Household Resilience:
Absorptive Capacity, Adaptive Capacity and Transformative Capacity
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Measures
These measures assess factors associated with a household’s ability to react to and handle household-level financial shocks that might otherwise lead to food insecurity (e.g., job loss, unexpected bill, expensive home damage not covered by insurance, etc.).
Household Resilience – User Guide
The guide provides a brief background on the development of the measures, descriptions of the measures, examples for potential uses, guidance for scoring and interpreting scores.
Absorptive Capacity
When faced with a household-level financial shock, this measure assesses a household’s on-hand resources to “Absorb” the impacts of the shock in the short term. The measure contains nine items assessing expense burden, income adequacy, and housing situation. There is also a brief two-item social needs screener version (see user’s guide).
English version
Spanish version
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese
Adaptive Capacity
If a household’s Absorptive Capacity to buffer against a household-level financial shock is exceeded, the household must then react and adjust livelihood strategies to “Adapt” to the shock in the intermediate term. This measure contains eighteen items assessing financial efficacy, financial stress, social support, and adaptive barriers. There is also a brief two-item social needs screener version (see user’s guide).
English version
Spanish version
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese
Transformative Capacity
If eventually adaptation required to handle the shock becomes too great, the household will need to “Transform” in the long-term, which is dependent on the external context in which the household is situated within. This measure contains sixteen items assessing community resources, social environment, financial outlook, and access to opportunities. There is also a brief two-item social needs screener version (see user’s guide).
English version
Spanish version
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese