The Adult Exploration of Attachment Interview (AEAI) is a therapeutic interview developed by the author to assist adults to understand themselves and their relationships with others, especially with a partner, co-parent and/or children. It is suitable for individuals and couples struggling to overcome repeated patterns of relating, helping to improve their intimate or parenting relationships through greater self and other understanding. The AEAI explores an adult's early relational learning, especially in regard to attachment needs, in order to allow change. The interview uses specific externalising language to help persons tolerate difficult memories, reduce guilt and shame and integrate their thoughts and feelings. It applies key implications of attachment theory and the approach is illustrated by examples from therapy.

This article is underpinned by the premise that for recovery, healing and post-traumatic growth to occur after traumatic events such as technological and natural disasters, massacres and terrorist attacks, effective therapeutic services need to be offered at both the individual and community level. Frequently, responses to such traumatic instances have been conceptualised as discrete, polarised interventions offered by various groups of health and welfare professionals at various points post the traumatic event. Traditionally when therapeutic interventions are considered, many practitioners assume that the response would, and should, focus primarily and narrowly, on individuals or their families and the symptoms of post-traumatic stress. Conversely, the perceived role of community wide interventions has been unnecessarily limited to disaster relief or organised emergency responses most usually offered at the time of the crisis. The consequence of these limited understandings is an apparent failure to explore fully the therapeutic or mediating role of social or community support in surviving trauma. Interventions encompassing the level of community might be therapeutic in two fundamental ways. First, if practitioners embraced ideas from systemic family therapy literature, ideas that acknowledge the importance of social networks, this would encourage a more holistic vision of resilience and recovery. Second, if practitioners recognised that whole communities and social networks might also be traumatised, they could provide support and interventions oriented toward healing at this broader level.

The Let`s Start Parent-Child Program is a manualised parent-child program which aims to improve educational, social and emotional outcomes for Aboriginal parents and their four- to seven-year-old children. It has been implemented in the Northern Territory, Australia on the Tiwi Islands and in Darwin since 2005. This paper outlines the adaptation of the program to include narrative approaches, the sharing of stories and the use of expressive arts as a way to build understanding between program leaders and participating families. An example from a recent program is used to illustrate how the sharing of stories and expressive use of art engages and binds group participants together. It supports parents to tell their own stories, to speak about their lived experience, to reconsider aspects of their own and their children's experiences and to achieve an increased awareness of their personal resources and a sense of self-empowerment. The program is designed and delivered with sensitivity to individual parents, children and families, where cultural and interpersonal differences and different developmental and family situations can be taken into account.

This paper reports on three complementary research studies that set out to examine the incidence and nature of single sessions in hospital social work practice. The first study was a data-mining exercise that used statistics recorded by practitioners in nine public hospitals over a 12-month period to establish the extent of single session work, the clinical areas in which it occurred, and the types of issues it covered. This quantitative information was enhanced with the qualitative findings of the two subsequent studies: the first with hospital social workers; and the second with single-session clients. We concluded that single session work has not been sufficiently acknowledged in social work education and literature, and that it needs to become a more legitimate part of social work practice and training. At best, it represents social work at its highest level of skill, requiring expertise in quickly building rapport, assessment, and knowledge about sources of practical aid and information.

The aim of this plenary address is to advocate for the role that research can play in family therapy, with particular reference to our future as a field in Australia. I will argue: 1) that we have been in transition as a field in the past 15 years or so, from a fairly closed system, to one that is more amenable to holding itself to account through research; 2) that we hold a number of misconceptions about research that need to be explored if we are to continue; 3) that we need to develop a research agenda that is consistent with our values and 4) that there are a host of research methodologies that are consistent with our epistemologies and modes of practice.

Setting up and implementing a single session family consultation in a specialist child and adolescent mental health setting, which for a long time has been an organisation and culture that has undertaken a traditional detailed child and family assessment and treatment, brings with it challenges. This paper will look at the history of single session consultation within the field of child and family services and, in particular, child and family services in mental health. It will also look at the development and implementation of a single session therapy program, and associated research on the effectiveness of the program, at the Alfred Child and Youth Mental Health Service. Clinical examples will assist in illustrating the program and its model and structures. Lastly, it will review the research data and compare this with other research data in the field.

This paper reports on the first phase of a larger study aimed at investigating factors hindering family work and exploring ways to improve the amount and quality of family contact within a community aged mental health service in Melbourne, Australia. During the first phase of the project, 28 mental health professionals were interviewed about their views and experiences. Interviews were transcribed, coded, and analysed in terms of repeating themes. The range of attitudes, beliefs and feelings about family work is summarised in this paper. Polarities emerged around questions of whether or not to engage family members, and if so, what function family work fulfils. The interviews also provided useful information on clinicians’ beliefs about what would increase the possibility of family work. The paper concludes with a discussion about how to recognize and value family work in this area and target sustainable interventions during the second phase of the study.

In November 2009, the Bouverie Centre, a centre for training, research, and clinical family therapy in Melbourne, Australia, embarked on a 12-month trial involving the implementation of single session work as our main model of service provision for all new family appointments. We were interested in evaluating clients’ and therapists’ experiences of this change in our clinical service delivery. This article discusses some clinical dilemmas that arose for staff in this process, and how they were addressed. Clients’ responses to single session work are outlined, followed by a discussion of outcomes of the implementation for our organisation.

Jim Crawley is a well-known psychotherapist, trainer and author approaching retirement after more than 40 years of practice. In 1985, Jim interviewed Australian family therapist Margaret Topham in this journal on her career and retirement. Jim is the author or editor of a number of books, including:

• ■ Grant, J. and Crawley, J. (2002). Transference and Projection: Mirrors to the Self. London, Open University Press. (Chinese Edition published 2010).

• ■ Shaw, E. and Crawley, J. (eds.). (2007). Couple Therapy in Australia: issues emerging from practice. Melbourne, PsychOz Publications.

• ■ Crawley, J. and Grant, J. (2008). Couple Therapy: the self in the relationship. Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan. (Spanish Edition published 2011)

• ■ Crawley, J. (1998). Couples Therapy: unravelling the strands; Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy; Vol. 19, No. 4.

• ■ Crawley, J. and Grant, J. (2005). Emotionally Focused Therapy for Couples and Attachment Theory. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy, Vol. 26, No. 2.

In recent decades, discussion about clinical practice has been dominated by a focus on evidence-based treatments, whilst the translation of evidence-based treatments into practice has been neglected or avoided. The single session therapy (SST) field reflects this general trend. As a result, the community has not benefited from available service improvements simply because they have not found their way into core practice or been translated across state-wide services. This article draws on a range of implementation projects managed by The Bouverie Centre, in particular a successful state-wide SST implementation project conducted in collaboration with Victorian community health counselling services, to raise implementation dilemmas and suggest practical ideas about the translation of SST ideas into mainstream clinical practice. It is hoped this discussion will be of interest to those wanting to translate any new idea into practice.