Frederick R. Ford, M.D.
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The Mapping of Rules (MOR) assessment was designed as a way to assess present family function and its change over time. Designed as a family checkup, the MOR performs that function very well. It is equally useful with individuals, couples and families, and with other social organizations, such as the work place.
Further the MOR is very versatile. We have employed it in a variety of situations, including: as a baseline for beginning individual, couple or family therapy, for appraising progress in therapy and as a psychometric tool with patients in psychotherapy. It has been utilized as a research tool and as a vehicle for teaching family therapy. Colleagues in general medicine have reported its usefulness in screening new patients. We look forward to a time when the MOR will be used outside the professional arena as a self assessment instrument.
[ Family Forum: A Chat Room and message center for family therapists ]
Frederick R. Ford, M.D., graduated from medical school at the University of Oklahoma. Subsequently, he pursued obstetrics and gynecology and then spent some time in the armed forces. From there he started and finished training in psychiatry and eventually found his way to the Mental Research Institute (MRI) in Palo Alto, California. This was at the time of Virginia Satir, Don Jackson, Jules Riskin, Jay Haley, Paul Watzlawick, and John Weakland. Trained by Satir in family therapy, he went on to run her program and teach her courses when she left the MRI.
On leaving the Mental Research Institute in 1969, Ford and Joan Herrick, MSSW, continued working with thoughts generated there. In the process they developed a family assessment instrument using videotape that is the forerunner of the Mapping of Rules (MOR). Later, and after Herrick had withdrawn, Marie Doyle, Ph.D., and Ford joined forces to put the Mapping of Rules into its first operational form.
Ford is a life fellow of both the American Psychiatric Association and the American Orthopsychiatric Association. He is one of the 14 Incorporating Members of the American Family Therapy Academy (nee Association). In the latter organization, he has co-chaired the (family) Typology Interest and Study Groups for many years.
Frederick R. Ford, M.D.
Email:
[ Family Forum: A Chat Room and message center for family therapists ]