Editorial: Effectiveness Research in Couple and Family Therapy

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/famp.12367
• Date: 01 June 2018
• Author: Jay L. Lebow
• Published date: 01 June 2018

JUNE 2018 VOLUME 57 NUMBER 2

Editorial: Effectiveness Research in Couple and

Family Therapy

JAY L. LEBOW*

Fam Proc 57:271–274, 2018

Research that provides the evidence base for psychotherapy is typically conducted in

the highly controlled conditions of randomized clinical trials. There, a very small

number of therapists who have been extensively trained in a specific method of doing psy-

chotherapy execute that method. Great care is applied to ensure that the client population

is as “pure” as possible with participants only having the problem in focus for the treat-

ment and ensuring that the treatment is being delivered as intended through vigilant

supervision and checks for treatment integrity. In couple and family therapy, there are

many such controlled studies demonstrating the impact of several couple therapies under

the best of conditions, including emotionally focused psychotherapy (Wiebe & Johnson,

2016), cognitive-behavioral couple therapy (Fischer, Baucom, & Cohen, 2016), and inte-

grative-behavioral couple therapy (Roddy, Nowlan, Doss, & Christensen, 2016), as well as

numerous family therapies, including functional family therapy (Robbins, Alexander,

Turner, & Hollimon, 2016), multisystemic therapy (Henggeler & Schaeffer, 2016), brief

strategic family therapy (Horigian, Anderson, & Szapocznik, 2016), Maudsley family ther-

apy (Jewell, Blessitt, Stewart, Simic, & Eisler, 2016), attachment-based family therapy

(Diamond, Russon, & Levy, 2016), and psychoeducational-based approaches for working

with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder (McFarlane, 2016; Miklowitz & Chung, 2016).

However, therapy, and most especially couple and family therapy, is typically con-

ducted under conditions far afield from those in the typical randomized controlled study.

Clients are likely to have other conditions that are comorbid with the focal problem; thera-

pists are not likely to practice a pure brand version of therapy; and a multit ude of other

less than optimal conditions, such as the time therapists are available, cost, insurance cov-

erage, and the availability of family members, affect treatment delivery. The question

then remains, how impactful treatments are under the conditions of typical health care

service delivery.

*Editor, Family Process, and Family Institute at Northwestern, Evanston, IL.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Jay L. Lebow, Family Institute at

Northwestern, 618 Library Place, Evanston, IL 60201. E-mail: j-lebow@northwestern.edu.

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Family Process, Vol. 57, No. 2, 2018 ©2018 Family Process Institute

doi: 10.1111/famp.12367