ABSTRACT
Understanding family dynamics is a complex endeavor. Family dynamics can be conceptualized in terms of the transactions that occur among family members (actual behavior), the reactions of family members to these transactions (including behavioral, cognitive, and emotional reactions), and the encoded memories of both transactions and reactions. To document family dynamics well requires a strategy for data collection that gathers and integrates both objective and subjective data on all family members. Ideally, such data creates a clear and compelling picture of how different types of families and individual family members participate in family dynamics. Gathered prospectively, such data provides a basis for studying how family dynamics contribute to the development of individual family members and to the family as a unit. In addition, family dynamics reveal how families respond to challenges and changes, from both intrafamilial or extrafamilial sources.
