The origins of the family stress model

This commentary for the special issue on resilience processes related to the family stress model of economic hardship (FSM; Conger & Elder, 1994) reviews the early origins of the FSM during the 1980s and how it developed into a model that has proven useful in family stress research. In the following comments, Conger describes the development of the model as a theoretical guide for a long-term study of family response to severe economic difficulties. First, he considers the setting for the planned study of rural families negotiating the financial collapse of the agricultural economy in Iowa during the 1980s. Second, he examines empirical findings from earlier research on family and individual response to economic hardship and gaps in that research that needed to be addressed in the original FSM study. He also considers evidence from adverse life circumstances that helped generate theoretical hypotheses in framing the model. Finally, these comments considered findings from a qualitative analysis of the experiences of three rural families that provided an early empirical test of the FSM's theoretical ideas. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).