Family Adaptation to Relocation: An Empirical Analysis of Family Stressors, Adaptive Resources, and Sense of Coherence. Technical Report 856.

This study investigated ways to improve family wellness during a critical period of family stress, the adaptation to relocation overseas. The study is based on a secondary analysis of the "1000 Army Families Dataset," which was collected in 1983. The final sample consisted of 983 officer and enlisted intact families in which the husband was in the Army and the wife was a civilian. Compared with earlier analyses of this dataset, additional concepts were specified to determine their relative influence on family adaptation, and separate analyses were conducted for: enlisted members, spouses of enlisted members, officers, and spouses of officers. The findings clearly supported the importance of congruency of expectations and actual experiences about life in Europe on the level of family adaptation. This factor emerged as the best predictor of family adaptation for all four subgroups. Specifically, family adaptation was highest in families where the actual experiences (e.g., the job, housing, and schools), were the same or better than expected before arrival in Europe. In addition, the level of community support also emerged as an important predictor of family adaptation for each of the subgroups. Additional variables predictive of family adaptation for selected subgroups included recent and post-move stressor events. (Author/ABL)