Creating healing relationships for couples dealing with trauma: the use of emotionally focused marital therapy.

@article{Johnson1998CreatingHR,
  title={Creating healing relationships for couples dealing with trauma: the use of emotionally focused marital therapy.},
  author={S. Marianne Johnson and L Williams-Keeler},
  journal={Journal of marital and family therapy},
  year={1998},
  volume={24 1},
  pages={
          25-40
        }
}
Emotionally focused marital therapy (EFT), a marital therapy that particularly focuses on the creation of secure attachment, has proven in empirical studies to be effective for distressed couples. This paper discusses the application of EFT in couples where one or both of the partners have experienced significant trauma. EFT, in this context of trauma, incorporates the nine steps of conventional EFT and also encompasses the three stages of the "constructivist" self development theory of trauma… 
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143 Citations

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Both female CSA survivors and their partners reported higher symptoms of stress, suggesting support for the theory of secondary traumatic stress, and relationship impairment results did not support the hypothesis that CSA would negatively impact the dyadic functioning of couples.
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Compared the attachment injury resolution process in two distressed couples undergoing ten sessions of Emotional Focused Therapy, findings suggest that the resolved couple tended to show more differentiation of interactional positions and greater levels of experiencing throughout the therapeutic process in relation to the non—resolved couple.
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