Quiz #11: Ethical Issues in Couples and Family Therapy
1. The family systems perspective is grounded on the assumption that a client’s problematic behavior may be:
a. an individual problem that needs to be resolved before the family can meet in a group.
b. the issue that is keeping the family in crisis.
c. A symptom of dysfunctional patterns handed down across generations.
d. A result of the individual’s maladjustment and psychosocial development.
2. All of the following are areas specifically addressed by the AAMFT Code of Ethics EXCEPT for:
a. professional competency and integrity.
b. giving gifts and receiving gifts from clients.
c. responsibility to students and supervisees.
d. responsibility to the profession.
3. According to couples and family ethical standards, the therapist needs to:
a. focus the therapy on the identified patient.
b. assure total confidentiality to family members who seek individual therapy sessions from the
therapist.
c. refrain from advertising their services.
d. maintain high standards of professional competence and integrity.
4. According to the authors, the first order of importance of training family therapists is to:
a. acquire self-knowledge, especially with regard to family-of-origin issues.
b. learn basic counseling techniques to use with families and couples.
c. learn and practice specialties such as systems theory.
d. understand effective intervention techniques used when working with families and couples.
5. Gender sensitive models of training family therapists are aimed at:
a. raising consciousness concerning the role of cultural and ethnic factors in influencing the outlooks
and behaviors of individuals and families.
b. overcoming trainee gender bias and sex-role stereotyping.
c. films and videotapes of family therapy sessions.
d. role playing and discussion.
6. Most family therapy training programs employ both didactic and experiential methods and supervised practice. Experiential methods include:
a. classroom lectures, reading, and demonstrations.
b. both personal therapy and working with one’s own family of origin.
c. films and videotapes of family therapy sessions.
d. role playing and discussion.
7. If counselors are working with families, and if their program did not prepare them for competence in family therapy, they are:
a. vulnerable to a malpractice suit
b. doing what they must under the circumstances
c. on safe ground as long as the family knows about their limited training
d. doing the appropriate thing if an individual client requests family therapy
8. Feminist family therapists are concerned about shifting the balance of power between women and men in the family. Therefore, it is not LIKELY that they would:
a. focus exclusively on the couple’s relationship.
b. question gender-specific roles
c. place the same demands for change on both women and men.
d. value the expression of emotion and nurturance in both men and women.
9. Below is a sex-biased therapist response to problems presented in couples therapy:
a. Assuming that remaining married may not be the best choice for a woman.
b. Demonstrating equal interest in both the woman’s career and the man’s career.
c. Encouraging the couples to accept the fact that child rearing is primarily the responsibility of the
mother.
d. Shows some value bias whether or not the wife or husband had an affair.
10. The authors take the following position in regards to confidentiality in couples and family therapy:
a. “Hidden agendas” are seen as material that should be brought out into the open during a family
session.
b. Therapists should not divulge in a family session any information given to them in an individual
session.
c. Therapists need to inform the clients that any information given during private sessions will be
divulged in accordance with the greatest benefit to the family.
d. Family therapists are exempt from reporting information that could harm the family system.