Intensive Filial Therapy With Brazilian Mothers and Their Children, Victims of Family Violence

Gedge, Helen

Abstract

The shelter home where this research project took place is a charity founded in 2000 in Curitiba, Southern Brazil.The charity houses an average of 40 single mother families with their children per year in two residential care homes.The families are sent via the municipal social services and law courts and come from situations of domestic and territorial violence as well as homelessness or extreme poverty. At the very heart of the project is their prime objective: to strengthen the family attachments andrelationships thus enabling children to remain with their mothers and within the family structure. They seek to empower the mother, helping to develop her own support systems and independence so that she can be integrated into society along with her children. To further promote and accomplish this primary focus, this research study proposed the introduction and development of filial play therapy within the work of the shelter home. Mixed methods in design and using a multiple case study methodology, evidence was collated to examine the efficacy of this intervention within this particular context. Data analysis showed a significant increase in empathy in the mother-child interactions mid-intervention with an unexpected drop in the post-intervention measurements. The results of the final interviews following the intervention reveal changes in the mother’s understanding of the importance of play and its benefits for her child, herself and the relationship between them. The results are discussed, a key findingbeing the importance of the role of the therapist in holding the mother’s process affording her the embodied experience of empathy herself so that she is enabled and empowered to provide this more fully for her child. Widening and expanding the therapist’s capacity to offer this holding has significant implications for practice and training which are then considered

Citation

Gedge, H. (2023). Intensive Filial Therapy With Brazilian Mothers and Their Children, Victims of Family Violence. (Thesis). University of Salford

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Jul 22, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Oct 30, 2023
• Award Date: Sep 29, 2023