this book was the original creation of Sharon and Pat’s combined efforts and their fingerprints are still present, we want to recognize and pay tribute to them both. We felt honored to take on the editorial responsibilities for the fifth and sixth editions of Families and Change and understood that we had big shoes to fill. Regarding this sixth edition, the suggestions and advice we received from those who used the fifth edition of this book were appreciated and important to the changes made in the content and format of the sixth edition. Also, the quality of the authors’ contributions, their timely responses, and their enthusiasm were invaluable to this updated version. Some of the authors were colleagues of both Sharon and Pat for many years and have contributed to multiple editions. Following in the tradition that Sharon and Pat practiced in previous editions, we sought out both “senior” and “young” scholars to collaborate and contribute to this volume. We were very pleased that “senior” authors involved junior colleagues or students to be coauthors and some former second authors moved into the position of senior authors. In addition, several new authors were asked to contribute. We would like to extend a special thank you to all of the authors; your efforts and contributions are greatly appreciated.
Kevin R. Bush
Christine A. Price
Chapter 1 Families Coping With Change: A Conceptual Overview
Christine A. Price, Kevin R. Bush, Sharon J. Price, and Patrick C. McKenry
Families increasingly experience a wide variety of stressors associated with both positive and negative events. Industrialization, urbanization, increased population density (e.g., housing, traffic, demand on infrastructures), community violence, threats of terrorism, advances in technology (e.g., e-mails, texts, social media), financial challenges, and everyday hassles (e.g., errands, commuting, appointments) are frequently identified as making daily life more complicated and impersonal. Family roles are more fluid than the past, resulting in fewer social norms and a lack of support. Families have become more diverse as a result of changing family structures (e.g, divorce, single-parent families, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer-parent families, custodial grandfamilies, remarriage, cohabitation, intergenerational reciprocity), immigration, economics (e.g., increased cost of living and two earner families), geographic mobility, and other macro level factors. In addition to natural disasters (e.g., hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes) and societal stressors (e.g., discrimination based on race, religious beliefs, gender, and sexual orientation), U.S. families are facing the reality of wars involving American troops overseas, the threat of nuclear attack, and the reality of an ever-changing, and often divisive, political landscape. Additionally, contemporary families are still experiencing economic insecurity and stress due to the Great Recession and the associated economic downturn in the global economy (see Bartholomae & Fox, Chapter 11 in this volume). Sobering financial losses in pensions, investments, and savings accounts, employment instability, income volatility, and rising unsecured debt contribute to the financial struggle of individuals and families. Consider the accumulation of these events and it quickly becomes apparent that stress is a part of everyday life.
Families often face many unique problems, not because of one identifiable crisis, event, or situation, but because of continuous everyday societal change. Technology, for example, has enhanced everyday life in many ways but it has also brought about an increasingly overextended population that is bombarded with ongoing tweets, texts, and work-related demands. From an economic standpoint, members of the younger generation, in many families, are struggling with an increase in cost of living and overwhelming debt as they establish their independence. They are also faced with the reality that their life experiences may involve fewer opportunities and resources as compared to their parents and grandparents. At the same time, due to medical advancements improving longevity and quality of life as we age, a demographic of adult children is faced with the undefined responsibilities of caregiving for their elders. Finally, the fluidity of family structures requires most families deal with cumulative, and sometime coinciding structural transitions during the life course (Teachman, Tedrow, & Kim, 2013; Walsh, 2013b).
All families experience stress as a result of change or pressure to change, whether or not change is “good” or “bad.” The impact of change or the pressure to change depends on the family’s perception of the situation as well as their coping abilities (Boss, 2013; Lavee, 2013; McCubbin & McCubbin, 2013). Boss (1988, 2002) defines family stress as pressure or tension on the status quo—a disturbance of the family’s steady state. Life transitions and events often provide an essential condition for psychological development, and family stress is perceived as inevitable and normal or even desirable since people and, therefore, families, must develop, mature, and change over time. With change comes disturbance in the family system and pressure, what is termed stress (Boss, 2002; Boss, Bryant, & Mancini, 2017; Lavee, 2013). Changes affecting families also occur externally (e.g., unemployment, natural disasters, war, acts of terrorism), and these also create stress in family systems. This instability becomes problematic only when the degree of stress in a family system reaches a level at which family members becomes dissatisfied or show symptoms of decreased functioning (i.e., ability to carry out regular routines and interactions that maintain stability).
The Study of Family Stress and Change
Compared to the long history of research on stress and coping, theoretical and clinical interest in family-related stress is a rather recent phenomenon. Research on family stress and coping gradually evolved from various disciplines that have examined stress and coping from primarily an individualistic perspective.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term stress can be traced back to the early 14th century when stress had several distinct meanings, including hardship, adversity, and affliction (Rutter, 1983). Even among stress researchers today, stress is variably defined as a stimulus, an inferred inner state, and an observable response to a stimulus or situation (e.g., Oken, Chamine, & Wakeland, 2015). There is also an ongoing debate concerning the extent to which stress is chemical, environmental, or psychological in nature (Folkman, 2013; Lazarus, 2006; Sarafino, 2006).
In the late 17th century, Hooke used stress in the context of physical science, although the usage was not made systematic until the early 19th century. Stress and strain were first conceived as a basis of ill health in the 19th century (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). In the 20th century, Cannon (l932) laid the foundation for systematic research on the effects of stress in observations of bodily changes. He showed that stimuli associated with emotional arousal (e.g., pain, hunger, cold) caused changes in basic physiological functioning (Dohrenwend & Dohrenwend, 1974). Selye (l978) was the first researcher to define and measure stress adaptations in the human body. He defined stress as an orchestrated set of bodily defenses against any form of noxious stimuli and identified the term General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS) to describe the body’s short- and long-term reaction to stress. In the l950s, social scientists became interested in his conceptualization of stress, and Selye’s work has remained influential in the stress and coping literature (e.g., Hatfield & Polomano, 2012; Lazarus & Folkman, 1984).
Meyer, in the l930s, taught that life events may be an important component in the etiology of a disorder and the most normal and necessary life events may be potential contributors to pathology (Dohrenwend & Dohrenwend, 1974). In the 1960s, Holmes and Rahe (l967) investigated life events and their connection to the onset and progression of illness. Through their Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRSS), which includes many family-related events, Holmes and Rahe associated the accumulation of life changes and those of greater magnitude to a higher chance of illness, disease, or death.
In the social sciences, both sociology and psychology have long histories of study related to stress and coping. Sociologists
