Abstract

The author characterizes the underlying assumptions, convictions, and beliefs that each family holds about its environment as the family paradigm, citing the evidence for the family paradigm gleaned from the laboratory study of how families solve problems. He suggests that a family's health depends on the conservation of its paradigm; pattern regulators and ceremonials are two types of family routine that conserve the paradigm. When the paradigm is threatened with collapse, three stages can be delineated: the emergence of rules, the explicit family, and rebellion and action. Each last stage can propel the family toward