Communication for Families in Crisis: Theories, Research, Strategies - Hardcover

"With this volume, the editors have significantly improved what we know about families' actual experiences with crises and the role communication plays in dealing with them. The research is original, engaging, useful, and highly likely to be heuristic." (J. D. Ragsdale, Editor of `Southern Journal of Communication') "Fran C. Dickson and Lynne M. Webb have gathered together some of the top scholars in the communication discipline to examine how families experience, confront, and manage crisis in their everyday lives. The chapters are grounded in theory and research while maintaining a `real world' focus on key areas such as family relationship crises, family health crises, and family economic crises. As such, this book provides both a much-needed scholarly and applied contribution to a critically important area of family communication studies." (Glen Stamp, Professor and Chair, Department of Communication Studies, Ball State University) "The scholars mine the depth of the communication discipline's offerings to understand messages and discourses family members experience and employ when faced with crises." (Dawn O. Braithwaite, Willa Cather Professor of Communication, University of Nebraska-Lincoln) "With this volume, the editors have significantly improved what we know about families' actual experiences with crises and the role communication plays in dealing with them. The research is original, engaging, useful, and highly likely to be heuristic." (J. D. Ragsdale, Editor of `Southern Journal of Communication') "Fran C. Dickson and Lynne M. Webb have gathered together some of the top scholars in the communication discipline to examine how families experience, confront, and manage crisis in their everyday lives. The chapters are grounded in theory and research while maintaining a `real world' focus on key areas such as family relationship crises, family health crises, and family economic crises. As such, this book provides both a much-needed scholarly and applied contribution to a critically important area of family communication studies." (Glen Stamp, Professor and Chair, Department of Communication Studies, Ball State University) "The scholars mine the depth of the communication discipline's offerings to understand messages and discourses family members experience and employ when faced with crises." (Dawn O. Braithwaite, Willa Cather Professor of Communication, University of Nebraska-Lincoln)

In this volume, the first book-length work to address effective family communication during times of crisis, leading researchers provide in-depth discussions of communication theory vis-a-vis specific scientific analysis of families in crisis. Three general types of crises are examined: relational crises (infidelity, infertility, identity shifts, parental deployment, death of a child); health crises (mothers with breast cancer, children with disabilities, pediatric cancer, geriatric health crises); and economic crises (job loss, divorce, homelessness, post-hurricane survival). Each chapter ends with practical advice for families on how to communicate effectively during crisis. Given its presentation of diverse theories, research methodologies, and crises, this volume can serve as a useful textbook for graduate courses in communication and family studies. In addition, the accessible writing style and engaging topics make it an ideal supplemental text for upper division undergraduate classes and a useful resource for practitioners who assist families in crisis.