GENOGRAM, ITS CONSTRUCTION,
ASSESSMENT, PLANNING AND
INTERACTION THROUGH
GENOGRAM.
PRESENTED BY
AREEBA NASAR
ROLL NO.15
GENOGRAM
• It provides a way of mapping family patterns and relationships
across at least three generations.
• It includes:
• ---Demographics: name, age, gender, date of birth, date of death.
• ---separation, divorce illness/accident, death, lawsuit/legal
problem, income increase/decrease
• ---Relationships: nature of family relationships, emotional
relationships, social relationships.
• ---Functioning: Onset or exacerbation of illness, legal problem,
trauma- job loss, school or work problem, Time of year of
previous trauma or loss
CONSTRUCTION OF GENOGRAM
• Construction of genogram has been divided into three
main steps:
• 1-Determine your purpose.
• 2- Gather information.
• 3-Construct the genogram
1-DETERMINE YOUR PURPOSE
• Widely used by both family therapists and family physicians:
Genograms can be used to identify hereditary patterns, genetic
diseases, religious affiliations, and relationship quality.
(McGoldrick,1999)
• Why are you making a genogram? Knowing your purpose for
making a Genogram will also make it easier for you to determine
the kinds of information you need to look for. You’ll also have an
idea who to approach and how to introduce the questions to them.
GATHER INFORMATION
---Creating a safe context for collaboration: ensure confidentiality, build rapport, be
empathetic, active listening.
---Beginning the inquiry: explore the history including; personal, family, educational,
sexual, marital, occupational, social domains.
• The process of gathering information can be thought of as casting an information net in
progressively larger circles to capture relevant information about the family and its
broader context. The net spreads out in different directions:
• from the presenting problem to the larger context of the problem;
• from the immediate household to the extended family and broader social systems;
• from the present family situation to a chronology of historical family events and future
aspirations;
• from easy, nonthreatening queries to difficult, anxiety-provoking questions.
FAMILY'S HISTORY AND CURRENT STRESSES
• The therapist needs to know who is in the family and their whereabouts, level of
functioning, and relationship to the client. The information on the genogram can
specifically help you to understand not only the presenting problem but also the
vulnerabilities and resources of the system.
• What are the relationships between the client and others in his/her network?
• What untimely or traumatic losses or problems have family members had to deal with
in the past?
• What are the family’s assets and resources?
• Are there concurrent stresses that may be compounding the current situation for the
client and/or the family, such as work problems, financial strain or debt, anyone moving
in or out of the family, an illness or other disruption?
• Were there stresses or disruptions at this age or life cycle stage in previous generations ?
FAMILY'S PROBLEM-SOLVING HISTORY
• The therapist will want to know how previous problems have been
solved in a family.
• Has anyone ever sought a therapist’s advice?
• Is it viewed as a loss of face to seek outside consultation?
• Do members of the family seek support from others within or outside
the family?
• If it is a marital problem or a problem with raising or launching a
child, how have these problems been dealt with in previous
generations?
3- CONSTRUCT THE GENOGRAM : KNOW THE SYMBOLS
• Genograms use a variety of symbols to represent family members and their
relationship with one another. Males are represented by squares while females by
circles. Some even include pets which are represented by the diamond shape.
• Entities in the genogram are connected by lines. Solid ones indicate a healthy
relationship between the members. Variations can be observed when the family
relationship involves separation, divorce, affair, and marriage.
• Colors and more animated lines appear when the emotional relationship among the
entities in the genogram is described. Symbols for apathy, harmony, hate, love,
hostility, abuse, and violence all have distinctive figures that make them easily
distinguishable to professionals.
• Mental illnesses,
medical conditions, and addictions have their own symbol.
Deceased members are depicted with a large ‘X’ over their symbols.
(Genopro,2024)
• BASIC SYMBOLS
DRAW THE MEMBERS AND CONNECT THEM WITH
EACH OTHER
• Each generation is drawn below the previous one, with grandparents at the top,
parents on the next level below, and the children at the bottommost portion of the
genogram. The male parent is always drawn on the left side while the female is on
the right. Children also follow a drawing direction, with the eldest placed on the
leftmost portion and the youngest on the right in descending birth order.
• Genograms can depict the quality of relationships between each family member
through the use of lines. Lines can denote marriage, divorce, and other living
situations.
• The name and age of each member are written inside the shapes. Additional
information like the date of marriage, educational background, occupation, and
current location can also be included, depending on which of them are relevant to
the purpose of your genogram.
(Genepro,2024)
DIVE INTO DEEP
• After doing the basic connections, it’s time to delve further into
detail and include the specifics of each relationship
• Emotional connections between each member tell a lot about
how aspects like stress, abuse, harmony, and support affect the
quality of life of an individual.
• Completing your genogram may take quite some time,
depending on how expansive and detailed you want it to be.
(Genepro,2024)
• To indicate the different diseases, which are often hereditary, you
must use a symbol that contains a smaller coloured shape. For
instance, heart disease is shown with a red shape, while
Alzheimer’s disease is shown with a yellow shape. This way, these
diseases within the family history based on the medical genogram.
(Therapist Aid,2020)
THING TO REMEBER
• The male parent is always at the left of the family and the female
parent is always at the right of the family.
• A spouse must always be closer to his first partner, then to
second(if any) and then third and so on.
• A genogram is an assessment tool that can be used to open up
discussion on an individual’s traits, experiences, and relationships.
The information written on it should be treated with respect and
confidentiality.
(Therapist Aid, 2020)
• Every generation, families pass a piece of themselves to their kin. The things that are
passed down can be beautiful or valuable, like stories, culture, knowledge, and
belongings. Or, they can be mostly insignificant, like green eyes from one's
grandfather.
• Other times, more insidious traits can be passed through generations. Sometimes
there's a genetic predisposition to addiction or depression. Other times, unhealthy
ways of thinking and behaving are passed down socially, through example.
• Genograms provide a way for us to examine these patterns. They bring a family's
strengths and weaknesses out into the open. Genograms set the foundation for
nurturing generational strengths and overcoming weaknesses.
(Therapist Aid,2020)
EXAMPLE
• Zahid, is having conflict with his father. He reported that his father is very strict in nature and is inflexible. There was lack off conversation and
conformity (according to family communication pattern theory: laissez-faire) due to which there arises conflict between Zahid and his father.
After probing the history in detail, the therapist come to know that as Zahid's grandfather was only a farmer and due to his old age he couldn't
work more; for which Zahid's father had to go out off country when he was just 18 years old in order to support his family financially, he has a
responsibility four sisters and one brother ( he had to take care of their basic needs, their study and marriage as well). He completed all his
responsibilities very well for which he has to go through from hard and difficult times and he also had no such emotional bonding with his
family. The second thing was, as his father was the bread earner of their family so in every decision his point of view in was considered as
priority. After getting married he used to came on vacations for one or two months which are not enough to have strong bonding with children.
All these situations had made him more authoritative, rigid and inflexible.
And now his father came permanently to Pakistan after almost 32 years( when Zahid's elder brother had gone out off country to work).
Zahid complains about his father as his father wants him to do everything according to him and bounds him for going on outings with friends
and not to stay out late night.
Which raises a conflict between both of them. He wants his father to change his behaviour but the therapist' main goal is to make him
understand that its you who have to develop change in your behaviour.
Through genogram the therapist will make Zahid to understand about the difficulties faced by his father( when his father was of his age, he had
a lot of responsibilities which he had to fulfil, at his age; his father has not enjoying everything that now Zahid is being enjoying; his father had
no facilities like him( e.g; motorbike, mobile phone, branded clothes etc.)
And make him realise that his father was struggling and working hard for their best future. So know Zahid had to find out his role in making the
conditions better to move forward.
EXAMPLE CONTINUE
Which raises a conflict between both of them. He wants his father to change his behaviour but
the therapist' main goal is to make him understand that its you who have to develop change in
your behaviour.
Through genogram the therapist will make Zahid to understand about the difficulties faced by
his father( when his father was of his age, he had a lot of responsibilities which he had to fulfil,
at his age; his father has not enjoying everything that now Zahid is being enjoying; his father
had no facilities like him( e.g; motorbike, mobile phone, branded clothes etc.)
And make him realise that his father was struggling and working hard for their best future. So
know Zahid had to find out his role in making the conditions better to move forward. On the
other hand therapy sessions with his father may also be conducted in order to have a healthy
and flexible approach.
• Helping clients understand themselves through their genograms can facilitate their
determining what changes they are ready to make. Recognizing their connections to
others can often give them the courage to do what is required to resolve their issues.
When people come for therapy they almost always have a degree of ambivalence
about change, along with distress about the current situation and wish for things to
be different. Helping them tell their story allows them put their distress in context
and figure out what change they are ready to undertake.
• For example, when a person goes to a medical doctor for pain, he may just want the
pain to stop. He may not really be ready to change his eating habits or begin a
regimen of exercise to lower his weight or improve his cholesterol level. When he
thinks only about himself, he may not want to change his eating patterns, but
perhaps when he thinks of the implications for his spouse, children, and
grandchildren, he may be able to think differently and make different decisions. It
may even motivate him to think how he misses his father who “killed” himself by
smoking and overeating and died at 43, when he was only 14. He may realize the
long-range implications of his current behavior best when he thinks of himself in
terms of all the people he belongs to, that is, all the people on his genogram.
• Genograms are a primary orientation tool for helping clients figure out where they
have become stuck and where their best resources reside (McGoldrick, 2016).
• Gathering genogram information should be an integral part of any
comprehensive clinical assessment. There is no quantitative
measurement scale by which the clinician can use a genogram in a
cookbook fashion to make clinical predictions. Rather, it is a factual as
well as an interpretive tool, enabling clinicians to generate tentative
hypotheses for further evaluation in a family assessment. Typically, the
genogram is constructed from information gathered during the first
sessions and revised as new information emerges. Thus, the initial
assessment forms the basis for treatment. Of course, we cannot
compartmentalize assessment and treatment (McGoldrick,2016).
Thank you
REFERENCES
GENOPRO. (2024, MAY 25).
WIKIPEDIA.
HTTPS://EN.M.WIKIPEDIA.ORG/WIKI/GENOPRO
MCGOLDRICK, M. (2016). THE GENOGRAM CASEBOOK: A CLINICAL
COMPANION TO GENOGRAMS: ASSESSMENT AND INTERVENTION. W.
W. NORTON & COMPANY.
THERAPIST AID. (2020). GENOGRAMS FOR PSYCHOTHERAPY (GUIDE) |
Therapist Aid. Therapist Aid.
https://www.therapistaid.com/therapy-guide/genograms
HOPE, L. B., MILEWSKI‐HERTLEIN, K. A., & RODRIGUEZ, A.
(2001). CONTEMPORARY FAMILY THERAPY, 23(1), 33–49.
HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.1023/A:1007820115454
