ABSTRACT
In the book, Foundations of Family Therapy, Hoffman (1981) wrote that the field of psychotherapy and especially family therapy was changed when a new tool—the one-way mirror—came into use during the 1960s and 1970s. With the new tool, a therapist could interview clients accompanied by a group of colleagues who could watch and listen from behind the mirror. Whereas previously the conduct of therapy was a solitary activity, a different sensibility evolved. The whole group, rather than the interviewing therapist alone, took on responsibility for the case. By the late 1970s, family therapists who had been working this way routinely wrote about themselves as “the team” (cf. Selvini-Palazzoli, Boscolo, Cecchin, & Prata, 1978).
