Carmen Knudson‐martin
Biographic Data
| ID | 142304 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Carmen Knudson‐martin |
| GIVEN NAMES | Carmen |
| FAMILY NAME | Knudson‐martin |
| SIGNATURE | MARTIN C K |
| AFFILIATIONS | Loma Linda University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-9966-5181 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 23 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 44 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 23 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1992 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
The Enduring Logics of Settler Colonialism in Family Therapy
Drawing on insights from critical Indigenous studies, settler colonial studies, and critical whiteness studies, the authors examine how settler colonial and white supremacist ideologies may continue to structure their own family therapy theorizing and practice, with particular attention to the concept and practice of sociocultural attunement (SCA) as applied to Socio‐Emotional Relationship Therapy (SERT). SCA was developed within settler colonial…
FPI Writers Fellowship Special Section
The Family Process Institute (FPI) Writers Fellowship supports the development of scholars who will advance systemic theory, research, and clinical practice grounded in a commitment to social justice. In this introduction to the Writers Fellowship special section, I describe the rationale for and history of this FPI initiative and how these eight authors help expand whose perspectives, interests, and voices are included in the family therapy fiel…
Learning to Embody a Social Justice Perspective in Couple and Family Therapy
Sociocultural Attunement to Vulnerability in Couple Therapy
Increasingly, couple therapists are called to promote equity in their clinical practice, yet little research illuminates the intricacy of doing this work. The purpose of this study was to clarify the clinical processes involved when therapists facilitate a more equitable balance of power in couple relationships while utilizing a sociocontextual frame of reference. It is part of larger research explicating Socio‐Emotional Relationship Therapy (SER…
Moving from “I” to “We”
Prior research indicates that couples who cope with chronic illness from a relational “we” orientation experience more positive outcomes than couples that cope individually; however, little prior research identifies clinical processes that promote reciprocity or how societal gender processes are involved. This grounded theory analysis of 25 videotaped therapy sessions with six heterosexual couples coping with chronic liver disease (LD) used a fem…
Transmission of Intergenerational Migration Legacies in Korean American Families
Exploring the Relationship Balance Assessment
Assessments of power in couples' relationships often only survey one partner, but they do not take into consideration both partners' perceptions. Thus, many assumptions about power and equality in relationships have not been quantitatively tested due to a lack of dyadic measures of power. Therefore, the purpose of the Gender and Relationships Study was to develop and test a new scale of equality and relative power for couples, the Relationship Ba…
Doing What It Takes to Make It Work
This study began with an interest in how long-term marital couples are able to maintain stability in light of changing social and personal contexts. Using a qualitative grounded theory method as a part of an ongoing study of how couples manage the tension between ideals of partnership and stability over time, 21 couples were selected by theoretical sampling. Participants had to be living together for at least 10 years, with an oldest child at lea…
Intergenerational Tension, Connectedness, and Separateness in the Lived Experience of First and Second Generation Chinese American Christians
Practicing Socio-cultural Attunement
Why Power Matters
Research shows that equal power helps couples create intimacy and relationship success. However, though couples increasingly desire equal relationships, cultural models of mutual support are not well developed. Clinicians often approach heterosexual couple therapy as though partners are inherently equal, thus reinforcing unacknowledged gender inequities. This article examines research that shows why power imbalances are destructive to intimate re…
Attachment in Adult Relationships
The author critiques attachment theory through a feminist lens and argues that the focus of attachment theory on relational bonds is consistent with feminist values but that theorists must place attachment processes with the larger societal context such as gender, culture, and power. The article focuses on the historical context, values, and assumptions embedded in attachment theory, then offers 5 guidelines for a feminist application of attachme…
Gender equality during the transition to parenthood
Few studies of marital equality have addressed the issue in a collectivist context. This grounded theory analysis examined movement toward gender equality among 12 dual-career Singaporean couples interviewed as newlyweds and interviewed again five years later when all had children. The analysis focused on the relational processes that reproduced gender patterns and those that undid them. Whether or not parenting was shared depended on four factor…
I nstitutionalizing R evolution
Relational Harmony
Social harmony is a valued relational rule in collectivism. Using data from in-depth interviews with 20 Chinese American couples, the authors study how husbands and wives interpret and negotiate marital harmony within a multicultural context and how gender relates to this process. Although all participants appear to seek harmony, the result indicates two quite different forms. Structural harmony is based on traditional social norms that emphasize…
Reshaping marital power
Movement toward gender equality occurs in incremental steps, but how such change occurs has not been well studied. A qualitative analysis of 20 heterosexual Singaporean couples identified the processes that equalize power within couple relationships. Results reveal that (i) prioritizing women's careers encourages men to change role expectations, take on household tasks, value wives' contributions and emotionally attend to them, and encourages wom…
Making Sense of Abuse
A Push Toward Equality
This study examines gender construction among dual-career newlywed couples in a collectivist culture. A qualitative analysis of in-depth interviews with 20 heterosexual Singaporean couples reveals aspects of the collectivist norms (e.g., doing family, we-consciousness, marrying one's equal) that are favorable toward the development of gender equality. Additionally, as couples respond to the political and social pulls of economic development, they…
Gender and Biology
This paper applies findings from recent biological research to the historical debate between nurture and nature in the construction of gender differences. Four emerging trends in the biological literature are identified and examined in relation to their implications for how gender is conceptualized and addressed in the practice of marital and family therapy. A multilevel feedback framework for understanding gender differences is proposed and appl…
Narratives of escape
Wild (powerful) women
Gender identity and family relationships
Balancing the ledger
Gender equality during the transition to parenthood
Few studies of marital equality have addressed the issue in a collectivist context. This grounded theory analysis examined movement toward gender equality among 12 dual-career Singaporean couples interviewed as newlyweds and interviewed again five years later when all had children. The analysis focused on the relational processes that reproduced gender patterns and those that undid them. Whether or not parenting was shared depended on four factor…
Relational Harmony
Social harmony is a valued relational rule in collectivism. Using data from in-depth interviews with 20 Chinese American couples, the authors study how husbands and wives interpret and negotiate marital harmony within a multicultural context and how gender relates to this process. Although all participants appear to seek harmony, the result indicates two quite different forms. Structural harmony is based on traditional social norms that emphasize…
Reshaping marital power
Movement toward gender equality occurs in incremental steps, but how such change occurs has not been well studied. A qualitative analysis of 20 heterosexual Singaporean couples identified the processes that equalize power within couple relationships. Results reveal that (i) prioritizing women's careers encourages men to change role expectations, take on household tasks, value wives' contributions and emotionally attend to them, and encourages wom…
A Push Toward Equality
This study examines gender construction among dual-career newlywed couples in a collectivist culture. A qualitative analysis of in-depth interviews with 20 heterosexual Singaporean couples reveals aspects of the collectivist norms (e.g., doing family, we-consciousness, marrying one's equal) that are favorable toward the development of gender equality. Additionally, as couples respond to the political and social pulls of economic development, they…
Intergenerational Tension, Connectedness, and Separateness in the Lived Experience of First and Second Generation Chinese American Christians
Practicing Socio-cultural Attunement
Making Sense of Abuse
Balancing the ledger
Learning to Embody a Social Justice Perspective in Couple and Family Therapy
Exploring the Relationship Balance Assessment
Assessments of power in couples' relationships often only survey one partner, but they do not take into consideration both partners' perceptions. Thus, many assumptions about power and equality in relationships have not been quantitatively tested due to a lack of dyadic measures of power. Therefore, the purpose of the Gender and Relationships Study was to develop and test a new scale of equality and relative power for couples, the Relationship Ba…
Wild (powerful) women
Balancing the ledger
Gender identity and family relationships
Wild (powerful) women
Narratives of escape
Gender and Biology
This paper applies findings from recent biological research to the historical debate between nurture and nature in the construction of gender differences. Four emerging trends in the biological literature are identified and examined in relation to their implications for how gender is conceptualized and addressed in the practice of marital and family therapy. A multilevel feedback framework for understanding gender differences is proposed and appl…
Making Sense of Abuse
A Push Toward Equality
This study examines gender construction among dual-career newlywed couples in a collectivist culture. A qualitative analysis of in-depth interviews with 20 heterosexual Singaporean couples reveals aspects of the collectivist norms (e.g., doing family, we-consciousness, marrying one's equal) that are favorable toward the development of gender equality. Additionally, as couples respond to the political and social pulls of economic development, they…
Reshaping marital power
Movement toward gender equality occurs in incremental steps, but how such change occurs has not been well studied. A qualitative analysis of 20 heterosexual Singaporean couples identified the processes that equalize power within couple relationships. Results reveal that (i) prioritizing women's careers encourages men to change role expectations, take on household tasks, value wives' contributions and emotionally attend to them, and encourages wom…
I nstitutionalizing R evolution
Relational Harmony
Social harmony is a valued relational rule in collectivism. Using data from in-depth interviews with 20 Chinese American couples, the authors study how husbands and wives interpret and negotiate marital harmony within a multicultural context and how gender relates to this process. Although all participants appear to seek harmony, the result indicates two quite different forms. Structural harmony is based on traditional social norms that emphasize…
Gender equality during the transition to parenthood
Few studies of marital equality have addressed the issue in a collectivist context. This grounded theory analysis examined movement toward gender equality among 12 dual-career Singaporean couples interviewed as newlyweds and interviewed again five years later when all had children. The analysis focused on the relational processes that reproduced gender patterns and those that undid them. Whether or not parenting was shared depended on four factor…
Attachment in Adult Relationships
The author critiques attachment theory through a feminist lens and argues that the focus of attachment theory on relational bonds is consistent with feminist values but that theorists must place attachment processes with the larger societal context such as gender, culture, and power. The article focuses on the historical context, values, and assumptions embedded in attachment theory, then offers 5 guidelines for a feminist application of attachme…
Why Power Matters
Research shows that equal power helps couples create intimacy and relationship success. However, though couples increasingly desire equal relationships, cultural models of mutual support are not well developed. Clinicians often approach heterosexual couple therapy as though partners are inherently equal, thus reinforcing unacknowledged gender inequities. This article examines research that shows why power imbalances are destructive to intimate re…
Practicing Socio-cultural Attunement
Intergenerational Tension, Connectedness, and Separateness in the Lived Experience of First and Second Generation Chinese American Christians
Doing What It Takes to Make It Work
This study began with an interest in how long-term marital couples are able to maintain stability in light of changing social and personal contexts. Using a qualitative grounded theory method as a part of an ongoing study of how couples manage the tension between ideals of partnership and stability over time, 21 couples were selected by theoretical sampling. Participants had to be living together for at least 10 years, with an oldest child at lea…
Exploring the Relationship Balance Assessment
Assessments of power in couples' relationships often only survey one partner, but they do not take into consideration both partners' perceptions. Thus, many assumptions about power and equality in relationships have not been quantitatively tested due to a lack of dyadic measures of power. Therefore, the purpose of the Gender and Relationships Study was to develop and test a new scale of equality and relative power for couples, the Relationship Ba…
Transmission of Intergenerational Migration Legacies in Korean American Families
Moving from “I” to “We”
Prior research indicates that couples who cope with chronic illness from a relational “we” orientation experience more positive outcomes than couples that cope individually; however, little prior research identifies clinical processes that promote reciprocity or how societal gender processes are involved. This grounded theory analysis of 25 videotaped therapy sessions with six heterosexual couples coping with chronic liver disease (LD) used a fem…
Sociocultural Attunement to Vulnerability in Couple Therapy
Increasingly, couple therapists are called to promote equity in their clinical practice, yet little research illuminates the intricacy of doing this work. The purpose of this study was to clarify the clinical processes involved when therapists facilitate a more equitable balance of power in couple relationships while utilizing a sociocontextual frame of reference. It is part of larger research explicating Socio‐Emotional Relationship Therapy (SER…
Learning to Embody a Social Justice Perspective in Couple and Family Therapy
The Enduring Logics of Settler Colonialism in Family Therapy
Drawing on insights from critical Indigenous studies, settler colonial studies, and critical whiteness studies, the authors examine how settler colonial and white supremacist ideologies may continue to structure their own family therapy theorizing and practice, with particular attention to the concept and practice of sociocultural attunement (SCA) as applied to Socio‐Emotional Relationship Therapy (SERT). SCA was developed within settler colonial…
FPI Writers Fellowship Special Section
The Family Process Institute (FPI) Writers Fellowship supports the development of scholars who will advance systemic theory, research, and clinical practice grounded in a commitment to social justice. In this introduction to the Writers Fellowship special section, I describe the rationale for and history of this FPI initiative and how these eight authors help expand whose perspectives, interests, and voices are included in the family therapy fiel…
Psychology (20 works) · Social Psychology (17 works) · Sociology (14 works) · Social Psychology (12 works) · Developmental psychology (11 works) · Attachment and Relationship Dynamics (8 works) · Counseling, Therapy, and Family Dynamics (8 works) · Family Dynamics and Relationships (7 works) · Gender Studies (7 works) · Political science (7 works)