Biblioteca Virtual en Salud Enfermería

The present study test the applicability of the structured family interview (EFE) Carneiro (1983) to use with families with violence problems for diagnosis and therapeutic purposes. The evaluation of the family-child relationship is based on a systemic family assessment approach. To validate the adaptation of EFE, certain transactional dimensions were studied (such as aggressively) with ten children between the ages of 7 and 8 years old, who had a mild asthmatic condition, along with their families. This target group (family and asthmatic children) was paired with ten non-asthmatic children and their families. There were no significant differences between the groups of children in terms of age, education or birth order of the children, or in terms of the parents age and mothers education. The interviews with the children and their families were scored by one of the authors and a second judge, blind to the experimental condition with reliability of 87%. Highly significant statistical differences were found between asthmatic and the non-asthmatic groups in all the families transactional dimensions examined. In the experimental group, the families were more dysfunctional and they exhibited denial of conflicts and denial of aggressiveness, parent-child coalitions, anxiousness in dealing with new situations and lack of individualization of each member of the group. The transactional dimensions studied in the EFE support the results of other studies on family violence, although expressed with other concepts. The inequality of power on the family indicates individual problems among the members and is associated with mistreatments which are an important part of the problem of family violence. Another aspect investigated in this study is concerned with the denial of family violence on order to preserve the myth family union. Concluding, the results of an adaptation of the EFE diagnostic instrument showed that EFE can be applied in various families' contexts...