Name
Prata, Guiliana
Introduction
Giuliana Prata was a medical doctor practicing psychiatry in Milan, Italy. She is one of the originators of the Milan systemic approach and, later, one of the four second-generation Milan group members. She authored two books: A systemic jolt to “family game”: The new method, in 1977, and A systemic harpoon into family games: Preventative interventions in family therapy, in 1988. She also co-authored one book with colleagues of the Milan group – and several journal articles. Her works were first published in Italian then later translated to English, French, and Spanish.
Career
Guiliana Prata was a practicing psychiatrist in Milan, Italy, during the 1960s. In 1967, she became one of the eight original psychiatrists of the Milan group lead by Mara Selvini-Palazzoli. This original Milan group disbanded in 1971, leaving Prata, along with Selvini-Palazzoli, Luigi Boscolo, and Gianfranco Cecchin, to form the second-generation Milan Group. The group opened the Milan Centre for the Study of the Family in Milan, Italy. In the years that followed, the team split again, leaving Prata to continue her work with Selvini-Palazzoli. The team reorganized again years later with a younger group that included Selvini-Palazzoli’s son and Anna Maria Sorrentino. In addition to her work with the Milan group, Prata was the director of the Centro di Terapia Familiare Sistemica e di Ricerca (Center for System Family Therapy and Research) in Milan, Italy. She was also Co-Director of the Nuovo Centro per lo Studio della Famiglia (New Centre for Family Studies) until June 30, 1985.
Contributions to Profession
Guiliana Prata was a part of the Milan group and developed a family therapy model derived from structural family therapy. However, group members shifted their focus from the interactional patterns of the family to their belief systems and rituals. The goal of the Milan approach was to assist families with becoming aware of these behavioral patterns in addition to their beliefs in order to view themselves in a relational context to other family members.
The Milan team began their sessions by prescribing no change in symptomatic behavior. They adapted the MRI technique of paradoxical interventions through their own systemic lens that viewed all of the family’s attitudes, behaviors, and interactional patterns as moves designed to perpetuate family games. With the use of counterparadoxes – therapeutic double binds – the team advised the family not to rush to change. As a result, each family member felt more accepted and unblamed for how they were, as the team attempted to discover and counter the family’s paradoxical patterns to disrupt repetitive, unproductive games.
Another contribution of the Milan team was the use of positive connotation. Positive connotation refers to the act of reframing the family’s behaviors that maintain familial interactional patterns so that the family can view symptoms positively because they maintain systemic balance, facilitate cohesion, and overall well-being. The use of rituals is also a contribution by the Milan group. The team believed rituals were important aspects of the family relationship that the therapist hypothesizes are significant for family functioning regarding the presenting problem. Rituals are generally ceremonial acts proposed by the therapist for temporary experimentation. The therapist does not insist the family engage in a ritual, but rather hints that it may be useful. The team believed that carrying out rituals clarifies differences in approach for family members and provides greater awareness of how their differences can cause confusion within the family. Rituals help bring to the family’s attention the importance of consistency in order to organize themselves to a certain level of comfortability to eliminate dysfunctional interactional patterns and behaviors.
According to Boscolo et al. (1987), one of the main contributions by the Milan team to the profession is that of the structured family session. The structured family session is the classic Milan therapeutic interview that consists of five segments: (1) presession, (2) session, (3) intersession, (4) intervention, and (5) post session. The Milan group believed that treatment began at the presession, e.g., the initial telephone call from the family. At this juncture, a team member, namely, Prata, talked to the caller at length, taking note of relevant information. According to Barrows (1982), this was Prata’s main contribution to the Milan systemic approach; the “intensive” telephone interview conducted during the presession at the Milan Family Institute.
Following the presession phone call, the team discussed issues brought to light during intake and proposed working hypotheses regarding the family’s presenting problem. Team meetings took place before each session, as the group met to review the previous session and plan strategies for the upcoming session. These tactics affirmed the group’s belief that the family and therapists are a part of the same system. During the session itself, a major break in the family interview, the intersession, occurred as the observation team had an active discussion with the therapist outside the family’s presence, where the team either adopted or rejected their hypotheses. The therapist would then return to the family to offer the team’s intervention in the form of a prescription or ritual. The post session discussion focused on analysis of the family’s reaction to the intervention and gave the therapist a chance to plan for the following session (Boscolo et al. 1987).
Cross-References
Key Citations
Barrows, S. (1982). Interview with Mara Selvini and Giuliana Prata. The American Journal of Family Therapy, 10, 60–69.
Boscolo, L., Checchin, G., Hoffman, L., & Penn, P. (1987). Milan systemic family therapy: Conversations in theory and practice. New York: Basic Books.
Johnson, C. H. (1998). Using social work theory to engage with gatekeepers in researching the sensitive topic of intra-familial homicide. Qualitative Social Work, 17, 423–438.
Prata, G. (1988). A systemic jolt to “family game”: The new method. Helsinki: Valtion.
Prata, G. (1990). A systemic harpoon into family games: Preventative interventions in family therapy. New York: Brunner/Mazel.
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Moreno, J.M. (2018). Prata, Giuliana. In: Lebow, J., Chambers, A., Breunlin, D. (eds) Encyclopedia of Couple and Family Therapy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15877-8_1038-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15877-8_1038-1
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