The Emotional Side of Socioeconomic Status: A review of the CFC Summer Conference with Dr. Laurie Lassiter

“The Emotional Side of Socioeconomic Status” was the title of Dr. Laurie Lassiter’s presentation at the Center for Family Consultation’s annual summer conference on July 14.  It is also the title of an article by Lassiter published in a recent issue of the journal, Family Systems.  Dr. Lassiter has reviewed a wide range of research to help us understand how social status impacts our health, relationships, and quality of life.  As a scholar of Bowen theory, she brings knowledge of emotional systems and differentiation of self to her study of social status.  Drawing from both her conference presentation and her article, I have chosen the following highlights.

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Collective Intelligence and Differentiation of Self

Why do humans dominate the planet?  Not, as often assumed, because of individual intelligence according to science writer, Matt Ridley.  Not because we have big brains.  Having smarter, cleverer people is not what makes societies work better.  He proposes that

“Human achievement is entirely a networking phenomenon.  It is by putting brains together through the division of labor — through trade and specialization — that human society stumbled upon a way to raise the living standards, carrying capacity, technological virtuosity and knowledge base of the species. …Human achievement is based on collective intelligence–the nodes in the human neural network are people themselves.  By each doing one thing and getting good at it, then sharing and combining the results through exchange, people become capable of doing things they do not even understand.” 

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Learning Bowen Theory

My first acquaintance with the thinking of Murray Bowen was through reading “On the Differentiation of Self,” the paper in which Dr. Bowen presents his theory and describes how it guided his effort toward differentiation of self in his own family. In my first couple of readings, I understood little of the theory or what Dr. Bowen was doing on those visits home, but I heard him clearly on the results. His family became calmer and more flexible. Personal communication opened up. Seriousness gave way to humor.

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Searching for Nature’s Rules

“When we ponder the workings of the human body or of the life of the Serengeti National Park, the details would seem overwhelming, the parts too numerous, and their interactions too complex. The power of a small number of rules…is their ability to reduce complex phenomena to a simpler logic of life.” (10) With this thought, Sean B. Carroll introduces his book, The Serengeti Rules:  The Quest to Discover How Life Works and Why It Matters. 

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The Caste System and The Emotional System

Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste:  The origins of our discontents, is a hard book.  Her words confront us with a hard truth about human behavior:  that humans are capable of imposing extreme cruelty and suffering on other humans and have done so at many points in history.  With brilliant writing and thorough research on three caste systems–American slavery and its aftermath, Nazi Germany, and the millennia-long caste system of India–she traces the forces that drive human behavior to destructive extremes.

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The Use of Force: Law Enforcement as a Reflection of Society

The use of physical force is an instinctual response to a real or perceived threat.  In a moment of fear, who has not found themselves raising a voice, or raising an arm, or seeking a way to constrain the other and protect self?  The use of force to bring conflict under control should be a last resort and applied judiciously, yet with rising emotional intensity, it easily becomes the first resort, setting in motion an escalation of conflict. 

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Bowen Theory Conferences Adapt to Pandemic Conditions

For all of its tragic impacts on humanity, the coronavirus pandemic is presenting us with an opportunity and impetus to take time out for serious thinking.  Since the time of social distancing began several weeks ago, two important Bowen theory network events have taken place:  the annual Spring Conference of the Bowen Center for the Study of the Family (April 3-4) and the 37th Midwest Symposium of the Center for Family Consultation (May 1).  Both were originally planned as onsite conferences but converted to online.  In so doing, the conferences became very different experiences for all involved–planners, presenters, and audience members—and much was learned in the process.  This essay offers thoughts on what was learned, particularly in the area of human behavior and human response to threat.          

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Welcome to a New Year of Opportunity

The new year and new decade present us, our families and our nation with “necessary, serious, and great things,” some which have not been faced before.  Can we bring to it the wisdom we need to transcend our differences and build the cooperation that these times require?

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The Family Leader

Leaders are often described in terms of their individual characteristics:  special talents or knowledge, confidence, charisma, organizing ability and especially the ability to excite others around an important mission.  Some are “born leaders” and others work at developing leadership skills.  Leadership and followership are reciprocal functions in human systems. Leadership training programs abound, but I know of none on followership training which may be equally important.  One cannot lead if no one follows.

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Family-of-Origin Work: The Road to Maturity

At the Family Research Conference in 1967, Murray Bowen gave a presentation that was unusual for a professional meeting.  He had been seeking a way to teach family systems theory in a way that trainees could grasp.  He had also been “working intensively in a new phase of a long-term effort to differentiate my own ‘self’ from my parental extended family.”* He had reached a “dramatic breakthrough”* shortly before the conference. He decided to present his experience in his own family to his colleagues.  It was a very different kind presentation than expected and sparked surprise and much interest from the audience.  He described it as “a practical application of the major concepts in my theoretical and therapeutic systems (page 468).”* It was premised on the concept that the family emotional system is universal in all families, including those of family therapists.  Taking responsibility for defining oneself in one’s own family translates into greater maturity in one’s life overall, and is key to one’s effectiveness as a clinician.

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