Parent marital relation's of a boy (13 years old) with severe bronchial asthma was successfully treated with approaches based on L'Abate's family psychology.

　　The parent had had marital process dysfunction characterized by repetitive reactivity, between critical attitude of the wife (39 years old) and withdrawal of the husband (43 years old). When the wife sought for psychotherapy she was depressed and thought of divorce. A marital therapy was suggested.

　　The first intervention was a proposal of non-destructive contract based on TA model, which was accepted by the couple. They confirmed to each other not to divorce. Then several writing tasks were assigned to them as educational approach. Especially effective was the intimacy experiential exercise of “sharing of hurt” through which real intimacy problems were disclosed. The approach/avoidance questionnaire led the wife to expand awareness of her own behavior patterns. She realized that she avoided intimacy. Fifteen sessions of marital therapy brought about stability and release from repetitive reactivity patterns. The hospitalized asthmatic boy also recovered.

　　Forty-two months after the last session, follow-up session was conducted. Good relation was still maintained.

　　The purpose of this study is to introduce Contextual Theory, which was established by Boszormenyi-Nagy, as a tool of producing dialogue among family members. I present herein clinical cases which were discussed to clarify the contribution of this theory to reconstruct family relationships.

　　Loyalty, the spiritual bond connecting each family member to its own family consciously or unconsciously, is the key concept to understand the context which underlies behind Identified Patient's (IP's) symptom and their family problems. It is an inevitable question to be raised in this theory how fairness is broken down and whose loyalty is ignored in the family.

　　Therapist's multi-directed partiality to all members in the family is an important technique at the beginning of the treatment. This will encourage family members to disclose what they think and feel, and also give them good opportunities to think over other members' realities. It is also essential for each member to have a safety-feeling to talk to the therapist and a sense to be listened sympathetically by other members. This process will help the family to take a risk of reacting positively to the considerations given by others including IP. This process finally enables the entire family to dialogue with IP as well as with each other.

　　Case examples presented here suggest us that dialogue might not be a criticism but a self-controlling statement. Dialogue wiil lead the family to create a new balance of relationships which is regarded as being fair by all family members. Unfair partiality of the therapist to particular person in the family would be also useful for the treatment as far as other members follow the treatment process and listen to that person with the therapist.

　　This study examined present and future family images of adolescents by using three methods: Kinetic-Family-Drawing, Family Image Method, and Semantic Differential Method. The present family is defined as the family in which a youth has grown up and the future family is defined as the family which the youth might make after she/he marries in the future.

　　The following two hypothese were made :

　　(1) A circle type would be the form of the healthy family system. The circle type is one of the regular polygons in the family image method.

　　(2) There would be a large difference in the family-image between men and women, in particular for the father image in their future family. Subjects were 209 undergraduate university students (101 men and 108 women).

　　In the Kinetic-Family-Drawing, the subjects drew two pictures representing their present and future family images. In the Family Image Method, so-called “the circle type” is regarded as standard type.

　　Eight groups were made from the circle type and were compared with each other. In the Semantic Differential Method, the subjects rated 12 pairs of adjectives in rank order from 1 to 7.

　　The main results obtained are as follows:

　　1. The circle type is a form of healthy family system having a family circle image.

　　2. There was a difference in the family image between men and women. However, the father images in the future family were not different. Based on the results, we suggest that if the family system is evolved like other life systems, the circle type of family is the best form in evolution.

　　System theories which have been applied so far to family therapies are the first and second generation system theories. This study will explore the possibility of the application to family therapy of autopoiesis theory, regarded as the third generation system theory.

　　One of the most important aspects of autopoietic theory is that it makes it possible to define life in terms of communication that continues without interruption, while producing some new meaning in the process.

　　All sorts of problems which occur within the family are regarded as results of stagnation in communication. Disfunctional behaviors of family members have two simultaneous significations from the point of view of autopoietic therapy. One is the above-mentioned content and the other is the revival of living communication in dysfunctional families. What we must do in family thrapy is to find the small rules observed repeatedly in the family for linking one communication with the next and to revive living communication by correcting these rules.

　　Finally, we should attempt to conceptualize an autopoietic responese on the basis of Bateson's communication theory.