Beyond Family Crisis: Family Adaptation

Abstract

Families in Disaster research has drawn heavily from the family stress and crises research paradigms and concepts advanced by Reuben Hill's ABC-X Model and by related research. This article attempts to broaden the perspective of family behavior in disaster situations by advancing additional concepts, definitions and propositions. Findings from longitudinal research on American families faced with the historically unique traumatic situation of having a husband/father held captive or unaccounted for in the Vietnam War were analyzed first in reference to the ABC-X Model, which suggested the need to expand this classic model. This article introduces the Double ABC-X Model in an effort to capture the dynamic nature of family response to stress over time. This expanded model includes: AA-the family's pile up of life events and stressors over time; BB-the family's resources which are strenghened or developed within and in transaction with the community and include coping and social support; CC-the family's perception of the stressor and related changes in the family; and XX-the additional end state of family adaptation following a crisis. This model merits careful consideration and additional testing in light of stress and disaster studies reviewed and propositions advanced during the past decade.