AAFCS CFCS-HDFS flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Ellen Swallow Richards

Founder of home economics who organized the first Lake Placid conferences beginning in 1899; her work established the scientific study of home and family life that became FCS.

Near environment

The physical, social, and economic settings closest to individuals and families, such as housing, food, clothing, and household resources; a core FCS organizing concept.

CFCS credential

Certified in Family and Consumer Sciences, a generalist professional credential administered by AAFCS that requires education, experience, examination, and ongoing professional development for recertification.

FCS Body of Knowledge

The profession's conceptual framework organizing core concepts including basic human needs, individual well-being, family strengths, community vitality, and the near environment.

Empiricism in FCS

The profession's primary way of knowing, relying on systematic observation, measurement, and experiment; interpretive and critical perspectives supplement it for meaning and power.

Beneficence and nonmaleficence

Ethical principles requiring professionals to act for others' benefit and to avoid causing harm; they guide decisions in family and consumer sciences practice.

Cooperative Extension

The land-grant university system that translates research into community programming; a historical and continuing delivery channel for family and consumer sciences knowledge.

Home economics to FCS

The 1990s renaming of the profession, reflecting a shift toward lifespan, systems, and prevention orientations rather than household skills alone.

NASAFACS standards

National Standards for Family and Consumer Sciences Education defining 16 areas of study that structure FCS curricula, courses, and career pathways.

RIASEC typology

Holland's six vocational personality types (Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, Conventional) used to match individual interests with occupational environments.

Super's life-span theory

A career development theory describing growth, exploration, establishment, maintenance, and decline stages unfolding across multiple simultaneous life roles.

FCS teaching licensure

Typically requires a state teaching license plus an FCS content endorsement, often including a content examination such as a Praxis or state test.

O*NET and BLS data

Occupational information systems providing growth projections, median wages, required education, and task descriptions used for career exploration and advising.

Career decision-making process

A sequence of self-assessment, occupational exploration, decision, preparation, and adjustment used to guide career choices and transitions.

Family systems theory

Bowen's framework treating the family as an interdependent emotional unit; key constructs include differentiation of self, triangles, and multigenerational transmission.

Ecological systems theory

Bronfenbrenner's model nesting the developing person in microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem, and chronosystem, with change in one level affecting others.

Family life cycle stages

Carter and McGoldrick's stages from leaving home through later life, each carrying developmental tasks that families must accomplish to move forward.

ABC-X model

Hill's family stress model: A is the stressor event, B family resources, C the family's perception, and X the resulting crisis outcome.

Double ABC-X model

An extension of Hill's model adding pile-up of stressors and family coping over time, explaining adjustment after prolonged or repeated stress.

Exchange theory

A family science framework explaining behavior through costs, rewards, and perceived alternatives, predicting that relationships persist when rewards exceed costs.

Community needs assessment

A process of defining the population and problem, gathering existing and primary data, analyzing and prioritizing needs, then planning, implementing, and evaluating programs.

Formative vs summative evaluation

Formative evaluation examines process and implementation during a program; summative evaluation measures outcomes and impact after or at completion.

Mandated reporting

State statutes requiring FCS and human service professionals to report suspected child abuse or neglect to designated authorities within specified timelines.

Piaget's cognitive stages

Four stages: sensorimotor (object permanence), preoperational (symbolic thought, egocentrism), concrete operational (conservation), and formal operational (abstract reasoning).

Erikson's psychosocial stages

Eight lifespan crises each paired with a virtue, from trust versus mistrust (hope) through integrity versus despair (wisdom).

Zone of proximal development

Vygotsky's concept describing the gap between what a learner can do alone and what they can do with guidance, where scaffolding is most effective.

Kohlberg's moral development

Three levels of moral reasoning: preconventional (punishment, exchange), conventional (conformity, law and order), and postconventional (social contract, universal principles).

Gilligan's ethic of care

A critique of Kohlberg arguing that moral development also includes relational care and responsibility, a perspective more often emphasized in girls' reasoning.

Attachment patterns

Bowlby and Ainsworth's classifications of secure, avoidant, resistant/ambivalent, and disorganized attachment, assessed through the Strange Situation procedure.

Maslow's hierarchy

A motivational framework ordering physiological, safety, belonging and love, esteem, and self-actualization needs, with lower needs generally preceding higher ones.

Backward design

An instructional planning process that identifies desired results first, then determines acceptable evidence, then designs learning experiences aligned to objectives.

Bloom's revised taxonomy

A hierarchy of cognitive objectives ordered as remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate, and create, used to write observable, leveled learning objectives.