Bowenian Family Therapy: Types, Techniques, & Benefits

What Is Bowenian Family Therapy?

Bowenian family therapy aims to create an understanding of current family dynamics by highlighting how these dynamics were shaped by family history. Murray Bowen developed the theory, emphasizing the importance of each family member being able to balance being separate from other people’s emotions while remaining connected.^{1, 2}

Bowenian Family System Theory Concepts

Several concepts are important to understand from Bowenian family systems theory. While these may not be completely evident in a therapy session with a therapist using a Bowenian approach, these concepts inform the basis of the questions they would ask.

Here are the eight core concepts of Bowenian family systems therapy:

1. Triangles: A triangle is formed when a relationship between two people (such as spouses) involves a third member to function (such as a child).⁴ These relationships are often very rigid.
2. Differentiation of self: This concept involves balancing one’s ability to make important life choices while remaining emotionally connected to their family.³ When unbalanced, it can create a lot of issues. Each individual within the family will have a unique differentiation of self, with some being more healthy and some less.
3. Nuclear family emotional system: This concept states that four basic relationship patterns impact the healthiness of a family unit: marital conflict, dysfunction in one spouse, impairment of one or more children, and emotional distance.³
4. Family projection process: This is when parents project their struggles onto their child. Instead of working through their issues, they blame their child for the issue. This often results in the child developing the problems that were projected onto them.
5. Multigenerational transmission process: Bowen believed that the emotional patterns in families are transmitted through many generations.³ When individuals do not work through their inherited trauma, they will likely pass it on to their children.
6. Emotional cutoff: This is when an individual cuts off all contact with their family unit without working through the present issues.³ This is unhealthy for the individual and all the other individuals within the family unit.
7. Sibling positions: This is the tendency for specific roles to be assigned to children based on the order in which they were born. These roles likely continue into that child’s future spousal and parenting relationship.³
8. Societal emotional process: Bowen believed that societal incidents impact a family unit and can exacerbate issues within the family.⁶

Types of Bowenian Family Therapy

Bowenian family therapy is not only for family therapy. While it usually involves the entire family, sometimes particular attention should be given to the marriage dynamic. Other times, getting the family into the session may be difficult, particularly in the case of an emotional cutoff.

The types of Bowenian family therapy are:

Family Therapy

Bowenian family therapy that focuses on the whole family unit can help to address intergenerational trauma. It can work to defuse damaging triangles in the family unit, heal a family when an emotional cutoff occurs, and work on each member in the family developing healthy self-differentiation. Focusing on the whole family can be beneficial because it allows all family members to heal.

Couples Therapy

Bowenian family therapy excels at working with the marriage relationship. It does so by helping the couple to look to each other to work through their emotions instead of taking out their marriage issues on their child. Changing the lack of communication in the relationship can bring about significant change in the family.

Individual Therapy

In individual therapy, Bowenian family therapy aims to increase differentiation, or an individual’s ability to be independent within their family dynamic. Individual therapy is not the classic form of Bowenian family therapy, but keeping the sessions smaller can save time and provide more personal attention.

Bowenian Family Therapy Techniques:

Bowenian family therapy has a unique approach to treatment with families. In particular, the implementation of genograms for mapping a family system stands out. Bowenian family therapy relies on terminology and methods that encourage differentiation of the self. Other approaches may be aimed at demonstrating emotional fusion in the family.

Bowenian family therapy techniques include:

• Genograms: This is a specialized family tree made by a Bowenian family therapist. A genogram has unique symbols and markings to help therapists explain family patterns to their clients.⁵
• Differentiating emotions: This technique aims to help each person in the family recognize that they are personally responsible for handling their emotions rather than relying on someone else in the family to cope.
• I-statements: I-statements, such as “I feel sad” are meant to keep people accountable for their feelings instead of discussing someone else’s feelings.
• Defusing triangles: If fusion in the marriage relationship has led to the development of triangles, Bowenian family therapists will work to defuse those relationships.
• Demonstrating intergenerational patterns: With the help of the family genogram, the therapist will point out how family patterns have passed down from generation to generation.
• Normalizing challenges: Bowenian family therapy will show how challenges are normal and are to be expected because of the intergenerational family dynamics that have been passed down.

Benefits of Bowenian Family Therapy

Bowenian family therapy has many benefits for all families, but these benefits are most helpful to families with emotional cutoffs or significant fusion. Those families have an opportunity to recognize these patterns and change them.

Some benefits of Bowenian family therapy include:

Learning to Be Differentiated

Differentiation is the ability to recognize that you are an individual who is responsible for your own emotions within your family unit. It is important to balance differentiation with the ability to stay close to your family unit; at times, you may be unbalanced. You could be unbalanced by being too self-absorbed and disconnected from your family. Another possibility is being overly connected and fused to your family. Bowenian family therapy can help you find this balance.

Reshaping Conflict

Bowenian family therapy can help people find a healthier way to deal with conflict by recognizing their emotions and learning to separate them from other people in the family. This can reshape how these conflicts go, as it will help you take responsibility for what you can address. Bowenian family therapy can teach couples some fair fighting rules to work through emotions in the family.

Healthier Boundary Setting

Bowenian family therapy can help you to learn how to set healthy boundaries in your family. The techniques and work you put in will help you learn how to do this and create a safe space for yourself and those you love. Beyond your family, Bowenian family therapy will also help you set healthy boundaries in your personal relationships.

Understanding Your Family’s Patterns

Bowen family therapy will help you to learn how your family has historically operated more clearly. By recognizing how your family naturally interacts, you can begin to change how you interact with them in the future. This can help break the hurt cycles that keep recurring within the family unit. It may surprise you how this insight can change things for you and your family.

Going Beyond Your Expected Role

Bowen family therapy helps us to step beyond the roles we are expected to play in our family. An example of a role in our family is a peacemaker. The peacemaker in the family learns to monitor emotions and help to comfort others. However, when a child has this role, emotional fusion is highly likely. Bowenian family therapy can help the peacemaker learn to be kind to others without taking responsibility for their emotions.

Disrupting Family Projection Process

The family projection process is how parents project their issues onto their child. Bowenian family therapy aims to stop the parents from projecting their issues by pointing out what is happening and offering alternative ways for the family to function. These corrections can be challenging because the patterns existed for a long time.

Is Bowenian Family Therapy Effective?

Research has shown that Bowenian family therapy can successfully treat various family issues. For instance, Bowenian family therapy has been shown to decrease the likelihood of affair development.⁷ In another study, it has also been shown to help reduce marriage conflict.⁸ Working on family communication and differentiation can help with these relationships.

In individual modalities, Bowenian family therapy has been shown to help internet-addicted people with problems with people.⁹ Another, more personal take from a researcher who went through Bowenian family therapy reported how it helped him deal with separation anxiety.¹⁰ Bowenian family therapy can help prepare for family reunification or deal with estrangement.

Is Bowenian Family Therapy a Good Fit for Me?

Consider Bowenian family therapy if you experience family dynamics that drain you or are cut off from a part of your family. You do not have to reconnect with your family to participate in therapy. Bowenian family therapy can help you make sense of the situation and learn how to differentiate yourself from those situations.

If you need help finding the right therapist, try using this online therapy directory. If Bowenian family therapy does not seem like the right fit for you, but it is close, consider structural family therapy or functional family therapy. In the end, this is your life, and looking into treatment is a step you have taken to address problems in your life.

In My Experience

I use some of the concepts of Bowenian Family Therapy in my practice as an LMFT. In particular, the concept of differentiation is useful, although I do not use the term precisely like Bowen did. Regardless, I find Bowen’s work compelling and useful for helping families deal with complicated emotional situations. If a client of mine had a particular interest in engaging with Bowenian methods, I would be able to accommodate that and would appreciate the initiative it took to ask that of me. In my experience, the outlook in therapy is bright when clients know how to ask for help specifically. Even if they cannot ask, getting a general idea of what is needed can be a step in the right direction.