Diana Kirschner

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Diana Adile Kirschner, Ph.D., is an American psychologist and author. Early in her career she was heavily involved in the field of Integrative Psychotherapy, a movement that seeks to find the best practices from among the major schools of therapy. Kirschner's work involved integrating individual, couples therapy and family therapy into an approach called Comprehensive Family Therapy. The book she coauthored, Comprehensive Family Therapy, was nominated by the Family Psychology Division of the American Psychological Association as one of the 100 most important books written in family psychology. Kirschner has co-authored four professional books and numerous papers and chapters on psychotherapy integration, couples and family therapy, the treatment of sexual abuse and the role of psychologists in family-owned businesses and the media. Her chapter on Comprehensive Family Therapy was included[1] in the two-volume survey and history of the field, Voices in Family Psychology. Four different texts on Integrative Psychotherapy included Kirschner's work on treating couples and families,[2] the process of change[3], the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder in incest survivors in the context of family dysfunction[4] and the treatment of difficult children.[5]

Kirschner was a founding member of the editorial board and contributor to the Journal of Couples Therapy.[6] She was also a founding faculty member and Director of the Pennsylvania-based Institute for Comprehensive Family Therapy, a non-profit, postgraduate mental health training and treatment center whose certificate program in marriage and family therapy was accredited by the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapy.

Contents

[edit] Seminal Contributions to the Field

Kirschner has contributed two major ideas to the field of psychotherapy that have found their way into empirical research: the impact of the marital relationship on children's functioning and the common underlying characteristics of healthy marriages. Kirschner hypothesized that researchers would ultimately be able to tease out the most critical variables that impacted children's well-being and their social functioning. First among these factors, she wrote, would be the quality of the marital relationship and everyday marital conflict and their influence on the way the spouses reared the child. Recent studies have validated this hypothesis. For example, in a study[7] of over 2,500 married parents with a child under 18 living at home, researchers found that marital conflict had a direct impact on children's problems, was related to more frequent use of harsh disciplines, and increased the level of conflict between parents and adolescents. While these findings and those of Cummings and Davies[8] on the impact of marital conflict on children's adjustment may seem obvious to some, they are in fact at the center of the nature vs. nurture controversy.

A second important idea was Kirschner's belief in the existence of healthy or highly satisfied couples. She interpreted Tolstoy's opening line from Anna Karenina, "All happy families resemble one another, all unhappy families are unique in their own grief," as an observation by a great novelist that happy couples and families share unique characteristics. She made it her life's work to look into and discover those commonalities. Kirschner believed that at the core of these relationships was a win-win commitment by the spouses to help each other grow and develop. She and her colleagues found that these couples enjoyed spending time alone more so than medium- or low- satisfaction couples. She found that they also learned to handle conflicts skillfully such that resentments didn't linger. Two decades of empirical research summarized by Gottman and Silver (1999)[9], Olson & Flowers[10] (over 6,000 couples studied, 1993) and a metanalysis by Bradbury, Fincham, and Beach (2000)[11] have validated the existence of healthy couples in the general population and the common traits they share. These researchers have confirmed the importance of the win-win commitment , conflict resolution skills, the desire to spend time with each other, and several other variables including sexual fidelity and lack of violence as common key characteristics of healthy couples.

[edit] Media Psychologist

For the past fifteen years, Kirschner has worked as a media psychologist and was the co-editor of the American Psychological Association’s first book devoted to psychology and the media.[12] As co-editor she helped shape contributions by leading researchers on the impact of violence in the media on children; gender and ageism in television and other media; as well as the roles psychologists play in the mass media. Kirschner also appears regularly as a guest expert on love and relationship issues on national TV and radio shows, and in major newspapers, periodicals and on-line publications. Kirschner has also written Opening Love’s Door: The Seven Lessons, a novel with psychological insights, as well as a best-selling Amazon short about love relationships.

[edit] Publications

  • Kirschner, D. (2005). The Ultimate Guide to Getting the Love You Want. Amazon Shorts, ASIN B000BO0M30.
  • Kirschner, D. A. (2004). Opening Love’s Door: The Seven Lessons. Lincoln, NE: iUniverse, ISBN 0-595-33386-9.
  • Kirschner, D.A. & Kirschner, S. (1986). Comprehensive Family Therapy. New York: Brunner-Mazel, ISBN 0-87630-403-X.
  • Kirschner, S., Kirschner, D.A. & Rappaport, R.L. (1993). Working with Adult Incest Survivors: The Healing Journey. New York: Brunner-Mazel, ISBN 0-87630-691-1.
  • Kirschner, S. & Kirschner, D.A. (Eds.) (1997). Perspectives on Psychology and the Media. Washington: American Psychological Association. ISBN 1-55798-433-6.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Kirschner, S. & Kirschner, D.A. (1990). Comprehensive Family Therapy. In F.W. Kaslow (Ed.)Voices in Family Psychology, Vol. 2, (pp. 231-243). Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications. ISBN 0-8039-3794-6.
  2. ^ Kirschner, S. & Kirschner, D.A.(1993). Couples and Families. In G. Stricker & J.R. Gold (Eds.), Comprehensive Handbook of Psychotherapy Integration (pp. 401-412). New York: Plenum Press. ISBN 0-306-44280-9.
  3. ^ Kirschner, S. & Kirschner, D.A. (1991). The two faces of change: Progression and regression. In R.C. Curtis & G. Stricker (Eds.), How People Change: Inside and Outside Therapy(pp.117-127). New York: Plenum Press. ISBN 0-306-43784-8.
  4. ^ Kirschner, S. & Kirschner, D.A. (1996). Relational Components of the Incest Survivor Syndrome. In F.W. Kaslow (Ed.), Handbook of Relational Diagnosis, (pp.407-419). New York: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 0-471-08078-0.
  5. ^ Guerney, Jr., B.G., Fraillon, J. M. G., Kirschner, D. A., & Kirschner, S. (1990). In N. Saltzman & J.C. Norcross (Eds.), Therapy Wars: Contention and Convergence in Differing Clinical Approaches (pp.218-241). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. ISBN 1-55542-259-4.
  6. ^ Kirschner, D.A. & Kirschner, S. (1990). Couples Therapy: A New Look. Journal of Couples Therapy, 1 (1),91-100,
  7. ^ Buehler, C. & Gerard, J.M. (2002). Marital conflict, Ineffective parenting, and children and adolescents' maladjustment. Journal of Marriage and the Family,64, pp. 78-92.
  8. ^ Cummings, E.M., & Davies, P.T. (2002). Effects of marital conflict on children: Recent advances and emerging themes in process-oriented research. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 43, pp. 31-63.
  9. ^ Gottman, J.M. & Silver, N. (1999). The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work.New York: Crown.
  10. ^ Olson, D.H. & Flowers, B.J. (1993). Five Types of marriage: An Empirical Typology based on ENRICH. The Family Journal, 1, (3), pp.196-207.
  11. ^ Bradbury, T.N., Fincham, F.D., & Beach, S. (2000). Research on the nature and determinants of marital satisfaction: A decade review. Journal of Marriage and the Family,62, pp.964-980.
  12. ^ Kirschner, S. & Kirschner, D.A. (Eds.) (1997). Perspectives on Psychology and the Media. Washington: American Psychological Association. ISBN 1-55798-433-6
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