The relational reframe and parents' problem constructions in attachment-based family therapy.

Abstract The authors studied the impact of relational reframes on parents' problem constructions and the reciprocal impact of parents' problem constructions on therapists' use of the relational reframe in five early sessions of attachment-based family therapy for depressed adolescents. Across all five sessions, relational reframes led parents to construct problems in interpersonal terms in at least two of their six subsequent speech turns. There was partial support for the hypothesis that reframes led to shifts in parents' constructions, from intrapersonal to interpersonal. In good, but not poor alliance sessions, parents' interpersonal problem constructions led therapists to use relational reframes. Future research should examine not only how interpersonal problem constructions are generated but their quality as well.