“The troublesome other and I”: Parallel stories of separated parents in prolonged conflicts

Abstract

This qualitative study aims to explore how noncohabiting parenting couples in prolonged conflict construct the other parent and themselves. Ten parents from five parent couples were interviewed. A dyadic analytical design was used, where parent's stories of conflict were analyzed in parallel with their co‐parent. Drawing on positioning theory, self‐identity as parents emerged as implicit counter positions in storylines, which construct the co‐parent as “the troublesome other.” Two typologies of conflicted storylines were prominent in the findings: storylines of violations of trust, positioning the co‐parents in relation to traumatic events in the past and, storylines of who is bad, positioning the co‐parent as either a disloyal co‐parent or a dysfunctional parent. The findings indicate that prolonged conflicts made it impossible to find available positions for cooperation. We argue that family therapists should aid each household toward promoting child and family resilience rather than continued efforts to solve chronic conflicts.

Researching what we practice—The paradigm of systemic family research: Part 2

“…By founding our research on the causality pillar and thereby, by extension, assessing for the assumed interdependence of observations (i.e., a test of nonindependence in quantitative methodology; Kenny et al, 2020), we are in a position to empirically test hypotheses generated by family systems theory (Priest, 2021) relating to how systems change across time. Similarly, one could supplement quantitative tests of non-independence with indepth interviews to method triangulate (Fielding, 2012) and hence explore links between statistical associations (e.g., actor and partner effects; Kenny et al, 2020) and meaning-making from different subject positions on relational processes (e.g., self/another positioning, positioning theory; Stokkebekk, 2022;Stokkebekk et al, 2019Stokkebekk et al, , 2021Stokkebekk et al, , 2022.…”

High Conflicts as Wicked Problems from the Perspective of Family Counsellor and Child Welfare Services in Norway

“…The research literature (Anderson et al., 2010; Haddad, Phillips, & Bone, 2016; Johnston, 1994; Kosher & Katz, 2022; Smyth & Moloney, 2019; Stokkebekk, Iversen, Hollekim, & Ness, 2021) shows great variation in terminology when describing parental conflict. Coleman (2014) labels prolonged marital disputes as intractable conflicts characterised by escalation, hostile interactions, sentiment, and a change in quality over time.…”

Reconnecting with relational values in highly conflicted separating couples: A narrative therapy‐informed relational interviewing teamwork‐based supervision approach

“…Recent research identified two common typologies of conflicted storylines. Storylines of violations of trust, positioning the co‐parents in relation to traumatic events in the past, and storylines of who is bad, positioning the co‐parent as either a disloyal co‐parent or a dysfunctional parent (Stokkebekk et al, 2020). The overarching conclusion is that cooperation and reconciliation of positions seems to be unreachable, unless the meaning framework of reference is changed.…”