The California Family Health Project: VI. Multidomain analyses

The preceding articles in this series have reported associations between each of four domains of family variables (World View, Emotion Management, Structure/Organization, Problem Solving) and the Health of adults in a community-based sample of 225 families. In this article, we explore the relationships among all four family domains (73 variables) and between all four family domains and adult Health. The results of both principal components and multidimensional scaling analyses suggested the viability of the four-family-domain framework. As expected, the pattern of relationships among the variables in each family domain was maintained when Health was added to the analyses. Using multidimensional scaling analysis, we also found that the relationship between some family domains and Health changed when viewed in the context of the other family domains. These shifts suggested the importance of family context on the relationship of that family domain and Health. Family World View and Emotion Management maintained their relationships with Health; family Structure/Organization shifted relatively moderately; and Problem Solving shifted substantially. Family World View and family Emotion Management may be relatively more independent in their relation to family member health than family Structure/Organization and Problem Solving.