The Development of Accommodative Coping

doi:10.1017/9781108917230.020

15 - The Development of Accommodative Coping

Conditions and Consequences from a Lifespan Perspective

from Part IV - Psychological Foundations of the Development of Coping

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 June 2023

Werner Greve and

Cathleen Kappes

Edited by

Ellen A. Skinner and

Melanie J. Zimmer-Gembeck

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Ellen A. Skinner: Affiliation:
Portland State University
Melanie J. Zimmer-Gembeck: Affiliation:
Griffith University, Queensland

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Summary

The concept of accommodative coping refers to a "family" of processes by which goal blockages, losses, and similar threats to quality of life are coped with by adjusting individual goal and valuation structures, i.e., in particular by devaluing or "letting go" of threatened or blocked goals and upgrading and pursuing alternative, more attainable goals in their place. While the functionality of accommodative regulatory processes in older and older adulthood has long been elaborated theoretically in several compatible modeling approaches and well studied empirically, accommodative processes in childhood and adolescence have only recently attracted scientific attention. It is helpful here to distinguish the efficacy of accommodative processes in childhood and adolescence itself from the developmental conditions for accommodative processes in adulthood and old age. Combining these perspectives opens up the prospect of an actual lifespan perspective on developmental regulation.

Keywords

Accommodation developmental conditions of adult coping lifespan perspective developmental regulation goal adjustment goal disengagement goal reengagement

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Type: Chapter
Information: The Cambridge Handbook of the Development of Coping , pp. 382 - 400
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108917230.020 [Opens in a new window]
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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