ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses both the lack of multi-community studies of the impacts of the farm crisis on rural community residents, and the paucity of information on residents' perceptions of the impacts of the farm crisis on their communities and their personal lives. To compare the consequences of the farm crisis as perceived by residents in these communities, crosstabulations were run and the chi-square statistic was utilized to determine if the differences between the communities were statistically significant. The residents of communities with greater economic dependence on agriculture were the most likely to have stated that their lives had been affected a great deal by the farm crisis. Age and education were significantly related to the residents' perceptions of community effects. A random sample of residents in three rural communities in North and West Texas were interviewed to determine the perceived effects of the farm crisis on their community and their own personal lives.
