The Bowen Center

The formation of public policy almost always involves issues about which interested parties hold differing views of varying intensity about their resolution. Within the framework of Bowen Theory, those parties form a three-person emotional relationship system, the basic building block which is known as a triangle. The concept of the triangle in Bowen Theory describes […]

Observations from clinical work with couples who have children reveal certain gender based relationship patterns consistent with other mammals that form pair bonds. Stress affects males and females differently, and they often show different patterns of behavior regarding social bonding. The psycho/behavioral systems involved in this intricate interplay between males, females, and offspring are rooted […]

Murray Bowen’s “Dear Family” letters contain numerous examples of his theoretical thinking about the concepts of Bowen family systems theory and its applications. Dr. Judith M. Bowen will present some of these letters that comprise one distinctive component of the Murray Bowen Archives. Many of these writings illustrate theory but also reveal Dr. Bowen’s keen […]

The family emotional system presents the combination of emotion and relationship. Emotion provides the energy and relationships provide the arena for the expression of emotion in behavior. The combination produces the dynamic ebb and flow of family life across time. Family emotional process lies at the heart of the family, an ever-present phenomenon shaping, shifting, […]

The differences in Christian and Judaic theology and practices have been considered the root of anti-Semitic behavior for generations. This cause and effect, narrow view of a complex, persistent, and widespread phenomenon is less than helpful and more than inaccurate in explaining the fundamental emotional process that has driven anti-Semitism throughout history. This presentation attempts […]

San Lucas Quiaviní is a Zapotec Community in Oaxaca, Mexico. Since the 1970s San Lucas has seen large scale migration to Los Angeles where about half the community resides. This presentation centers on the factors influencing parental language choices among migrants. With a substantial number of families settling or being raised in Los Angeles, family […]

Dr. Bowen defined eight concepts, two main variables, two counterbalancing life forces, numerous subvariables and one key assumption that make up the structure of Bowen theory. Randall T. Frost will examine how the parts fit together to make a coherent whole and how developments in the life sciences — such as research on the stress […]

Most people recognize resilience when they see it — the ability to “bounce back” from adversity or hardship. Is resilience “hardwired” into a person or is it a relationship process? What factors increase resilience in a person or a family? This presentation will pose some questions about the research on resilience over the last thirty […]

Dr. Anne S. McKnight will discuss addiction as an outcome of an emotional process through which family anxiety is both generated and managed. She will address the reciprocal interactions of the family that lead to the progression of the addiction as well as the anxiety that is unleashed when an addicted member stops using drugs […]

Anxiety disorders are the most common mental disorders and result in considerable impairment across many areas of functioning. Dr. Bruce N. Cuthbert will present a perspective on studying emotions, particularly anxiety, empirically. This view will be exemplified by recent findings comparing emotional responses in patients with differing primary diagnoses of anxiety. Patients with greater levels […]

Authors like Richard Russo and Anne Tyler tell stories we want to hear because they resonate with our own experience. They give us their best writing and, in return, our best reading recognizes that our own stories affect what we see and hear in the narrative. Bowen family systems theory offers the reader a way […]

Can science tell us whether blood is thicker than water? Are we particularly nice to our blood kin and, if so, why? In The Altruism Equation, Dr. Lee Alan Dugatkin tells the story of the fierce debate about altruism and kinship among evolutionary biologists, Before the debate was over, politics, philosophy, even religion, would enter […]

In her recent book, The Beauty of What Remains, Dr. Susan Hadler reveals the details of her journey to break through barriers of absence, silence and prohibitions. This effort was an opportunity to gain strength and support to persevere in the face of reactivity to find the lost, to bridge cut-offs and to bring her shattered family together. Her husband, The Rev. Jacques Hadler, journeyed with her using his awareness of Bowen theory through his learning experience with Rabbi Edwin Friedman. Dr. Hadler will talk about her journey and The Rev. Hadler will describe how Bowen Theory was an influence in this process. This lecture was recorded live at The Bowen Center in Washington, DC on February 9, 2017.

The development of higher cortical systems involved in the ability to manage self is embedded in the relationship circuitry of the family. The differentiation of the intellectual system and its relationship to the family will be discussed in its developmental and evolutionary contexts. *Please note that there were some technical difficulties in this recording of this presentation. At about 48:45 there is a period of silence where we switched to a back up recorder. This lecture was recorded live at The Bowen Center in Washington, DC on January 12, 2017.

Observations from clinical work with couples who have children reveal certain gender based relationship patterns consistent with other mammals that form pair bonds. Stress affects males and females differently, and they often show different patterns of behavior regarding social bonding. The psycho/behavioral systems involved in this intricate interplay between males, females, and offspring are rooted partly in the neurobiology of social affiliation and pair bonding, which is similar among mammalian species. The differences in how males and females manage stress reactivity and affiliation lead to predictable ways that triangles take shape as tension arises within families. The concept of the triangle theoretically grounds the predictable patterns that emerge within the family unit involving parents. This lecture was recorded live at The Bowen Center in Washington, DC on January 8, 2015.