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The idea of the Mental Research Institute (MRI) existed even before it came to life. Here, we present a brief history that we believe is relevant. Of course, we are constructing it, as history is always constructed: by the person who tells it. We will open the curtain and offer a glimpse into the work and research of the Brief Therapy Center, which shaped the perception around the world that MRI is where it all began. True! For the first 7 years, but then there were changes that we will explain.
The team at the Brief Therapy Center has a unique characteristic that few other centers can claim: a continuous team effort from 1966 to 2019. FIFTY-THREE years of recordings, work, preparation, and uninterrupted growth in the fields of psychotherapy and family therapy. Now, even though the team is spread out across the globe, the recordings, supervisions, teaching, and learning continue.
Some of the ideas from the Macy Conferences, held in New York between 1940 and 1953 and organized by Warren McCulloch, influenced Bateson’s language. These were scientific meetings, and eventually, Bateson brought these ideas to the Bateson Group, which operated at the Veterans Affairs Hospital in Menlo Park from 1952 to 1961. The funding for this research came from various sources: the Rockefeller Foundation (1952-54), the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation (1954-56), and, after 1956, Don Jackson took on the responsibility of acquiring the funds. Since Jackson was a psychiatrist, the research in the group—G. Bateson, J. Haley, W. Fry, and J. Weakland—shifted to a more psychological perspective. Rumors from that time suggest that Bateson was dissatisfied with this perspective, as he was more interested in a broader view of interaction and communication systems in general. That research included trips to the San Francisco Zoo to study communication between otters: What was play? What was fighting? How did they interact as a group? Nora Bateson also speaks about interactions with her father at home: he observed communication and interaction in every aspect of life!
Around the same time, Don D. Jackson, MD was returning to Palo Alto after studying at Chestnut Lodge with Harry Stack-Sullivan. His psychoanalytic perspective was already programmed to look at the context in which behaviors occur. It was Jackson who sought funding from the National Institute for Mental Health to continue the research around 1959.
Bateson and Jackson, both giants with enormous creativity, collaborated on the Schizophrenia Project at Menlo Park VA in late 1952. Bill Fry was the supervising doctor, but he was called to serve in the Korean War in 1953. Don Jackson was hired to cover this position from 1954 until Dr. Fry returned to the group in 1956. Many important articles and books were published from the research done by the Bateson Group, which sent shockwaves through the prevailing psychoanalysis field and also helped establish the field of Family Therapy.
In 1958, Don Jackson, head of psychiatry at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation—now Sutter Health—founded the Mental Research Institute (MRI), which was “A Public Service, Non-profit Institution dedicated to research in the field of Mental Health.” In 1966, he personally led a major fundraising campaign with the help of the MRI Board to acquire the building on Middlefield Road, where it operated until the sale of that building in 2019.
Considering the dates mentioned, it’s clear there was an overlap between the work of the Bateson Group at the Veterans Administration (VA) and the founding of MRI, with mutual influences in their ideas. Bateson and Jackson admired each other, and Bateson had the title of Associate at MRI, although he was never formally employed by MRI. He was a man of ‘big ideas,’ a collaborator, and an inspiration.
In 1961, Paul Watzlawick was returning to Italy from El Salvador, where he had lived for a year, but he had heard about the work Don Jackson was doing in Palo Alto. That’s why he came, and as he recounts, he never left Palo Alto. He was ‘captured’ by the intellectual stimulation, the new ideas, and the potential for major changes. His roots were in Jungian psychoanalysis, but he became fascinated by the idea of the Interactional View—this was actually the title of a book he wrote with John Weakland. Paul will be the subject of another blog post, so let’s continue with our story: how the Brief Therapy Center was always a separate group but operating in the MRI building.
That same year, Richard (Dick) Fisch, MD, also joined MRI, drawn by John Weakland, who was using non-trance hypnosis in the treatment of his clients and obtaining results/changes in people’s lives in a very short amount of time. The visits by John Weakland and Jay Haley to Milton Erickson in Phoenix will also be covered in another blog post in the future. These trips started around 1955.
In case you’re wondering, Virginia Satir was also at MRI, bringing her unique intensity and power to this emerging field. One of the first women in a field almost entirely composed of men, she too deserves her own blog post.
In 1966, Dr. Fisch wrote a proposal to Dr. Jackson. This would be the first step in creating the Brief Therapy Center. The original—now in Karin Schlanger’s hands—says: “We suggest the creation of a center for the use of brief techniques with outpatients to develop more modern brief treatments and for training therapists in the use of these brief treatments.” If you, readers, are interested, it’s a very enlightening note, as it serves as a description of the therapy practiced at that time. Perhaps this will be the subject of another article. This is the Center that, after Don Jackson’s death in 1968, made MRI internationally famous. Most of the publications attributed to MRI and translated into many languages originated from this Center. It is the BTC, Watzlawick, Weakland, and Fisch who could be said to have taken MRI’s fame to the world. Of course, they saw no reason to leave the MRI building—it was their home, which they, in turn, nourished.
The mid to late 60s were turbulent years. Virginia Satir left in 1967, Don Jackson passed away in 1968, and Jay Haley left MRI and the Brief Therapy Center in 1967 to work with Salvador Minuchin at the U. Penn Pediatric Hospital. At that time, the services provided in that unit were heavily influenced by psychoanalysis. Haley was tasked with changing that, with the experience he brought from Palo Alto. Minuchin had met Haley at MRI in 1962, and he became Director in Philadelphia. He worked with Salvador Minuchin (from Argentina) and Braulio Montalvo (from Puerto Rico). His Strategic Therapy (which he would later develop) was greatly influenced by his time with Minuchin. Both models are normative models: there is a given way in which interactions should occur, and a deviation from this norm creates problems in the couple, family, or individual. This deviation from the norm creates an imbalance in the power structure of a relationship, and the problem becomes a symptom for which people seek help. Once again, I see the opportunity to write another article comparing and contrasting the Problem-Solving Brief Therapy model (BTC from MRI) and Strategic Therapy.
Jay Haley and his second wife, Cloe Madanes, founded the Family Therapy Institute in Washington DC in 1976. Haley left the institute in 1994 and spent the remainder of his academic life in La Jolla with his third wife, Madeleine Richeport, a renowned anthropologist. Jay Haley passed away in 2007.
After his retirement in 2008, Richard Fisch appointed Karin Schlanger as the next Director of the Brief Therapy Center at MRI, a position she still holds today.
In 2019, the MRI Director and Board decided to sell the iconic MRI building on Middlefield Road in Palo Alto, which effectively ended the training programs and client services. From the Brief Therapy Center, we clearly see the need to continue these valuable activities, but we find ourselves without a home—at least for now. Most of the Spanish-language training is taking place in person at the Brief Therapy Center Mexico – http://mx.brieftherapycenter.org. The current Director of the center, Karin Schlanger, MFT, has embraced technology to continue online training in both English and Spanish on this platform. This blog is the first attempt to get the wheels turning because we felt it was important to clarify that, in fact, MRI’s fame rests on the shoulders of the Brief Therapy Center, which is still very much alive and kicking.
