This subfield examines the internal workings of families, including communication patterns, power dynamics, roles and responsibilities, and how these factors affect family relationships and development.
Communication: Understanding how family members communicate and how to improve communication to avoid conflicts.
Family roles: The different roles family members play within a family and how these roles can affect family dynamics.
Family traditions: Family traditions are the routines and customs which family members follow and are significant for communication, bonding and bring the family together.
Family structure: The different types of families, such as nuclear families or extended families, and how family structures can influence family values.
Parenting styles: Different parenting styles, including authoritative, authoritarian and permissive, and how they influence family dynamics.
Conflict resolution: Techniques to avoid and deal with conflicts in a family setting.
Family values: The beliefs, principles and core values that define what a family stands for.
Family identity: What makes a family unique and how this contributes to family values.
Cultural backgrounds: How different cultural background's can shape family values and dynamics.
Family rituals: The practices and patterns that shape the values and identity of a family, which are a crucial part of family's life.
Gender roles: How gender impacts the division of roles and tasks within a family setting.
Generational differences: The differences between generations and how they shape family values.
Adoption: The effects of adoption on family values and dynamics.
Divorce and separation: The impacts of divorce and separation on a family's values and dynamics.
Family finance: Strategies to manage money as a family and how financial decisions can affect family dynamics.
Family health: The impact of health on family dynamics and the importance of promoting healthy lifestyles as a family.
Education: Education and its effects on family values and dynamics.
Family support: How to provide support to family members in times of crisis.
Parent-child relationships: Understanding the bond between parents and children, parenting styles and the impact of nurturing relationships in family dynamics.
Relationship dynamics: The dynamics between family members that can affect family values and the functionality of the family unit.
Nuclear Family: Consisting of parents and their children living under one roof.
Extended Family: Including grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and sometimes even distant relatives living together.
Single-Parent Family: Consisting of one parent and their children.
Blended Family: Marrying or moving in together with children from previous relationships.
Foster Family: Providing a temporary home for children who have been removed from their birth parents' home for various reasons by the state.
Adoptive Family: Adopting a child from an agency or privately.
Grandparent-Headed Family: Grandparents raising their grandchildren.
Same-Sex Parent Family: Consisting of parents of the same gender.
Multigenerational Family: Having more than three generations coexisting under the same roof.
Communal Family: Groups of adults coexisting and pooling resources together to raise their children.
Intergenerational Family: Grandparents living with their adult children and grandchildren.