Feminist Therapy Flashcards

Focus on how the effects of gender, cultural, heterosexual, and other stereotypes affect an individual’s identity and relationships.

Relationships that enhance both parties’ sense of well-being.

The root cause of most forms of emotional distress in feminist theory; this becomes the focus of treatment.

• Increased zest and energy
• Self-worth
• Knowledge and clarity about one’s own experience, the other person, and the relationship
• Creativity
• Productivity and desire for more connection without feeling helpless or needy.

Both client and counselor discover how best to resolve clients’ issues in which counselors recognize the clients’ expertise in their own lives.

Refers to two-way empathy in which each person–counselor and client–is able to see, know, and feel the inner experience of the other as well as experience responsiveness from the other.

Each person’s unique experiences, beliefs, and feelings are heard and responded to, allowing for each member to learn and grow.

Old relational images are reworked in counseling process.

Implies a genuine responsiveness that keeps the well-being and needs of the client in mind.

Describes a commitment to:

• Recognizing the impact of dominant cultural norms
• Acknowledging power differentials in relationships
• Managing overlapping relationships to avoid abuse
• Establishing counselor accountability
• Promoting social change

Meaning that a person’s internal reality, and therefore pathology, is inherently interconnected with political issues from the broader social context.

Counselors explore how the client has internalized social messages about gender and how an individual’s social class, cultural background, profession, and sexual orientation shape the clients’ understanding of gender roles.

Refers to an alternative model for conceptualizing women’s development through relationships.

Internal constructs and expectations of relationship based on early life experience, and how these affect present-day relationships.

Refers to the ability to move back into relationship following disconnection and empathetic failures as well as the ability to ask for help when needed.