FEST Writing Group

The Potential of Natural Systems Thinking for the Human Condition

Bowen observed the family as a natural system and was able to identify a predictable relationship between how the family unit functions and the adaptiveness or level of functioning of each of its members. This predictive relationship between the family system and its members may reflect common or related principles that underlie the functioning of the social group and its members in other species and natural systems. If so this observation of the relationship between the individual and the group has the potential of bringing together disparate knowledge about natural systems. As EO Wilson described in his book Consilience, observations that “jump together” across scientific disciplines are the basis for solid theory that can integrate existing and new knowledge. (E. O. Wilson, 1998).

The evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr was also on a wavelength with Bowen when he wrote that scientific progress is based more on the progress of conceptualization than it is on new facts. One expression of this viewpoint was Bowen’s stated belief that schizophrenia, the most debilitating of psychiatric dysfunctions, would not be explained until psychology, sociology, biology, evolution, behavior and medicine could all be understood within a single frame of reference. There can be progress towards an overarching theory of natural systems that emerges inductively out of the study of living systems. Such a theory would enable each scientific discipline to benefit from the advancing knowledge in any other discipline. Bowen also believed that the key to a comprehensive natural systems theory would be in how to conceptualize behavior. (Cite) The family systems theory he authored and it’s account of how the family unit regulates and is regulated by the behavior of its individual members, may rest on principles that are broad enough to serve as the basis for a natural systems theory that moves in the direction of a theory of natural systems.

Conceptualizing all behavior in an integrated theoretical framework requires identifying the principles by which primitive reflexive behavior, high-level mental processes, individual behavior and social unit functioning are interconnected. Such a framework would need to identify how all these phenomena operate in relation to one another to produce behavior. The scale of differentiation concept does this by conceptualizing behavioral phenomena as part of a single continuum of adaptive behavior. The scale of differentiation identifies this continuum as extending between two broadly recognized classes of behavior in psychology and the behavioral sciences.(Kahneman, Mischel), There is reflexive and stimulus bound behavior at one end of the continuum and behavior that is potentially under the control of the individual at the other end. This continuum captures the e trajectory of behavioral evolution up the phylogenetic tree, from simple reflexive behavior in one celled organisms, to increasingly complex later evolved species with nervous systems that culminate in big-brained humans with expanded potential for self regulation. This continuum of behavior also captures the range of functioning within the repertoire of the individual, from reflexive stimulus bound reactions to self-directed behavior available to individuals in big-brained species and possibly to some unknown degree to other life forms. (see Shapiro on cognition in bacteria).

In Bowen theory, the continuum of behavior is identified as the basis of differences in adaptiveness between individuals who are different in the frequency of their reflexive, automatic and stimulus bound behavior compared to the frequency of behavior that they self= regulate. The frequency of self-regulated behavior compared to stimulus bound behavior across all the members in a family unit determines the balance of individuality versus togetherness interactions in the family system. The balance of interactional pressures towards togetherness or individuality in the family system affects the opportunities the system affords for the development and exercise of individual self –regulation. Balance in the direction of togetherness interactions favors regulation of family members by group pressure for conformity, a phenomenon of individual responsiveness to the group that is well documented in social psychology. (See for instance, Ross & Nisbett) Self -regulation in the human is a function of more recently evolved executive functions (Bowen, McLaine, Baumeister, Kahneman, Mischel, Shields), while regulation by the group operates by triggering reflex- like emotional reactions in family members.

The principles regulating interaction of individuals in the group units of other species may also be based on processes related to the individuality and togetherness interactions in the human emotional system. Evolutionary biologist John Bonner’s work is a case in point. Bonner focuses on the integration and isolation of individual organisms from the larger societies of which they are a part, in species that range from amoebae to humans. He points out, as something which is obvious, that the viability of collectives depend upon the functional integrity of their individual constituents. The viability of individuals depends upon their ability to maintain boundaries separating andpreventing them from merging into the larger system and losing integrity as functional units. At the same time the viability of individual organisms also depends upon their functional integration as part of the larger systems in which they live(Bonner, 1988 pp 229-246). The importance of a functional relationship with the larger system extends to the human. Viable contact with the extended family system moderates tensions and directly and indirectly supports the individuality of family members.

There are many observations of relationship phenomena across the biological sciences that seem closely related to principles of functioning that underlie the family as a natural system (Noone & Papero, 2017). The potential for increased understanding of the interrelatedness of life based on systems thinking that is moving towards an integrative natural systems theory, promises to benefit humanity and the natural systems we depend on in countless ways. Meanwhile, the potential of natural systems thinking about the family has produced a new way of understanding the origins human dysfunction and the suffering that attends it. The perspective also illuminates pathways for the amelioration of problems in human psychology and physiology and relationships through addressing the functioning of social systems.

As the family adapts to changing internal and external conditions it must manage tensions that come with adaptive challenges. The family system manages tensions in the relationship system, sometimes with person-to-person relationships and when that is not possible, through the emotionally reactive relationship patterns of conflict, emotional distance, dominant subordinate relationships and triangles. A family with a reasonable level of functioning and emotional connection with the larger family system will haveoptions for using family relationships to manage tensions without impairments resulting for anyone in the family. Less integrated and more cutoff families will have fewer options and the reactive relationship patterns triggered in stressful circumstances will transfer tensions to family members who occupy vulnerable positions in the family patterns, such as the child in the family projection process. (Bowen, 2013) This can impair the family member who ends up stuck with the emotional load especially when tensions are chronic.

Patterns of interaction that transfer and distribute anxiety among family members do so to the benefit of some at the expense of others in the unit. (Bowen in Butler, ed. 2013). Symptoms in a family member lessen when anxiety is transferred to someone else in the family who becomes upset. This process exists in all families to some degree and its’ intensity and persistence determines the severity of illness and dysfunction that results for a family member in the position of absorbing the transferred anxieties of the family. At the same time, being freed of the transferred anxiety, other family members function better in ways the family may depend on.This remains a shocking view for many, but as an adaptive strategy it seems related to patterns that appear in social systems of other species including slime mold and bacteria. (Lassiter, 2011). Evolutionary biologists have tried to explain how it is that some individuals of different social species sacrifice their own reproductive potential and even their survival to benefit the reproductive fitness of others in their social unit. Kinship theories have tried explanations based on genetic relatedness. Wilson & Wilson argue that group selection explains this altruistic behavior better than kinship. (Wilson & Wilson 2007, Wilson, DS, 2008; Wilson E O 2012) They present evidence that species enjoy a competitive advantage over others when they are organized so that some individuals give up their own fitness to serve that of others in the social unit.

Impairments produced by patterns of interaction that transfer anxiety to certain family members are a major source of human suffering. If the resulting impairments reach a critical level, they themselves become a destabilizing threat from within the family. Increased family anxiety in response can spur an emotional regression in which the patterns intensify or break down altogether. As the problems in the family multiply they can spill over and into to the larger community.

The ability to use systems thinking is an advantage to a family member seeking to control their own behavior instead of yielding to the family system and its patterns of transferring tension to family members in vulnerable positions. The family emotional system changes around the individual with sufficient individuality to hold a principled position and resist participation in the relationship patterns of anxiety transfer. Family reactions pressure members resisting participation in patterns to change back. When the individual has sufficient strength to resist the pressure to fuse back into the family system the family reactions die down. With a reset towards more individuality based on a members effort to differentiate self from the family emotional system, the patterns moderate and symptoms ameliorate for family members in vulnerable positions.

When the family system is reset in the direction of permitting more individuality, there are adaptive advantages for the family beyond moderating symptoms. When the environment changes, family system patterns and roles that may have been adaptive may no longer be adaptive. Change may be required for well-being and even survival. Tightly bound family systems that leave less individual leeway for innovative behavior in the face of adaptive challenges will not fare as well as those that can let its perceptive members lead in new directions. Rigid emotional systems are prone to collapse under pressure and will suffer loss of order and stability their members depend on as they break apart. Like evolution, progress is driven by innovation in natural systems that stay intact enough to change as a unit. (Shapiro, 2011; Bonner, 2001).

Given the times and the extent of environmental crisis that awaits, systems thinking may yield the human more options for charting a course through the natural disasters of increasingly threatened and threatening natural systems and the social disruptions they spawn. Natural systems thinking is poised to create an expanding knowledge base about natural systems themselves. A theoretical roadmap of how the human can correct in the direction of self-regulation by understanding the human family as a natural system is already in place. Maybe this will be a basis for the human to change automatic behavior patterns that degrade the environment and social relations in favor of self regulated behavior that preserves the natural world and an adaptive social order we can depend on. If so, natural systems thinking holds important promise for the future.