How to Coach Yourself and Others Coaching Families | Page 34

founded the first family therapy journal, Family Process, which is still the leading journal of ideas in the
field today. In 1955 Ackerman organized the first discussion on family diagnosis at a meeting of the
American Ortho psychiatric Association to facilitate communication in the developing field of family
therapy.
In 1957 Ackerman established the Family Mental Health Clinic in New York City and began teaching at
Columbia University. He opened the Family Institute in 1960, which was later renamed the Ackerman
Institute after his death in 1971.
Virginia Satir
Virginia Satir is one of the key figures in the development of family therapy. She believed that a healthy
family life involved an open and reciprocal sharing of affection, feelings, and love. Satir made
enormous contributions to family therapy in her clinical practice and training. She began treating families in
1951 and established a training program for psychiatric residents at the Illinois State Psychiatric Institute in
1955.
Satir served as the director of training at the Mental Research Institute in Palo Alto from 1959-66 and at the
Esalen Institute in Big Sur beginning in 1966. In addition, Satir gave lectures and led workshops in
experiential family therapy across the country. She was well-known for describing family roles, such as "the
rescuer" or "the placator," that function to constrain relationships and interactions in families (Nichols &
Schwartz, 1998. Family Therapy: Concepts and Methods. 4th ed. Allyn & Bacon).
Satir's genuine warmth and caring was evident in her natural inclination to incorporate feelings and
compassion in the therapeutic relationship. She believed that caring and acceptance were key elements
in helping people face their fears and open up their hearts to others (Nichols & Schwartz, 1998. Family
T herapy: Concepts and Methods. 4th ed. Allyn & Bacon). Above all other therapists, Satir's was the most
powerful voice to wholeheartedly support the importance of love and nurturance as being the most
important healing aspects of therapy. Unfortunately, Satir's beliefs went against the more scientific approach
to family therapy accepted at that time, and she shifted her efforts away from the field to travel and lecture.
Satir died in 1988 after suffering from pancreatic cancer.
Ivan Boszmormenyi-Nagy
Ivan Boszmormenyi-Nagy's emphasis on loyalty, trust, and relational ethics -- both within the family and
between the family and society -- made major contributions to the field of family therapy since its inception
in the 1950's (Nichols & Schwartz, Family Therapy: Concepts and Methods. 4th ed. Allyn & Bacon 1998).
A student of Virginia Satir and an accomplished scholar and clinician, Nagy was trained as a psychoanalyst
and his work has encouraged many family therapists to incorporate psychoanalytic ideas with family
therapy.
Nagy is perhaps best known for developing the contextual approach to family therapy, which emphasizes
the ethical dimension of family development. Based on the psychodynamic model, contextual therapy
accentuates the need for ethical principles to be an integral part of the therapeutic process. Nagy believes
that trust, loyalty, and mutual support are the key elements that underlie family relationships and hold
families together, and that symptoms develop when a lack of caring and liability result in a breakdown of
trust in relationships (Nichols & Schwartz, Family Therapy: Concepts and Methods. 4th ed. Allyn & Bacon
1998). The therapists' role is to help the family work through avoided emotional conflicts and to develop a
sense of fairness among family members.
In 1957, Nagy established the Eastern Pennsylvania Psychiatric Institute (EPPI) and served as co director
and co therapist along with social worker Geraldine Spark. Nagy was also an active researcher of
schizophrenia and family therapy and coauthored Invisible loyalties: Reciprocity in intergenerational family
therapy (Boszormenyi-Nagy & Spark, 1973). Since the closing of EPPI, Nagy has continued to develop his
contextual approach to family therapy and remains associated with Hahnemann University in Pennsylvania.

34