Family Development Theory focuses on the systematic and patterned changes experienced by families as they move through their life course: Children and Families Assignment, NUI, Ireland

Family Development Theory:

• Family Development Theory focuses on the systematic and patterned changes experienced by families as they move through their life course.
• The purpose of the family according to Duvall (1977, p.5) ‘is to create and maintain a common culture that promotes the physical, mental, emotional, and social development of each of its members.
• Works from the premise that families develop in predictable ways.
• The assumption is that most families at a particular stage will be very much like other families at that stage.
• Some theorists emphasize there are biological, psychological, and social influences that accompany family life events and that these influences create stages that are helpful in understanding and intervening with families.
• Swiss psychologist Piaget’s (1896-1980) theory provided many of the central concepts for a developmental theory such as:

   

1. Movement through stages.
2. Constructivism.
3. Schemata – how people perceive the world through developmental stages.

• The term family as used here represents a social group containing at least one parent-child relationship. The family group is organized and governed by social norms.
• The general notion of a family life-cycle has a long history that dates back to 1777 (Mattessich and Hill 1987).
• Maintains that family development unfolds through invariant, universal stages, a conception that is very similar to the aging process.
• A more conscious formulation known as family development theory began after World War II with work on family stress by Reuben Hill (1949) and later Duvall (1957).
• The first systematic statement of the approach characterized family development as proceeding through life-cycle stages (family stages) such as early marriage, families with young children, the launching of children out of the home, and the empty nest (Hill and Rodgers 1964).