Dealing With Financial Stress in the Family - Focus on Teens
This is a particularly difficult time for teens whose families have been hit hard by economic changes such as a job loss.
Why especially hard for teens? This is a time when teens want to break away from their families more and turn to their peers.
Yet if the family is in crisis, it becomes very hard to break away just when everyone needs to pull together.
So these changes are working against the developmental task of the teen years.
It is also possible that being with the peer group would involve money that is no longer available.
To go out to eat or on field trips or other youth activities requires money that the other kids may still have and your teen can be left out.
Sometimes families have to relocate and your teen loses friends and finds it hard to break into a new group.
And of course, teens are often materialistic and group status may depend on wearing certain clothes, shoes, etc.
In addition many teens are aware that plans for college may have to change and this can be upsetting especially if older siblings have not had to deal with this stress.
The Iowa Youth and Family Study project was started during a period when many families in Iowa were not able to keep the family farm (late 80's) and had to weather a serious economic downturn.
500 7th grade students were followed over a period of 20 years, making this one of the most comprehensive studies of family life done.
What do you imagine caused these teens the most trouble? The emotional distress of their parents!!! They were able to adapt to the changes in circumstance but if the parents were irritable, depressed, withdrawn, or fighting, these teens did worse than the teens whose families pulled together and weathered the changes with greater acceptance and calmness.
It is hard to believe that the attitude of acceptance and just enduring change with grace could be so powerful, but it is.
The families that did best also took advantage of all the community supports that were available to them and reached out for help.
They were not ashamed, bitter, depressed or angry but had a belief that they would see it through and that the relationships were what really mattered.
See also the 2008 February issue of Money magazine for an interview with me that talks further about helping teens through this time.
Why especially hard for teens? This is a time when teens want to break away from their families more and turn to their peers.
Yet if the family is in crisis, it becomes very hard to break away just when everyone needs to pull together.
So these changes are working against the developmental task of the teen years.
It is also possible that being with the peer group would involve money that is no longer available.
To go out to eat or on field trips or other youth activities requires money that the other kids may still have and your teen can be left out.
Sometimes families have to relocate and your teen loses friends and finds it hard to break into a new group.
And of course, teens are often materialistic and group status may depend on wearing certain clothes, shoes, etc.
In addition many teens are aware that plans for college may have to change and this can be upsetting especially if older siblings have not had to deal with this stress.
The Iowa Youth and Family Study project was started during a period when many families in Iowa were not able to keep the family farm (late 80's) and had to weather a serious economic downturn.
500 7th grade students were followed over a period of 20 years, making this one of the most comprehensive studies of family life done.
What do you imagine caused these teens the most trouble? The emotional distress of their parents!!! They were able to adapt to the changes in circumstance but if the parents were irritable, depressed, withdrawn, or fighting, these teens did worse than the teens whose families pulled together and weathered the changes with greater acceptance and calmness.
It is hard to believe that the attitude of acceptance and just enduring change with grace could be so powerful, but it is.
The families that did best also took advantage of all the community supports that were available to them and reached out for help.
They were not ashamed, bitter, depressed or angry but had a belief that they would see it through and that the relationships were what really mattered.
See also the 2008 February issue of Money magazine for an interview with me that talks further about helping teens through this time.
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