Springer Affinographs: A Dynamic Method for Assessment of Individuals, Couples, Families, and Households

The need for a new method for assessment and imaging of families, couples, and individuals has emerged in response to changes in family forms during the twentieth century. In the twentieth century divorce, remarriage, out-of wedlock child bearing, and alternate life styles have replaced monogamy as predominant form of marriage and the family. The methods of representation and assessment on the other hand remain based on the nineteenth century eugenics models embedded in the modern day genograms. This book is based on the premise that changes in family structure require changes in methods of representation, assessment, research, and teaching. This book introduces such a method in the form of a model named the affinograph. The affinograph provides a method which allows a greater respect for individuals, especially if their relationships contradict the preconceived institutional notions of marriage and the family. Improvement in visualizing families of various types and complexities can make affinographs an important new method that can bring together the theory, research, and application across varied disciplines that comprise family sciences. From the Back Cover Affinographs A Dynamic Method for Assessment of Individuals, Couples, Families, and Households Davor Jedlicka The word family traditionally referred to two parents and their children, a concept that has been subject to constant revisiting over the past half-century with society’s gradual  acceptance of single-parent, blended, adopted, and same-sex families. And as the relationships increase in complexity, so do their problems, requiring innovative professional tools for understanding and assessing families. Affinographs expand on the genogram and other methods currently in use by translating complex family narratives into dynamic, gender-neutral graphic images. Affinograph explains how to create and use these images to generate hypothesis for clinical interventions. The affinographs  represent relationships as clients see them (such as having more than two parents). The book offers varied uses of the method in working with troubled families over diverse situations and across the helping disciplines. Case studies illustrate compound families formed through serial marriages, multiple generations, and multiple households. Extramarital relationships, from the briefest  to the most committed, are also examined. The book covers: Constructing the affinograph. Charting patterns of divorce and remarriage. Assessing gay and lesbian families. Using affinographs in family therapy. Applying affinographs to child protection work. Integrating affinographs into genealogy. Family therapists, sociologists, psychologists, counselors, social workers, and others who provide services to families will find Affinographs both highly informative and eminently useful. The book also lends itself to research and teaching applications. About the Author Dr. Jedlicka is licensed marriage and family therapist with a doctorate degree in sociology from the University of Hawaii and a doctorate degree in Marital Therapy from Texas Woman’s University. He has participated in a pioneering NSF study on computer applications in academic settings. His research on the counseling and supervision on the Internet appeared in the Journal of Technology in Counseling, and in Professional Issues in Counseling. He also published in The Journal of Marriage and the Family, Family Relations, Family Science Review, and Journal of Social Psychology, among other journals. His research articles on Globalization of Romance, Computer Dating, International Mate Selection, Social Networks, and Couple Counseling Online, have been widely cited in professional and popular publications.