Bowen family systems theory postulates that the family is a living emotional system where the behavior of each family member both simultaneously contributes to and reflects what is occurring in the family as a whole.

Functioning in reciprocal relationships, changes in one family member’s functioning is automatically compensated for by changes in other family members’ functioning – resulting in one family member’s behavior only being adequately understood in the context of understanding the primary emotional system in which he or she functions – usually his or her nuclear or extended family. This webinar considers a few of the profound personal and practice implications resulting from this perspective, specifically that: (1) people have less autonomy in their functioning than is commonly thought, (2) every family members’ functioning contributes to medical, psychiatric, or social symptoms in another family member, and (3) treatment need not be directed at the symptomatic family member.