Murray Bowen, M.D.鲍文简介心理学空间

Murray Bowen, M.D.

January 31, 1913 - October 9, 1990

Murray Bowen was born in Waverly, Tennessee to a family that had been in MiddleTennessee since the Revolution. Waverly, which is located about sixty miles westof Nashville in Humphreys County, was a town of approximately 1000 inhabitantsin 1913 when Murray Bowen was born. He was the oldest of Jess Sewell Bowen's andMaggie May Luff Bowen's five children. He attended primary and secondary schoolsin Waverly, earned a B.S. degree from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in1934, and an M.D. from the University of Tennessee Medical School, Memphis in1937. He then interned at Bellevue Hospital in New York City in 1938 and at theGrasslands Hospital in Valhalla, New York from 1939-41.

Following medical training, Murray Bowen served five years of active duty withthe Army during World War II, 1941-46. He served in the United States andEurope, rising from the rank of Lieutenant to Major. He had been accepted for afellowship in surgery at the Mayo Clinic to begin after military service, butBowen's wartime experiences resulted in a change of interest from surgery topsychiatry.

His psychiatric training was at the Menninger Foundation in Topeka,Kansas,beginning in 1946. He became a staff member upon completion of his formaltraining--although he had assumed staff-level responsibilities while still in atraining status--and remained at Menninger's until 1954. He then embarked on aunique five-year research project at the National Institute of Mental Health inBethesda, Maryland. The project involved families with an adult schizophrenicchild living on a research ward for long periods of time.

Bowen left N.I.M.H. in 1959 to become a half-time faculty member in theDepartment of Psychiatry at Georgetown University Medical Center. He became aClinical Professor, was Director of Family Programs, and in 1975 founded theGeorgetown Family Center. Dr. Bowen was the Director of the Family Center untilhis death. He also maintained a private psychiatric practice at his home-officein Chevy Chase, Maryland.

He was Visiting Professor in a variety of medical schools including theUniversity of Maryland, 1956-1963; and part-time Professor and Chairman,Division of Family and Social Psychiatry, Medical College of Virginia, Richmond,from 1964to 1978. While at MCV he pioneered the use of closed-circuit televisionin family therapy. Television was used to integrate family therapy with familytheory.

Murray Bowen was a scholar, researcher, clinician, teacher, and writer. Heworked tirelessly toward a science of human behavior, one that viewed man as apart of all life. He was very active in professional organizations, alwayswanting to contribute in any way he could, usually trying to remind himself thatthere was only so much he could do. He was a life fellow of the AmericanPsychiatric Association, the American Orthopsychiatric Association and the Groupfor the Advancement of Psychiatry. He served two consecutive terms as the firstPresident of the American Family Therapy Association. His activities andprolific writings led to many awards and much recognition. He was recognized asAlumnus of the Year by the Menninger Foundation in 1985 and received theDistinguished Alumnus Award from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville in 1986.

He has been credited as being one of those rare human beings who had a genuinelynew idea. He had the courage to go against the psychiatric and societalmainstream, to stand up for what he believed about human behavior. Thanks to hisefforts the world has been rewarded with a new theory of human behavior, onewith the potential to replace Freudian theory with a radically new method ofpsychotherapy based on the new theory.