Chapter 15:
Family Change: Stress, Crisis, and
Transition
Family Development Stress
• Stressor
– Anything that elicits a physiological and/or
psychological response – a stress response
• Good stress – eustress
• Negative stress - distress
Categories of Common Stressors
•
•
•
•
Personal
Social/family
Work
Environmental
Family Life Cycle
Developmental Tasks
• Changes in Structure
– Family structure is dynamic
– Must adapt to ongoing changes in the
system
• Changes in Family Roles
– As structure changes, family roles change
– Changes occur in family boundaries
Family Life Cycle
Developmental Tasks
• Changes in Family Roles
– As roles change, communication changes
– Individual growth demands change
Family as a System
• Family is a system of interrelated parts
• Family members affect and are affected by
each other
• Each family must be viewed as a whole
• Each family’s goal is to maintain homeostasis
or balance
Figure 15.1: Stages of
Selye’s General
Adaptation Syndrome
General Adaptation Syndrome
• Describes the physiological responses to
eustress and distress
• Stage 1: Alarm Reaction
– The brain perceives the stressor and
signals the body to deal with it through
neurological and physiological means
– The body reacts to the threat
– Fight or flight tendency
General Adaptation Syndrome
• Stage 2 : Stage of Resistance
– The body continues to battle the stressor
and remains in a state of arousal
– Increased level of stress steroids alarms
the body’s organs
– Energy eventually becomes depleted
General Adaptation Syndrome
• Stage 3: Exhaustion
– Chronic unrelenting stress or mismanaged
stress can cause permanent damage
– The body over time simply breaks down
– People under stress may experience a
variety of symptoms – headaches, nausea,
depression, crying, fatigue, anger, racing
heart, inability to eat or sleep, and more
Event Based Stress
• A life change event
• One that is forever life altering
• One that requires significant social and
psychological adjustment
Social Readjustment Rating Scale
• Identifies association between life events
and life transitions
• Identifies the impact of these events and
transitions on individual physical health and
well-being
Transactional Model of Stress
• The impact of the stressor is wholly
dependent on our perception and appraisal
of the stressor
• Primary appraisal – instinctively evaluate the
stressor and assess its significance
• Secondary appraisal – assess how
controllable the stressor is and which
resources
Locus of Control
• External Locus of Control
• The perception that we cannot control what
happens to some aspects of our lives
• Internal Locus of Control
• The perception that we are in control of our
destiny
Coping Efforts
• Strategies used to bring order to, normalize, or
regulate the stressor
• Problem management strategies
– Aimed directly at attacking the stressor
• Emotional regulation strategies
– Help individuals change their perceptions,
interpretation, and the meaning of the
stressor
• Meaning based strategies
– Techniques that produced positive emotion
Table 15.2: Types of Family Crises
Four Types of Family Crisis
• Dismemberment – separation of isolation of
an individual from the rest of the family
• Accession – when turbulence occurs due to
the addition of a family member
• Demoralization plus Dismemberment or
Accession- family is demoralized because of
embarrassing stressors such as
imprisonment or suicide of a family member
Figure 15.2: Hill’s ABC –X
Model of Family Stress
The ABC’s of Family Crisis
• ABC-X Family Crisis Model – Reuben Hill
• Family crisis is a combination of factors and
the outcomes of the event
• The A Factor – stress can be normative
development such as the birth of a child,
marriage of an adult child, early death of a
spouse – are family specific
ABC-X Model continued
• The B Factor- refers to the resources the
family has that will help meet the demands
of the stressor or crisis – communication,
problem solving, coping strategies
• The C Factor – the definition the family
assigns to change, transition, stressor, or
disruption
ABC-X Model continued
• The X Factor – this is the combination of A, B
and C and is totally dependent on the
resources the family has to meet the crisis or
stressor
Double ABC-X model
• Stressors pile up on families
• 3 types of stressors that lead to the pile-up
– Initial stressor: the first stressor
– Family life changes and transitions: things
that take place regardless of stressors
– Stressors: those stressors associated with
family’s attempt to cope with circumstances
Double ABC-X model
• The Double B Factor
• Resources that family already has – minimize
impacts
• Coping resources – self reliance, self esteem
Double ABC-X model
The Double C Factor
• The perception of the event or stressor may
be
– The family’s perception of the stressor
itself
– The family’s perception of the crisis
Double ABC-X model
• The Double X Factor
• Possible outcomes of stress
• Family adaptation – return to pre-crisis level
of functioning
• Maladaptive levels of functioning – lowfunctioning, ill-functioning, non-functioning
• Bonadaptive – level of functioning may grow
and strengthen
Figure 15.3: McCubbin’s Double ABC-X
Model of Family Stress and Crisis: Pile-Up
Family Adaptive Tasks
To successfully adjust, families must
1. Establish the meaning and understand the
personal significance of the situation
2. Confront reality and respond to the
requirements of the external situation
3. Sustain relationships with family
members and friends as well as with
other individuals who may be helpful in
resolving the crisis and aftermath
Family Adaptive Tasks
• Preserve a reasonable emotional balance by
managing distressful feelings in response to
the situation
• Preserve a satisfactory self-image and
maintain a sense of competence and
mastery
Family Violence
• Violence perpetrated against family
members by an offender who is related to
the victim biologically or legally
• Batterers – current or former spouses,
parents, guardians, children, siblings,
grandchildren, aunts and uncles, nephews
and nieces
Figure 15.4: Domestic Partner
Violence by Race/Ethnicity and
Gender
Domestic Violence Categories
• Physical Violence – hitting, punching,
pushing, slapping, biting, or throwing
something at the victim
• Emotional violence – controlling the amount
of contact with others, name calling,
criticism, controlling spending, excessive rule
making
More Domestic Violence
• Sexual violence – marital rape, battering
rape, and forced sexual acts
Measuring Domestic Violence
• Measured in two ways
– Through survey interviews with victims
– Through statistics gathered by police
The Battered
Characteristics of the battered
• Lower educational levels
• Teenage parents
• Women who are single parents
• Women who have witnessed a parent being
battered
Prevalence of Domestic Violence
• 1 in 4 women have been physically or
sexually abused by an intimate partner
• Women are more likely than men to be
victims
• 3/4 of the people who commit family
violence are men
• 74% of family violence victims are white,
13.6% are African American and 10.1 % are
Hispanic
More Domestic Violence Facts
• Girlfriends are more likely to be injured by
their boyfriends during family violence than
are wives by their husbands
• 15% of all violent acts between intimate
partners are perpetrated against men
• 18% of family murders are siblings who kill
siblings
Figure 15.5
Primary
Populations
Served by
Domestic
Violence
Shelters
Domestic Homicides
• Everyday an average of 4 women in the U.S.
are killed by their intimate partners
• Of all murders in the U.S., 21.5% are
committed against family members
• Intimate partner violence is the leading
cause of death among pregnant women
• Whites are more likely to die at the hands of
their partners than other races
Violence Against Children
• Each year over 3 million children experience
some type of maltreatment or abuse by a
caregiver
– 61% are neglected
– 19% are physically abused
– 10% are sexually abused
– 5% are psychologically abused
– 2% experience medical maltreatment
– 17% experience abandonment
Figure 15.6: Types of Child Abuse
and Neglect by Percentage of
Total Abuse
Figure 15.7:
Who Abuses
Children?
Violence Against
Same Sex Partners
• 6,523 incidents of domestic violence among
same sex partners
• 44% of victims were men, 36% were women
and 2% were transgendered
• 44% were white, 25% were Latino, 15% were
African American and 6% were Asian
The Signs of an Abusive Partner
•
•
•
•
•
•
The Batterer
Low self-esteem
Blame others for their behavior
Typically extremely jealous
Use sex as their weapon of aggression
Need to control and dominate and become
master manipulators
The Cycle of Violence
• Tension Building – victim senses an
explosive, violent episode is about to occur,
fear builds, she tries to stay out of his way;
goal is to prevent batterer from becoming
violent
The Cycle of Violence
• Acute Battering Incident – destructive, out of
control, brutal, violence has escalated into
an acute battering incident, can become
deadly, verbal abuse, severe beating,
possible rape, victim does not usually fight
back
The Cycle of Violence
• Respite Phase – often called the
“honeymoon,” abuser apologizes, may give
victim gifts, express his regret, victim may
have sense of renewed hope
Figure 15.8: The
Power and
Figure
15.10
Lenore
Walker’s
Cycle of
Violence
P. 512
Family Coping and Resilience
• Major Types of Coping Skills
– Appraisal focused – attempt to understand
why crisis occurred and attempt to find
meaning in circumstances that caused
crisis
– Problem focused coping – allows family to
confront the situation by seeking
information about the crisis
Family Coping and Resilience
• Emotion focused coping – crisis evokes a wide
range of feelings and emotions
– Progressive desensitization: gradually allow
increasing exposure to aspects of the stressor
– Emotional discharge: venting of anger,
frustration, confusion, disappointment
– Resigned acceptance: family ultimately
accepts the situation, recognizes nothing will
change the course their family has taken
Family Resilience
• A family’s ability to function during times of stress,
adversity, crisis, and transition
• Resilience Processes
– Family belief system
– Making meaning of adversity
– Positive outlook
– Flexibility
– Connectedness
– Communication