Couples

Relationships: Love Is All You Need

Love is a particular kind of need and expectation in a relationship. For many people approaching marriage, love will be the foundation of their entire future together. Committed and passionate love is an important predictor of a relationships success and satisfaction (Hecht et al., 1994). The relationship between passionate and erotic love and satisfaction, along […]

Relationships: Myths and Expectations

Separate to the issue of needs and wants, a counsellor may find that clients are expressing unrealistic notions about married life. Strong correlations have been found between certain unrealistic notions that are believed or maintained by married people and their levels of marital dissatisfaction (Tysoe, 1994). It is worth looking at some of these areas […]

Relationships: Needs and Wants

In 1972 Carl Rogers surveyed the changing marriage scene of his day and said “It is becoming increasingly clear that a man-woman relationship will have permanence only to the degree to which it satisfies the emotional, psychological, intellectual and physical needs of the partners”. He went on to quote the philosopher Soren Kierkegaard , saying […]

Styles and Approaches to Pre-Marriage Counselling

Relationships are necessarily complex. It will be helpful to a counsellor to align and govern their approach with a particular style. There are three usual styles of approach to pre-marital counselling: Instructive Pre marriage counselling has previously been very much the province of churches and religious groups. In this traditional approach there was a tendency […]

Series: Pre-Marriage Counselling

In Australia, over 40 per cent of all marriages end in divorce over a 30 year period, and marriage rates have dropped to the lowest rate they have been in one hundred years (ABS, 2007). Somewhere around one million people in Australia have experienced divorce. The costs associated with divorce, including social security payments and […]

A Case of Using Logical Consequences

Richard is a 41-year-old plant operator in a heavy machinery company. He works long hours and must start very early each day. Twelve months ago he accepted a transfer from a country location to a capital city 250 kilometres away from his family. Due to financial obligations this was seen as a necessity. He travelled […]

Infidelity: Making a Decision

As discussed earlier, one of three events occur after the discovery of an affair. For some, nothing changes in the relationship and the affair is either ignored, denied, repeated, or continued. The affair can unfortunately also end a relationship depending on the intensity and length of the affair and the values of the parties involved. […]

Counselling Dilemma: A Multicultural Issue in a Relationship

An Asian couple has been referred to a counsellor for marriage guidance. The impact of migrating to Australia has taken its toll on their relationship. In the session, the husband seems quite controlled and reserved, whereas the wife cries often but says little. The counsellor is a novice in the area of multicultural difference, but […]