Introduction
Ecosystemic Structural Family Therapy (ESFT) is an empirically supported treatment/supervision/training model developed by Marion Lindblad-Goldberg in the 1970s and further elaborated at Philadelphia Child and Family Therapy Training Center.
ESFT trains family therapists to go against the cultural grain by empowering caregivers and nurturing resilient patterns of family and community connection.
Family therapists face three key clinical challenges when they are working to strengthen transactional patterns that weaken a family’s ability to nurture its children. These challenges are: (1) to see the family as ensnared in a set of negative interactional patterns fueled by avoidance and abdication; (2) to understand the therapist’s role to help caregivers envision new transactional patterns; (3) to respond to the family through a collaborative partnership with the caregivers and the at-risk child.
Prominent Associated Figures
The development of ESFT was influenced by Salvador...
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Bowlby, J. (1983). Attachment and loss (Vol. 1, 2nd ed.). New York: Basic Books.
Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base: Parent-child attachment and healthy human development. New York: Basic Books.
Lindblad-Goldberg, M. (2011). Ecosystemic structural family therapy treatment manual. Philadelphia: Philadelphia Child and Family Therapy Training Center.
Lindblad-Goldberg, M., Dore, M., & Stern, L. (1998). Creating competence from chaos: A comprehensive guide to home-based services. New York: Norton.
Lindblad-Goldberg, M., & Dore, M. (2004). Effective family-based mental health services for youth with serious emotional disturbance in Pennsylvania. The ecosystemic structural family therapy model. Philadelphia: Philadelphia Child and Family Therapy Training Center.
Lindblad-Goldberg, M., & Northey, W. (2013). Ecosystemic structural family therapy: Theoretical and clinical foundations. In Contempory family therapy (Vol. 35, pp. 147–160). New York: Springer.
Lindblad-Goldberg, M., & Igle, E. (2015). Grandparents raising grandchildren: An ecosystemic structural family therapy (ESFT) treatment approach. In S. Browning & K. Pasley (Eds.), Contemporary families: Translating research into practice (pp. 248–266). New York: Routledge.
Minuchin, S. (1974). Families and family therapy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Van der Kolk, B. A. (1997). The psychobiology of posttraumatic stress disorder. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 58, 16–24. Memphis: Physicians Postgraduate Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Section Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Lindblad-Goldberg, M., Igle, E.A. (2019). Ecosystemic Structural Family Therapy. In: Lebow, J.L., Chambers, A.L., Breunlin, D.C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Couple and Family Therapy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-49425-8_328
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-49425-8_328
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-49423-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-49425-8
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science and PsychologyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences