Research Methods in Family Therapy

by Douglas H. Sprenkle PhD (Editor), Fred P. Piercy PhD (Editor)

Overview

In this widely adopted text and professional reference, leading contributors provide the knowledge needed to design strong qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-method studies; analyze the resulting data; and translate findings into improved practices and programs. Following a consistent format, user-friendly chapters thoroughly describe the various methodologies and illustrate their applications with helpful concrete examples.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781609181147
Publisher:	Guilford Publications, Inc.
Publication date:	06/01/2005
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	473
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Douglas H. Sprenkle, PhD, until his death in 2018, was Professor Emeritus at Purdue University, where he was developer and former Director of the Doctoral Program in Marriage and Family Therapy Dr. Sprenkle was past Editor of the Journal of Marital and Family Therapy and the author or editor of over 130 scholarly articles and books. He received the Osborne Award from the National Council on Family Relations, which is given biannually for outstanding teaching, and the Outstanding Contribution to Marriage and Family Therapy Award, the Cumulative Career Contribution to Marriage and Family Therapy Research Award, and the Training Award from the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. Dr. Sprenkle also won the Award for Significant Contribution to Family Therapy Theory and Practice from the American Family Therapy Academy.

Fred P. Piercy, PhD, is professor and head of the Department of Human Development at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. He has served two times on the Board of Directors of AAMFT, and as the chair of the Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education. Dr. Piercy is also a member and fellow of both AAMFT and the American Psychological Association. He has written over 160 published articles, 5 books, and 35 funded grants. Most recently, he is the coeditor of the Handbook of the Clinical Treatment of Infidelity (with Katherine Hertlein and Joseph Wetchler). Dr. Piercy has won both national and university teaching awards. He has also collaborated extensively with colleagues from the University of Indonesia and Atma Jaya University (in Jakarta, Indonesia) and was the principal investigator of a World AIDS Foundation-funded project in Indonesia.

Table of Contents

I. INTRODUCTION
1. Pluralism, Diversity, and Sophistication in Family Therapy Research, Douglas H. Sprenkle and Fred P. Piercy
2. A Graduate Student Guide to Conducting Research in Marriage and Family Therapy, Lenore M. McWey, Ebony Joy James, and Sara A. Smock
II. QUALITATIVE METHODS
3. Let's Get Grounded: Family Therapy Research and Grounded Theory, Silvia Echevarria-Doan and Carolyn Y. Tubbs
4. The Use of Phenomenology for Family Therapy Research: The Search for Meaning, Carla M. Dahl and Pauline Boss
5. Focus Groups in Family Therapy Research, Fred P. Piercy and Katherine M. Hertlein
6. Action Research Methods in Family Therapy, Tai J. Mendenhall and William J. Doherty
7. Computer-Aided Qualitative Data Analysis Software: General Issues for Family Therapy Researchers, Jennifer L. Matheson
8. Bridging Research: Using Ethnography to Inform Clinical Practice, Carolyn Y. Tubbs and Linda M. Burton
9. Feminist Autoethnography, Katherine R. Allen and Fred P. Piercy
10. Performance Methodology: Constructing Discourses and Discursive Practices in Family Therapy Research, Saliha Bava
11. Future Directions for Qualitative Methods, Ronald J. Chenail
III. MIXED METHODS
12. Survey Research, Thorana S. Nelson and David D. Allred
13. The Delphi Method, Linda Stone Fish and Dean M. Busby
14. Task Analysis of Couple and Family Change Events, Brent Bradley and Susan M. Johnson
15. Program Evaluation Science and Family Therapy, Jay A. Mancini, Angela J. Huebner, Eric E. McCollum, and Lydia I. Marek
IV. QUANTITATIVE METHODS
16. Clinical Trials in Marriage and Family Therapy Research, Kevin P. Lyness, Stephanie R. Walsh, and Douglas H. Sprenkle
17. Meta-Analysis in Family Therapy Research, Karen S. Wampler, Alan Reifman, and Julianne M. Serovich
18. Economic Evaluation Methodology for Family Therapy Outcome Research, David P. Mackinnon
19. Approaches to Prediction: Correlation, Regression, and Classification Techniques, Douglas K. Snyder and Laurel F. Mangrum
V. ADVANCED QUANTITATIVE METHODS
20. Multilevel Growth Modeling in the Context of Family Research, Margaret K. Keiley, Nina C. Martin, Ting Liu, and Megan Dolbin-MacNab
21. Covariance Structure Analysis: From Path Analysis to Structural Equation Modeling, Margaret K. Keiley, Mary Dankoski, Megan Dolbin-MacNab, and Ting Liu

Interviews

Family therapists, psychologists, and counselors, as well as graduate students in these areas. The book's comprehensive coverage of research methods will also benefit researchers, instructors, and students in social work, education, and other social science disciplines. Serves as a primary text in research courses in family therapy.

Editorial Reviews

Explores existing and emerging approaches to traditions of qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods of research in family therapy. Describes methods including naturalistic research, critical theory research, quantitative design in family therapy, cost- effectiveness evaluations, meta-analysis, and survey research. For clinicians and researchers. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

"Lays out an important bridge between research and practice in family therapy. This very readable volume answers immediate research questions and serves as a convenient reference guide for further in-depth reading and application....For the clinician, this book is a must have to consult when evaluating research studies for an evidence-based practice protocol. Professors will want to have this resource for preparing lecture notes or for assisting student researchers. Students will benefit from having this book so that they can see more vividly the research/practice connection. Researchers will want to refer back to specific chapters relating to the methodological protocols and themes in order to produce solid and applicable research projects."

Journal of Marital and Family Therapy

"Sprenkle and Piercy do an excellent job of bringing together a group of learned authors on a multitude of family therapy research methods. The balance between qualitative and quantitative methods is well organized, and the Mixed Methods section is exceptional. Throughout the text, the use of computer technology in data collection and analysis is discussed as an essential research technique. This alone is enough to recommend it as a graduate text. This book would serve well as a 'stand-alone' text for the first graduate research class in marriage & family therapy and in other mental health and human services disciplines. It would also be a valuable resource for those clinicians already in practice, especially those responsible for administrative or program evaluation duties."

The Family Journal

"This book is a good choice for the family therapy practitioner who wants to understand more about the research enterprise and is a very good choice for the researcher who seeks a reference point for emerging issues across the domain of family therapy research approaches. For graduate students and their mentors, this will be an excellent core text and a worthy heir to the foundation established by the first edition."

PsycCRITIQUES

"Research Methods in Family Therapy is like a long-overdue summit meeting of ambassadors of all the conceptual powers in the field that will influence the directions family therapy research will go in the next couple of decades. While clearly focused on family therapy, almost all the material presented here is equally relevant to the understanding and application of investigative methods for individual therapy as well. This is a critical and technical tour de force for the field." —Alan S. Gurman, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry, University of Wisconsin Medical School

"This wonderful volume is the most ambitious project to date focused on bringing the full range of qualitative and quantitative research methods relevant for family researchers under one 'roof.' The book is quite simply a tour de force, a tribute not only to how rich a field family therapy research has become, but also to the extraordinary skills of the editors. Sprenkle and Moon have brought together a group of committed and highly articulate researchers, and have provided them with the necessary structure to ensure that each and every author will teach as well as inform. In this way, family therapy research is truly brought alive and made fully accessible for both aspiring and experienced researchers." —Peter Steinglass, MD, Executive Director, Ackerman Institute for Family Therapy

"This is far more than a handbook that merely lists or describes family therapy research methods. The specific methods are skillfully placed in their conceptual and historical contexts. And the content is pitched at a level that will provide an invaluable overview for graduate students and at the same time covers a variety of topics in a manner that will be remarkably fresh and informative for the most experienced researcher. Qualitative, constructionist, and naturalistic approaches are included together with state-of-the-art discussions of hard-nosed empirical and statistical methodologies. This volume should be on the desk of every family therapist who wants to expand and document the scope of the family therapy field." —Lyman C. Wynne, MD, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry

From the Publisher