In his acclaimed book A Theory of Personality Development, Luciano L'Abate introduced a revolutionary theory of personality development and functioning that departed radically from traditional theories. In place of hypothetical traits existing in an empirical vacuum, Dr. L'Abate offered an image of observable interpersonal competencies functioning within the basic contexts of home, work, leisure, and the marketplace. Central to his theory was a developmental model that posited the family as the primordial setting in which propensities are formed and behavior patterns set. By defining personality in terms of the growth and interplay of interpersonal competencies, the L'Abate theory provided an epistemologically and empirically sound basis for understanding personality function and dysfunction as corollaries and extensions of one another.
In The Self in the Family, Luciano L'Abate and Margaret Baggett again break new ground by expanding the L'Abate theory of personality development to encompass criminal and psychopathological behavior. Drawing upon mounting empirical evidence that the family paradigm is the major determinant of personality socialization throughout the life span, the authors develop a selfhood model with demonstrable links between the three domains of personality function, criminality, and psychopathology. With the help of the model, they show how it is now possible to arrive at a personality-based interpretation of most deviant behaviors, including criminality, psychopathology, addictions, and even psychosomatic illnesses, and they describe various preventive and psychotherapeutic applications for this expanded theory of family-based personality development.
The authors further elaborate on the theories developed in Dr. L'Abate's previous books by introducing the core concepts of hurt—the basic feeling underlying much of personality functioning and dysfunctioning—and a continuum of likeness—the fundamental determinant of interpersonal choices and behavior in friendships, parent-child relations, and marital relations.
Offering an empirically rigorous, developmentally based, unified field theory of personality function, criminality, and psychopathology, The Self in the Family is essential reading for developmental and clinical psychologists, family therapists, personality theorists, and criminality and psychopathology researchers.
CHILD-CENTERED FAMILY THERAPY
Lucille L. Andreozzi
This book is the first complete introduction to the Child-Centered Structural Dynamic Therapy Model—a revolutionary, short-term treatment model which helps integrate child and family system development into a comprehensive framework for self-guided, family-initiated change. This guide, with its numerous case illustrations, works to build knowledge from within the family by engaging family members in structured activities that help them translate family system principles into practical, everyday reality. Child-Centered Family Therapy is an important resource for couples and family therapists, child psychologists, counselors, and social workers.
1996 (0-471-14858-X) 374 pp.
TREATING THE CHANGING FAMILY
Handling Normative and Unusual Events
Edited by Michele Harway
This inimitable book offers a broad-ranging, carefully integrated review of contemporary trends in family therapy, research, and practice. It reexamines the family and the many challenges to its function and provides practical advice for therapists who treat troubled families. It explores the impact that non-normative events such as violence and abuse, addiction, long-term and chronic illness, divorce, adoption, trauma, and many others can have on family function and provides proven intervention strategies and techniques for treating these families. With the special attention given to the structure, dynamics, and unique problems of families that do not fit the traditional mold, such as binuclear, single-parent, and gay and lesbian families, Treating the Changing Family is a valuable resource for all mental health professionals and families.
1995 (0-471-07905-7) 374 pp.
Also in the Series:
HANDBOOK OF RELATIONAL DIAGNOSIS AND DYSFUNCTIONAL FAMILY PATTERNS
Florence W. Kaslow, Editor
1996 (0-471-08078-0) 592 pp.
LUCIANO L'ABATE, PhD, is Professor Emeritus of Psychology atGeorgia State University. In addition to his academic career, Dr.L'Abate has maintained a private clinical practice in individual, marriage, and family therapy since 1958. On retiring from GeorgiaState, Dr. L'Abate was appointed Clinical Director of theInternational Counseling Center, a church-sponsored facilitydedicated to helping minority ethnic groups in Atlanta, Georgia.Dr. L'Abate is a member of numerous professional societies, mostnotably the American Family Therapy Association, the InternationalAcademy of Family Psychology--of which he was cofounder and firstpresident--and the American Orthopsychiatric Association. Aprolific writer and editor, Dr. L'Abate has written several otherbooks including A Theory of Personality Development, Handbook ofDevelopmental Family Psychology and Psycho-pathology, bothavailable from Wiley, and Handbook of Social Skills Training andResearch.
MARGARET S. BAGGETT, PhD, is a licensed clinical psychologist whospecializes in the assessment and treatment of children and theirfamilies. In addition to her private practice, she works as aschool psychologist. She is a member of the American PsychologicalAssociation, the Georgia Psychological Association (in which sheholds a board position), and the American Society of ClinicalHypnosis. She is also a charter member of the Georgia Play TherapyAssociation. Dr. Baggett has studied and published with Dr. L'Abateover the past twenty years.
