Family Therapy, Family Practice, and Child and Family Poverty: Historical Perspectives and Recent Developments

ABSTRACT

This paper assesses the engagement of family therapy and family practice with families with children, who are living in poverty. It analyzes four promising models from two perspectives. The first perspective relates to critiques, which have been made of the practice of family therapy with families living in poverty; and the second relates to the implications of the theoretical and empirical literature on the impact of poverty on children. To place this discussion in context, the history of family therapy's involvement with families living in poverty is described and the relevance of the cause versus function debate is highlighted.

KEYWORDS:

• Family therapy
• family practice
• child poverty