Introduction and family background
The story revolves around a family setup whereby a young girl Mulala is born to an Islamic scholar by the name Ghulamullah who owns a school that does well in the village. She has two brothers by the name Atal and khushal who are born in an impoverished and humble background. Her mother is wonderful and adored by the father to an extent he cannot lay a hand on her like other men in the village setting. Her mother’s name is Tor Pekai which means raven tresses. Also her grandfather,Janser Khan who used to listen to radio news. Malala’s mother originates from a family that has strong women, for instance, her great grandmother who becomes a widow at a young age but strives to raise her kids. Her father tends to come from a larger family set up that originates from a very primitive area and has an elder brother by the name Saeed Ramzan and five sisters.In this family, boys were allowed to go to school whereas girls stayed at home.
The young girl originates from a country that has a history of Military coups, and the land is seized when her father is eight years old. Situation changes in the country when Russians invaded their neighbouring state and this lead to millions of people seeking refuge in their place. The father is threatened due to his stand, and the family faces challenges, especially when the Taliban came to their valley. The Taliban is headed by Maulana Fazlullah who first introduces himself as an Islamic Reformer and a Quran interpreter. He uses his station to educate people, but sometimes he misinterprets the Quran, and to an extent, he introduces oppressive rules to people that curtail their inner peace and justice. At first, people have a perception that he is an excellent interpreter, and within a short period, they obey his commands which harms them.
Nevertheless, some people support the leader, but Malala’s father is against him. People feel oppressed to an extent the family of Malala leaves their home to live in unknown place due to insecurity and a result of various bombings. This significantly affects the family as overall behaviour patterns have to change, and they need family therapists due to past experiences to help them adapt to a new way of living.
The Yousafzai family experiences dysfunction, relationship problems and child
behavioural challenges due to the experiences. Therapeutic intervention is required to alleviate the signs and symptoms experienced by each member of the family. The family has great fear as initially they are under threat, and they live their motherland which affects all the family members concerning their behavior patterns.
Assessment criteria
Assessment criteria are very critical when dealing with family therapy since it requires one to know the history of the family, the current state, and where they what to be soon.It is essential to get a clear understanding of the family concerns to intervene clearly and prudently to find solutions to the problem. For instance, as a therapist clear understanding of Yousafzai’s family has been achieved since I have understood their experience to the extent of relocating to the United States and trying to adapt to the new culture and political climate. The assessment is a tedious process that aims at achieving various goals like clarification of the family problems, understanding of how the members perceive the surrounding challenges as well as the creation of a picture regarding the structure, functioning and overall influences of family dynamics. Assessment of the family is critical as this will formulate a treatment plan for the family as well as act as an intervention tool.The assessment helps in tracking the overall progress of the family members and help in keeping in touch with the family members.For instance, as a therapist, it’s prudent to assess the behavior change of the family members of Yousafzai’s family to find out what challenges are they experiencing especially concerning their new environment. For the assessment of the family to be successful then necessary assessment information must be available, which include the problem .family membership that relates to family history, power and socioeconomic status.For example, in the assessment, the family tend to be from a poor background, and due to military coup history of their country then they were facing challenges especially in power perspective as they do not have a voice in the society. Also, another important assessment information is the family functioning that relates to life cycle issues. These roles are played by various individuals in the family, communication strategy employed within the family as well as problem resolution. Yousafzai’s family are facing challenges in the functioning dynamics as well as communication due to past experiences in the country. Thus through therapy, a proper technique must be instituted to ensure that it allows the family to interact in a normal way and help them live a better life outside their motherland. Family strengths and goals must be clearly defined as well as personality characteristics, for instance, the mother being hard-working given that she performs all house chores and even take care of children in the hospital during the tough period.As well the assessment examination of transgenerational history is significant for instance, it is evident that the great grandmother of Malala was powerful as she became a widow at a young age and managed to raise her kids. This can reflect on the ability and power of Malala who is up to advocate for girl child education but faces injustice in the community.
Evaluation system plays an important role in family assessment therapy. various techniques are used to assess the family members who are qualitative and sometimes family members generate their data.Direct interview acts as a perfect method of collecting data and assessing the members.Sometimes other methods can be used as art therapy especially for clients who are young as they can be involved in painting, clay modelling and drawing hence the therapist have to learn about the clients through the possessed skills and knowledge. For instance, an individual can be asked to draw a picture of their his or her neighbourhood and the therapists will be able to observe the roles of each member in the family, communication level with each other as well as problems that arise daily. Also, as a family therapist, I can use Want-ad measures, for example to as each family member to write adds for better communication and solutions to problems.This will help in basically discussing the hopes, values and expectations of a change of the family after the therapy. Another measure is by use of photographs as they tend to gather detail information about the family members,pat history and current events.Also, family polling technique can be used to gather qualitative data as this will focus on the family functioning dynamic, which is a greater challenge for our case study. For instance, certain questions are being asked like who is the family comedian? Who is the most powerful and sensitive person in the family? Who is the most affected person in the family? What changes and expectations do you need to see within the family? Data collection, assessment measures must be chosen in connection to the problem facing the family to be able to gather enough information that will help in deciding about the treatment plan .Evaluation must be conducted to ensure that the assessment measures support the active participation of all family members, and they must be culturally sensitive.
The family members are undergoing a problem of behavioral change which is a problem selected for intervention, and the rationale of selection is from the evidence texts. For example, Fazlullah’s men collect all TVs, DVDs and CDs and set them on fire this prompted CD and DVD shops to be closed temporarily, and Malala and his brothers are worried as they could not watch their best movies.As well he closes beauty parlours and barbershops, and this affects every member in the family as they are forced to change their behavior which is very difficult to adopt. The family intervention will be concerning behavioural management by the family members, and it must be achieved at the end of the therapy sessions. Family interventions are significant as they help families undergoing various kinds of challenges in society. With Yousafzai family, solution-focused brief therapy must be implemented to help in achieving the overall goal of behavior management.
Solution Focused Therapy
Refers to a model that tends to focus on positive aspects and possibilities of people. It assumes that individuals have a capacity to behave effectively, but their behavior tends to be influenced by mindset. The therapy focuses on an individual’s future goals and circumstances rather than past negative experiences. Hence the role of a therapist, especially in a family setting is to encourage the clients to develop a positive mind of the future as well as offering support for the clients to realize the goal. The theory is applied by helping individuals who are experiencing difficult situations with tools that can enable them to cope with the challenges as it’s grounded on the belief that each person can have a change in the lives especially behavioural change. People are already aware of the changes that are required, and thus the relevant therapists work to ensure that people do achieve their goals through guidance and care. Therapists do give encouragement to the relevant clients by imagining the future they want and then work in harmony to develop a plan that will make both parties achieve their goals. Guidance is provided to people by working with them, exploring various strategies, encouraging change and celebrating overall success. The model requires some techniques to be successful, which include asking specific questions that are coping questions and miracle questions to enable people to discover their skills in dealing with diversity issues. A miracle question challenges the person to have a vision of the future that do not involve problems.It allows people to view their lives in different ways hence identify practical steps that can be easily implemented in the journey toward change. Concerning the case study, the model is very applicable as it emphasizes the present family situation and future vision as opposed to their past experiences. Yousafzai’s family has to develop a positive mind about the future and forget about their experience. They must embrace diversity as they have to adapt to a new culture and above all, a political climate that is different from the one in their country.The family has to adopt a long term and short term goals by applying the model, for instance, by trying to create time for communication of a daily or weekly basis. As well, conflict resolution must be implemented, and family function system accelerated.
Rational Emotional Therapy
Rational emotive therapy focuses on identifying irrational beliefs and negative thoughts that lead to behavioural issues. Its focus on the present situation as a belief exists that our past influences our current situation and its true since our past tends to shape our present.The model aims at challenging the dysfunctional beliefs and trying to replace them with functional beliefs. The therapy questions the current behavior and replaces them with productive beliefs. The theory is principled in the basic idea that people want to be successful in life; for instance, when families want to find happiness, but in some circumstances, irrational beliefs do exist. The beliefs tend to bring an impact on how people perceive things and this cannot help in achieving the overall goal of success. The therapy employs various techniques like problem-solving that tend to activate an event which entails acquiring decision-making skills, conflict resolution as well as social skills. Also, cognitive techniques are very significant as they tend to challenge the general irrational beliefs.This includes humour, exposure to a feared situation, logical reasoning, and looking at situations from a different perspective. Cooping Techniques help individuals to manage the emotional impacts of the beliefs, and it entails proper meditation and relaxation. The family can use the therapy to help the family members to incorporate positive thoughts and feelings and evaluate the destructive emotions to ensure they achieve their goals. Rational, emotional therapy is very applicable concerning Malala’s family in various ways. First, through the therapy, the family, through the guidance of a therapist, can adopt coping skills that will enable them to accept the current situation and the new environment with a different culture.As well problem-solving skills is fundamental as the family members have to come up with ways to solve their problems, especially in the family setup. For example, the communication problem can be easily solved by conducting weekly meetings and ensuring that there is equal involvement of all the family members.
The treatment plan is very significant, and the rationale of the selection as the therapist need to be keen to ensure the best treatment is granted to the clients.The treatment plan is necessary tools that are required in the provision of healthcare to the clients. The treatment plan for the family is as follows
Overall Objective
The overall objective is to address the behavioral change issues among members of the family and try to create a vision that must be achieved in the future. The roles include;
Maintenance of consistent and cooperative therapeutic alliance with family members, for instance, ensuring they attend all the sessions and be keen on listening during the sessions.
Ensure access to emotional and past experience of the family members
Conduct overall restructuring of family interactions by focusing on dysfunctional family dynamics.
STEP 1
To create an alliance with the family members safety must be ensured by the parties involved to ensure trust and confidentiality is enhanced. The measurement will involve the family responses of the state of feeling safe and be open to disclose their experiences and participate actively in the treatment process during the sessions.
Intervention; Intervention is crucial, and it will involve having a clear understanding of the perceptions of the family concerning their problems, quick responses and accessibility to the family, creation of a safe and conducive environment for the family to air out their problems. Open discussion is important as it involves the active participation of the family members during the sessions.
Another important goal entails assessing the family gaols and plan to ascertain whether the family goals are feasible and in correspondence with the nature of the therapy.The measurable assessment involves the initial assessment questionnaires that the family must answer, family level of satisfaction and individual member response through an individual checklist.
Completion of the assessment is very critical, and this can be measured by the family attending sessions and agreeing to disclose all their problem.The intervention will involve looking at contradicting issues, discussion the modality of treatment and assessing the overall response of the family members.
STEP 2
The second step of the treatment is to focus on the past experiences of the family due to state of their country and have an understanding of how the present behavior evolved and what lead the family to seek therapy. Family members have to share their stories and measurement will entail assessment if past stories and behavior.
STEP 3
Access the primary behavior and emotional changes of the family members as well as unacknowledged behavior and share the behavior during the sessions.Intervention is important by observing the emotions of the family members and responding to the painful experiences of the family
Step 4
To help the family to adapt to the environment and new behaviour
STEP 5
Introduction of solutions to past problems and focusing on a vision that must be achieved at the end of the treatment.
The treatment will be successful due to the nature of the treatment plan as the family members must be actively involved and focus on achieving a specific goal.
The dysfunctional issue has been a challenge in many families around the globe. Relationship challenges with the parents do arise as well as behavioral problems among the children that need the intervention of a therapist. For instance, the Yousafzai family is dysfunctional has it has been affected by the state of the country. They experience behavioural change an thus need a therapist to help in the process of recovery. Emotional, rational theory and solution-focused therapy are very significant as people tend to acquire skills that enable them to handle the issues.