Traditional Gender Roles and Sexism

 

The very first general principal of the Ethics Code is about striving to do good and not doing harm.  One very important thing therapists need to be cognizant of is keeping an unbiased and objective mind during therapy

Every family is different!  In my house I don't cook, my husband does...and when there is a big spider - we call my 15 year old daughter to kill it. 

Some unacceptable examples of a biased therapist would be:

• Addressing the husband when discussing family finances
• Not taking serious a wife's need for help with child rearing, or only addressing the wife when speaking about child rearing
• Assuming that remaining in a marriage would be better for the woman
• Demonstrating less interest in the woman's career than the man's
• Having a double standard when addressing a woman's affair compared to a man's
• Deferring to the husband's needs over the wife's

Another example of a therapist undermining couples therapy would be a wife that is trying to challenge traditional gender roles within her marriage, and a husband who is a reluctant sexist.   If during individual therapy sessions the therapist agrees with the wife that the husband is a sexist, they have just done harm!  The therapists role is to guide both parties to a balanced alliance!

What if a couple enters therapy and one of their goals is to reinforce sexist gender roles...what can a therapist do?   The therapist should examine how to make the relationship more egalitarian.  There is a great chance that the issue at hand is just the tip of the iceberg and the real underlying issue has more to do with more fundamental issues about how the responsibilities of the relationship are defined and delegated.  It's the therapist's job to guide them to uncovering the real issues.

It is important that the therapist recognizes their own personal views on sex roles in order to avoid imposing any of their own personal views on their clients and their families. 

It is not the therapist's role to have a predetermined idea of how a family should function.


Source: Margolin, G., (1982). American Psychologist, Vol 37 (7) 788-801, retrieved online http://gsappweb.rutgers.edu/cstudents/comps/GenComps/Gen4-7_margolin_ethical.pdf