Directed toward the question of how parents and 15-year-old adolescents cope with the demands of social change occurring during unification in Germany, the comparative investigation of 40 families each in East and West Germany examines macro-social conditions of family relationships and rightist attitudes among German adolescents and adults. The results indicate that East German families are more subject to social change than West German families, but Eastern and Western German families show little differences in family relationships and rightist attitudes. Aspects of perceived social change affects family relationships although not dramatically, and findings also show that financial strain as perceived by parents correlated positively with anti-democratic and anti-foreigner attitudes, whereas other aspects of social change are more distant from the immediate living situation and less influential. Anti-democratic and anti-foreigner attitudes for East German adolescents seem to be more different from each other (r=.36) than for West German adolescents (r=.60). Implications from the study are that unification, though politically favored by most Germans, puts a burden on families and the East German families more so than West German families, and deteriorating economic situations weaken family ties and possibly increase anti-democratic and anti-foreigner attitudes. (CK)