Has anyone ever worked with MOL in couples therapy in a setting where both partners are present, or multiple people (e.g. a family setting)?
It’s a question that was asked in a MOL training that Ger Schurink and I were conducting. I’d be very interested in learning about anyone’s efforts in this direction.
Eva
Hi Eva,
Given that this post is over a year old, I’m not sure it’s still of interest to you or not… I’m a bit disappointed that no one replied to it as I think there is (and I personally use) some real potential in using MOL/PCT in couple therapy. I’d be curious as to what others might think as well.
So… while it’s not so much a pure MOL approach… I do use PCT conceptualization of behavior with almost all of my couples. And it looks something like this:
I then explain that this is all well and good for each of us as individuals, but that if we want to be in and maintain a relationship with another that one of our “just rights” has to include a consideration or desire to help their partner meet their just rights, as well… This generally, is pretty well accepted and a very very basic intervention might be just a semantic intervention of changing the vocabulary of our “just rights” wanting to be met from "I’d prefer (my reference signal) vs. I must have (reference signal)
Now, here’s where I think MOL could come into the room with both parties there…
Imagine the most common “conflicts” couples come in with… not taking the trash out, leaving the toilet seat up, toilet paper on top vs bottom… lol…
We can do a Why/How exercise (moving up and down hierarchies potentially) like this…
To client with “trash should be taken out” when I need it to be taken out reference signal:
What bothers you about the trash not being taken out on time? Why is it important to you. and what you’re likely to find with enough questions is another higher level “value” (reference signal)… cleanliness, feeling respected, etc… (it’s almost never about just “the trash”) 
Now, if the partner is listening we can turn to them and ask if they understand why the issue is important to their partner… and whether that makes a difference in how important it might be to them… And we could even ask some questions: “Is it a problem for you, if your partner feels disrespected…” How could you help your partner feel respected?" Is that something you’d be interested in doing, etc…
I suppose the goal for me is to help the partners see each others expectations as “just rights” (reference signals) and their own as being the way they want things to be… not necessarily the way things “must” be… My partner doesn’t need to have the same “just rights” as I do on all things (dishes, trash, toilet seats, etc…) but maybe there are some “just rights” that have to be aligned (commitment, monogamy, trust, etc.)
A phrase I heard or read recently from a Jungian perspective was that “we are the guardian of our partner’s solitude.” I’d appropriate that from a PCT perspective and say “in a relationship, we are the guardians of our partners reference signals” LOL…
Edit to post: One more thought and just something my wife and I have found personally helpful in our relationship and something I occasionally speak about to clients about their relationships whether they’re coming in individually or as a couple. Asking ourselves the question: When I said/did that… what was I trying to make happen? (in other words, what was I controlling for?) can be very helpful… especially if we can ask/ponder it before we actually say/do… And, even better if we can ask ourselves… what was my partner trying to make “just right” by saying/doing that…?
Thoughts?
Thank you Lynndal, for picking up this subject! Great to see your thoughts here on the forum.
So if I’m understanding your view correctly, partners in relationship troubles could benefit very well from understanding more about PCT, about how they are controlling their own perceptions and how these can conflict, and how to solve these conflicts. And those in a language that suits laypeople. Reminds me about EFT therapy, actually, although that method lacks a proper theory and they usually take way more sessions and combine it with exersizes and homework and all that stuff.
I think the MOL question remains: how would MOL with a couple look like? I think a skilled therapist might be able to have a couple in the room and pick up on disruptions from either one of them, going on from there, thus facilitating reorganization in the couple as a system. Wouldn’t that be an intense experience? Or do you think it’s bound to fail?
Eva
Yes… you understood my focus on PCT over MOL exactly with couples. I think you could do MOL with couples. I have one slight (or not so slight) philosophical problem with it though and it involves one of the two goals of MOL (keeping a client talking about a problem). All well and good in individual therapy, but I think couple therapy and couple therapists, in general, spend many, if not most sessions re-hashing fights/conflicts that couples have had during the week/s before the session… I personally think in couple therapy not focusing on these (problems) as much and perhaps focusing on strengths, coping mechanism, communication skills, etc… Might be as or even more important.
But… I’ve done the Adult Attachment Interview with half a couple with their partner listening to their answers and that’s been useful. So, I could see how doing MOL with one part of a couple with the partner listening could also be useful. It would go just like an individual session and the benefit might be that the MOL recipient might gain a different perspective on the “problem” with a side benefit that the listening partner strengthens their understanding of their partner.
I’d be curious to explore other permutations like potentially noting disruptions in the listening partner (what went through your mind just now, when you heard your partner say that)…
I don’t think it’s bound to fail… but I’d want to avoid a 100% focus on problems in couple therapy…
L
Hi Lyndal,
I am not a therapist but a philosopher of education and I found your message very interesting and important.
I have been developing an idea (quite self-evident maybe) that the ultimate goal of education and human growth (Bildung) is to learn responsibility. By that responsibility I mean just an ability and willingness to take into account the references of other controllers and (side) effects of our own controlling to them. It is not at all easy and natural task, because in principle a control system perceives only the perceptions which it controls itself or which immediately affect its controlling.
Now when I read your message I started to vaguely remember that some old thinker has maybe said that the function marriage is the possibility to grow as human beings.
Hi EetuP @EetuP,
I wouldn’t be surprised if some old thinker, perhaps one of the Greek or Stoic philosophers or a psychotherapist from the last century, could have said something like that. A more modern writer Carol Dweck, a professor of psychology at Stanford University, has a popular quote that seems fairly similar: “The whole point of marriage is to encourage your partner’s development and have them encourage yours.”
You’re probably already familiar with him, given your interest in education… but if not, you might find some resonance with Alfred Adler’s work as well, which was heavily based on personal responsibility. A recent, somewhat best-selling book based on Adler’s work and very much about education is “The Courage to Be Disliked.” A bit simplistic, but interesting.
All the best
Thanks Lynndal!
It’s an interesting thing in MOL, that what at the start looks like a problem, quickly becomes something else entirely. For example, a client who is talking about how she feels she has to climb this giant mountain, being tired all the time and not feeling like she’s getting somewhere, may through MOL questions find herself turning around and for the first time, look at the view from the mountain, noting all that she’s already left behind. I don’t feel MOL circles around problems the way other conversations tend to do. Problem and pain may not be the same thing.
But talking about this now, I could imagine MOL for couples being feasible. If the therapist is able to create a space in which whatever there is within each part of the couple is allowed to surface, that would set an example for the couple to start being more open to themselves and each other. Just like MOL within a person helps to create a habit of allowing all perceptions to have a seat at the table.
And nice words, @EetuP, about the growth of responsibility to allow others to control their own perceptions, and to be aware of how our own controlling influences those around us.
RM: No wonder you Finns have such a great society (well, it appears so from here in the US). In the US “responsibility” means “you’re on your own, baby”. In Finland it apparently means “we’re all in this together”. You would be called a damn socialist if you tried to teach your version of responsibility here. Actually, your version of responsibility is just PCT, isn’t it? I think all people come born intuitively understanding your version of responsibility. I don’t think you need to teach it to people. I think what you have to do is avoid teaching it out of them (as they do here in the US and as they apparently don’t do there in Scandinavia).
Best
Rick
Thanks Rick, interesting points.
RM: No wonder you Finns have such a great society (well, it appears so from here in the US). In the US “responsibility” means “you’re on your own, baby”. In Finland it apparently means “we’re all in this together”. You would be called a damn socialist if you tried to teach your version of responsibility here.
EP: Yes, it may appear so, depending on the perspective. Some critics say that Finland is the most American country in the Europe but that is certainly an exaggeration. But sure, there are cultural, social, and political differences.
It is interesting that “responsibility” can really mean those two things: either that no one will help you or that you have to help others. In philosophical / ethical discussions there is a strong meaning that AFTER you have done something you can be responsible to bear the blame or praise. Instead I would stress that BEFORE you do something you are responsible to consider the consequences.
RM: Actually, your version of responsibility is just PCT, isn’t it?
EP: Yes, there are very similar statements in PCT literature and PCT helped me a lot to formulate my current definition of responsibility. And PCT also helps to understand why it can be “cost-effective” also to yourself to consider the references of others.
RM: I think all people come born intuitively understanding your version of responsibility. I don’t think you need to teach it to people. I think what you have to do is avoid teaching it out of them (as they do here in the US and as they apparently don’t do there in Scandinavia).
EP: Well, I am not so sure about that. People are natural control systems and they come born with an ability and tendency to control just their own references. To consider the references of others requires much reorganization – part of which of course
can have been taken place by evolution. I think it is mainly in the family (or other primary socialization community) where we learn that it is possible and often useful or even necessary to take into account the references of the neighbor controllers.
EP: So, most people perhaps can intuitively understand this version of responsibility, but most can apply it only to a few nearest neighbors. The problem is to learn to generalize it to – in principle – all living control systems.
The main difficulty I see in MoL with more than one client concurrently is the inherent limits of the therapist’s relevant perceptual input functions. The therapist must pay acute attention to visual and acoustic indicators that the client may be experiencing a ‘background thought’. When their eyes are directed to one person’s face and body, the other person’s face and body are in peripheral vision.
This is a more careful way of talking about the therapist’s focus of attention. To do MoL the therapist must focus acute ‘attention on nonverbal cues’ suggestive of unspoken mental processes in the client. (Scare quotes for the familiar ‘human communications’ jargon.) Gaining skill at that is I think a fundamental learning for an MoL practitioner. Probably best to get skilled with single clients before expanding to couples therapy, much less group therapy.
But I suppose that’s pretty standard advice.
Before and during WWII, the great anthropologist Ruth Benedict developed the concept of synergy based on her knowledge of many diverse human cultures. Informally, you can think of synergy in this sense as evaluating how good a given culture is for its people–for the people who enact that culture with one another. One diagnostic: in a culture low in synergy, selfishness and altruism are in conflict, and it is not possible to benefit another without sacrifice or injury to oneself; in a culture high in synergy it is not possible to benefit oneself without benefit to others, and the language may not even have the vocabulary to express the concepts of altruism and selfishness. Viewed from within our low-synergy Euro-American cultures, this may seem an impossible fantasy, but it does exist. Friedrich Hyek, Milton Friedman, Ayn Rand, and the Trumpies live in a low-synergy perceptual universe in which you do unto others before they get a chance to do unto you.
This is related to competition vs. cooperation, and E. O. Wilson’s gnomic summation that competitive societies win in the short term but cooperative societies win in the long term. From our competitive point of view, this is akin to the contrast of tactics vs. strategy.
Benedict intended to write a book about the ‘arc’ of possible cultures with synergy as the variable on which to compare them, but wartime demands led her to write her classic study of Japanese culture (The chrysanthemum and the sword), and then her early death in 1948 supervened. Students published notes of her lectures in 1965.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/3739svkjuli79sf/Synergy.Benedict.pdf?dl=0
Ralph Abraham has done important work developing a mathematical model, with particular interest in international relations.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ybu9bhbm3m56oki/Synergy.Abraham.pdf?dl=0
Both of you have identified issues that could affect an MOL couples session all of which I think are extremely important and relevant. Bruce’s post outlining the role of the therapist in being skilled at paying acute attention to disruptions reminds us how challenging it might be.
In regards to Couple Therapy specifically, there are some factors that aren’t related to MOL or would make MOL even more challenging in the room.
It’s frequent that one party of a couple wants to “save” a relationship while another has their foot already out the door. Another couple may consist of a partner who thinks whatever problem they’re having are all on the other partner. Also frequent are partners who are “coerced” into the room and who don’t really want to be there. I don’t think MOL would be appropriate for these type couples.
However, the type Couple that Eva alludes to… that couple who are controlling their perceptions to increase their reference signals for closeness, intimacy, relationship strength, “saving the relationship” etc… might or even be likely to benefit from learning more about their partners references and perceptions.
Edit:
I’m going to try to rephrase/reframe my own quote to put it more in a PCT-informed language.
Lynndal > These include factors such as needing to have a agreed upon goal for the Couple Therapy triad. (couple + therapist).
Could the above quote be rephrased in PCT as all parts of the triad (Couple + Therapist) need to have an agreed upon perception to control for? (improving the relationship, etc…)
Just testing to see if reply by mail works.
| EetuP
October 13 |
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EP: Thanks Rick, interesting points…
EP: Well, I am not so sure about that. People are natural control systems and they come born with an ability and tendency to control just their own references.
RM: Just one little (but I think important) note here: organisms set their own references but they control their own perceptions.
Exactly! Thanks Rick.
Eetu
An afterthought…
RM: Just one little (but I think important) note here: organisms set their own references but they control their own perceptions.
EP: Yes, we partially “set” our own references, especially the lower ones, but the higher are either genetically determined or (partially) randomly reorganized. That’s why I feel that expression a little problematic.
EP: If we say: “they control for something” then to what refers that something? Reference?
Hi Eetu
October 14 |
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An afterthought…
RM: Just one little (but I think important) note here: organisms set their own references but they control their own perceptions.
EP: Yes, we partially “set” our own references, especially the lower ones, but the higher are either genetically determined or (partially) randomly reorganized. That’s why I feel that expression a little problematic.
RM: I was just explaining how the PCT model works. In the PCT model, reference signals are specifications for the state of perceptual variables, which are controlled in the sense that control systems act to maintain these perceptual variables in the specified reference states. So it is never correct in PCT to say that references are controlled.
RM: In the PCT behavioral hierarchy, reference signals are set (to varying values) by higher level systems as the means of controlling the perceptual variables that they are controlling; higher level control systems control their perceptions by telling lower level control systems what to perceive, not what to do.
RM: The PCT model currently assumes that the only references that are set genetically are those for the “intrinsic variables” – physiological variables such as glucose level, blood pressure, etc.
EP: If we say: “they control for something” then to what refers that something? Reference?
RM: The “somethings” organisms control for (according to the PCT model as well as the results of a considerable amount of research tests) are the states of perceptual variables. The reference signal is a theoretical concept in PCT that accounts for the observed fact that perceptual variables are controlled – maintained in reference states.
Best
Rick
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