Concepts Intrapsychic-biological system Interpersonal-dyadic system Relational-triadic matrix Sociocultural familial triangle Originators Gregory Bateson Virginia Satir Paul Watzlawick Stephen A. Mitchell Proponents Jeffrey J. Magnavita Relevant works Psychodynamic Family Psychotherapy[1] Personality systematics is a contribution to the psychology of personality and to psychotherapy summarized by Jeffrey J. Magnavita in 2006 and 2009.

Family systems therapy received an important boost in the mid-1950s through the work of anthropologist Gregory Bateson and colleagues – Jay Haley, Donald D. Jackson, John Weakland, William Fry, and later, Virginia Satir, Paul Watzlawick and others – at Palo Alto in the US, who introduced ideas from cybernetics and general systems theory into social psychology and psychotherapy, focusing in particular on the role of communication.

This approach eschewed the traditional focus on individual psychology and historical factors – that involve so-called linear causation and content – and emphasized instead feedback and homeostatic mechanisms and “rules” in here-and-now interactions – so-called circular causation and process – that were thought to maintain or exacerbate problems, whatever the original cause(s).

Personality systematics is based on a holistic model of functioning which considers part-whole relationships as being essential to understanding complex self-organizing systems.

To enhance efficacy and range, new methods are used, such as audiovisual recording and physiological measurements, galvanic skin response, heart rate variability, and other forms of bio- and neuro-feedback.