Maina Peter

 Author names: Author affiliation: Course number and name: Instructor name: Assignment due date: Family history & perspective According to Smith-Adcock and Tucker (2017), family belief systems comprise both implicit and explicit guidelines. These guidelines govern the relationship between members and their interaction with the outside world. A family with stable family dynamics, for example, expresses convictions about their children’s sense of purpose and achievement potential. Members of such families are better placed to cope with and survive serious crises. I interviewed an 11-year-old boy called ‘John’, and his mother ‘Jane’ for this paper. Various issues concerning them and their family unit were evaluated. According to Jane, they are a Christian family that derives their values from Christian values. Jane, who is an African immigrant from Kenya, prefers to raise her children how her parents raised her and insists on respect and obedience towards parents. The family’s internal dynamics are strong, as shown by Jane’s opinion that her children are free to choose what they want to be in their lives. She demonstrated her convictions about John’s achievement potential by investing in his interests in music by enrolling him in a music school. The parent’s insistence that John should clean and organize his room shows a culture of individual responsibility, an aspect also seen in John’s ability to prioritize his homework above playing. Family, according to Smith-Adcock and Tucker (2017), is the first source of socialization and thus an essential factor in promoting a child’s sense of belonging. According to John, his family loves him, takes care of him, and they play and listen to him. His remark confirmed the sense of belonging that this relationship with his family provides that he prefers playing outside with his siblings rather than playing games on his computer. John also loves spending time with his father and goes to his mother for comfort when hurt. My assessment of their parenting style from Jane’s description of how they have brought up their children led to the conclusion that they practice authoritative parenting. According to Smith-Adcock and Tucker (2017), authoritative parents set and reinforce rules while nurturing, supporting, and balancing freedom and responsibility for their children. John’s parents ensure he does his homework and cleans his room, but they do not deny him the time to play with his siblings and friends. While they support his interest in music, Jane insists he must go to college. Developmental history and current developmental levels According to Jane, John did not experience any developmental difficulties while growing up. He went through milestones, and in some stages, such as teeth and speech development, he was ahead of his agemates. His mother reported that he was an intelligent and music-loving child when he was growing up.  Social-emotional-behavioral functioning at home and school According to Saeki and Quirk (2015), the extent to which a child’s basic psychological needs are met mediates the relationship between their engagement and social-emotional-behavioral functioning. A child’s self-image regarding their autonomy, competence and relatedness to the task at hand predicts their social-emotional-behavioral functioning. A child with a good self-image is highly engaged and thus appears to be socially, emotionally, and behaviorally well-adjusted. According to his mother, John is a social child and very easy to make friends with. He balances well between church, school, and home, and keeps in contact with his friends through phone calls and messages. His academic performance and commitment to his studies are characteristic of a child who is well-behaved and self-directed. According to him, he seeks the comfort of his mother when sad, rather than engaging in maladaptive behaviors in such stressful situations. This is characteristic of a child who is socially, emotionally, and behaviorally well-adjusted. According to his mother, John had no mental health issues in the past. His mother, however, describes him as a sensitive child. My assessment during the interview also leads to the conclusion that John does not have any existing mental health condition. He seems aware of his emotions and constructively expresses them by going to his mother when sad instead of engaging in destructive behavior. This shows he has self-control and positive emotional health. Strengths and Goals According to Jane, her son is creative, innovative, and good with electronics. Additionally, John thinks outside the box and comes up with unique solutions to his problems. The family showed exceptional unity, as evidenced by the closeness between the siblings and their emotional availability to each other. The parent’s goals are for their children to do what they love. For example, John when John showed interest in drumming, his parents enrolled him in a music and art class. Although he did not like it at the beginning, he developed a liking for the music class. Jane’s goals are for John to choose what he wants to be. As an individual, John aspires to become a drummer or a gamer when he grows up. His mother’s goal is for him to grow up in the structured system of the school and for him to achieve academically, but is open to having him take part in activities outside of school. She wants him to realize his dreams, alongside academic achievements.  Self Reflection I introduced him to the game of cube story generator. We would roll dice and create stories using the pictures that came up. The first picture was a fort, followed by a spear. John said a spear was used in battle and reminded him of David and Goliath. I tried offering clues on how to play the game but abandoned it when he did not seem to understand the concept.  I attribute his limited engagement in the game to his level of cognitive development. An an11-year-old is in the late part of the concrete operations stage of cognitive development. According to Smith-Adcock and Tucker (2017), children in this stage are problem-solving skills and make predictions about what may happen in concrete situations they have encountered before. However, since their abstract thinking is yet to develop, they cannot think beyond the context of concrete situations. He cooperated with me on the tasks I asked him to perform during the interview, which is characteristic of children at this stage.   As for his current developmental stage, John is in the industry versus inferiority stage, which, according to Smith-Adcock and Tucker (2017), involves children's mastery of knowledge and skill development. Failure to develop the key areas of knowledge and skills and the inability to balance their multiple areas of involvement results in feelings of inferiority and incompetence in the child. Children who receive encouragement in their efforts, however, develop self-confidence in their abilities to achieve their goals and success in life. John, for example, receives support from both his parents. His father helps him with his homework and his mother enrolls him in a music school to support his interest in becoming a drummer. In addition, as is characteristic of this developmental stage, John seems to try to cope with social and academic demands, as evidenced by his struggle and attitude toward homework. I had intended to engage John in the cube story generator to see what thoughts the images would generate. He was not as interested in the game as I had expected. I, therefore, had to change tactics and abandon the game idea. I, however, feel that I should have used a game he was familiar with and interested in.  Jane and I were both born and raised in Kenya. Although our parenting styles have been to some extent influenced by western culture, our upbringing influenced our basic beliefs about parenting. Jane mentioned her parents chose for her the activities she could engage in as a child. Their goals were without consideration of what she aspired to be as an individual. This reminded me of my experience with my parents. They preferred I take on feminine roles and courses and insisted that I enroll in a home science class in high school while my preference was for agriculture. The family’s insistence on absolute obedience and respect for the elders also coincided with my family’s culture. My youngest daughter, for example, showed interest in music from a young age. Although I have always insisted on academic performance, I have supported her to the point of releasing two singles. Jane’s goal for her children is to let them do what they love. When John showed interest in becoming a drummer, they enrolled him in a music and art class. Although he disliked the classes, he later developed an interest in both the art and music classes.  Our cultures interacted in the mother’s role as the emotional anchor in the family. In our culture, children rarely approach their fathers for consolation. The mother provides emotional support, and the father guides the children in the more technical things. In this family, John goes to his mother when hurt, but relies on his father for help with his homework. I do not think the interview, having been time-restricted, provided enough information to warrant classifying the family into any developmental model. The interview focused on an 11-year-old child, and it is therefore not ideal to speculate on the changes that might take place throughout his life.  Kelly and Cecilia (1992) reported on the biases most witnessed in the counseling process, including availability and representative heuristics, confirmatory hypothesis testing, reconstructive memory, anchoring, prior knowledge, and labeling biases. I noticed that when John walked into the room, he had a laptop bag with him. Although I had arranged the games we could play together, his initial presentation made me settle for the dice game, because I thought a computer game would interest him. I did not realize until after the interview that in my assumptions, I had exercised anchoring, prior knowledge, and labeling bias. I also feel that since I had interviewed his mother first, I relied on reconstructive memory on some occasions when interviewing John. Had I carried my notes from the session with Jane, I would not have asked John how he keeps in touch with his friends since his mother had provided insight on that.  Walsh (2012) postulates that a flexible system is a key component of a healthy family. A family should adjust their rules, interaction patterns, roles, and beliefs to accommodate the development taking place in the children. Parenting styles, for example, ought to be adjusted depending on the age of the child, as some patterns may not be suitable for certain ages. The authoritarian parenting style may not be effective in pre-teens and teenagers who are exploring their freedoms and life choices. It is the norm for African-born parents to be strict with their decisions and opinions without consideration for the needs or feelings of their children. My experience and Jane’s regarding career and role choice demonstrate this strictness. Jane’s parenting style proves that the cultural context in which the children are growing, and the developmental stage should be considered when deciding on the type of parenting to practice. Brems (2008) reports that it is difficult for clinicians who prefer psychodynamic and psychoanalytic intervention models to avoid emotional reactions and countertransferences when working with children. Identification poses the threat of producing biases in favor of the child and ignorance of the contextual perspective of situations. It may, however, trigger empathy towards the child. The effect of identification on the treatment process depends on whether it is expressed with awareness. As the session was going on, I identified with John’s experiences. His experience with bullying in school, for example, reminded me of my experience when I joined high school. This identification, however, did not feel unhealthy to me, and neither was it too extensive as to trigger inappropriate attachment. Although I did not express it, I felt angry and frustrated over the bullying issue. John’s inability to engage made me question my competence in the effective use of play to draw out thoughts in the child. I felt inadequate when he did not understand some questions, even after I explained. When he engaged well in other tasks, I felt we were making progress and felt motivated.  Brems (2008) postulates that it is vital that child clinicians try to view situations from the child’s perspective and understand how they feel about that situation. One must exercise awareness of the child’s expressions and the latent messages in those expressions. There was an instant where I think I wavered between sympathy and empathy when he mentioned he was terrified of dark places, including their basement. I, however, realized that I was going off-course and collected myself on time and communicated my internal understanding that he feared darkness.  Children often fight, misunderstand each other and hold some resentment toward their parents. I, however, noticed that during the entire duration of the interview, John tried as much as possible to paint his family in good light. I tried to understand him and remained sensitive to his cultural background because most children brought up in African-style parenting value loyalty to the family. Brems (2008) describes various types of relational patterns observed when therapists interact with children, including big sibling countertransference, babysitter countertransference, teacher countertransference, and cop countertransference. I think Brems would put me in the big sibling category. Although this interview was not therapy per se, I do not think I addressed any serious issues. I intended to provide a supportive environment where John would feel safe to express himself. Characteristic of Brems’ (2008) description of the big sibling countertransference, I introduced John to various new games and showed him new strategies for identifying the people who were close to him. I did this with the paper–folding exercise but did not address issues such as the bullying incident and his fear of dark places. I feel like our engagement was rather superficial and nontherapeutic, but understandable because this was not a counseling session and John did not manifest any mental health issues.  According to Brems (2008), the personal attributes of a clinician can be conducive or counterproductive when working with children. Therapists must take it upon themselves to self-evaluate using specific markers of effectiveness. My self-evaluation leads me to conclude that I was effective in the interview with John because I satisfy a considerable number of the markers of effectiveness laid down by Brems. I was aware of my own biases and did not use any offensive, sexist or racist language. Furthermore, I accepted and did not dispute John’s definition of what was important to him, which, on reflection, seems to be his family. I was aware of his developmental stage and cognitive level and thus understood when he could not engage in certain tasks for long. My adaptation to his level and style of functioning was effective, as I did not castigate him for his style of reasoning. I, however, do not think I was effective with the use of metaphors. One thing I expect to feature when I’m counseling children is identification. Given the tendency of children to mirror our childhood, I am inclined to respond to and react to the plight of other people. I, however, believe that if I maintain an awareness of my vulnerabilities, I could maintain a healthy therapeutic stance.  According to Brems (2008), children communicate through metaphor and play. Clinicians are therefore required to be aware of and understand the use of symbolism to decipher the child’s metacommunication. I do not think I expanded enough on John’s use of the metaphor of the Bible story of Goliath and David. I, however, attempted to mirror his unconscious thoughts back to him by commenting that although David was younger and smaller than Goliath, he defeated him using a stone. My understanding of his use of this metaphor was that he felt overwhelmed by his home chores, school assignments, and the need to keep in touch with his friends and siblings. Although this was not a therapy session, I put several of my clinical skills to work. For example, when John said that his mother asks how his friends are, I reflected his feelings by saying that his mother’s inquiry about how his friends are doing is a sign that she likes them. When he said that he fears going into their basement, I reiterated his thoughts that he feared going there because it was dark. This was an effort to let him know I understood the reasons for his fears and how this benefited him by not subjecting him to situations that terrified him.  When occasions presented themselves, I used child-friendly language like commenting “wow! That must be fun”. I also self-disclosed by telling him that, like him, did not like homework. This was an effort to connect with him more and reduce the power differential between us. Additionally, I made most of my questions open so that John could have the liberty to express himself in his way without feeling restricted. For example, I asked him how school was and his response to the bullying incident and he narrated what he had told his parents and teachers, and how they responded to the incident.  If I could redo the interview, I would probe more into sensitive issues like the bullying incident and his fear of the basement. I would want to assess him further to see if the bullying incident caused any trauma in him and if he needs counseling to help him deal with that trauma. I would also want to understand the source of his fear of dark places and use metaphors more than I did in this interview.  References Christiane Brems. (2008). A Comprehensive Guide to Child Psychotherapy and Counseling (3rd ed.). Waveland Press. Morrow, Kelly & Deidan, Cecilia. (1992). Bias in the Counseling Process: How to Recognize and Avoid It. Journal of Counseling & Development-/j-.tb01663.x. Saeki, Elina & Quirk, Matthew. (2015). Getting Students Engaged might not be Enough: The Importance of Psychological Needs Satisfaction on Social-emotional and Behavioral Functioning among Early Adolescents. Social Psychology of Education-/s-. Sondra, Smith-Adcock & Catherine, Tucker. (2017). Counseling Children and Adolescents: Connecting Theory, Development, and Diversity. Sage Publications. Walsh, F. (2012). Normal family processes: Growing diversity and complexity (4th ed.).Guilford.