Thus, a CBCT therapist assumes different roles during the course of the therapy. During the initial stages of the evaluation and therapy, his role is didactic, requiring him to be both friendly and direct with the couple in setting targets, and in the utilization of cognitive strategies to achieve the targets (Baucom, Epstein, LaTaillade, & Kirby, 2008).

Behavioral Couple Theory applied to the same case

Mary is distanced from her family and a familial tie, Fred is very close to his. Fred's behavior causes Mary to react negatively for quite some time, though she does not always make it obvious. However, the cycle of cyclical and reciprocal sequences eventually leads to strained relationship. Fred's actions affect Mary's emotions and she, most obviously (on her own, and thinking it to be logical and rational), decides that Fred does not respect her point-of-view. The continued negligence to her request of intimation of family visitations and Fred's clear priority to other family member's views point towards the causation of Mary's thought process. The BCT recognizes this percept as the underlying cause of disruptive cognition leading to disruptive action.

BCT intervention requires that the couple recognize the assumptions.....

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