Spring Conference 2002: The Impact of Cutoff on Generations of Families

Cutoff is a concept of Bowen theory that has created much interest in research, clinical work, and family study. This conference is an opportunity to explore the complexity of the concept in the natural world, human society, and the family.

The two keynote speakers for this conference are Michael McGuire, MD, Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA and past Director of the Nonhuman Primate Laboratory, Sepulveda Veterans Administration Medical Center. Dr. McGuire discussed ostracism in the natural world and its implications for animal functioning.

Katharine Donato, PhD, is Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, Rice University. She will speak on her studies of Mexican family migration and the impact on child health. Other speakers discuss personal efforts to bridge cutoff, the societal implications of cutoff, and application of understanding cutoff to clinical work.

CONFERENCE

PART I

Welcome

Bowen’s Concept of Cutoff - Michael E. Kerr, MD

Panel Discussion

PART II

Unresolved Emotional Attachment and Defining a Self in the Parental Triangle - Selden Illick, LCSW

Cutoff as One Measure of Level of Differentiation - Randall Frost, M.Div.

Efforts at Bridging Cutoff and Its Reflection in Biofeedback - JoAnne Norton, M.Ed.

Panel Discussion

PART III

Ostracism in the Natural World - Michael McGuire, PhD

Panel Discussion

PART IV

Emotional Cutoff and the Brain - Priscilla Friesen, LCSW

The Origin of the Concept of Cutoff - Peter Titelman, PhD

Emotional Cutoff and Holocaust Survivors - Eileen Gottlieb, M. Ed.

Panel Discussion

PART V

Cutoff, Post-Partum Depression, and Perinatal Loss - Beatrice Flynn, RN, MS

Addressing Cutoff in Residential Care of Disturbed Adolescents - Roberta Gilbert, MD

Impact of Contact and Cutoff on Reproduction - Victoria Harrison, MA, LMFT

Panel Discussion

PART VI

Social Networks, Social Support, and Child Well-Being - Katharine Donato, PhD

Panel Discussion

PART VII

Environmental and Agricultural Effects from Human Cutoff - Mary Catherine Bass, M.Div.

Cutoff and Societal Process - Katharine Baker, DSW

Patterns of Cutoff in Families with Substance-Abusing Adolescents - Anne S. McKnight, MSW, EdD

Panel Discussion