Strategic change is the key to the longterm development of family businesses, but the prior research ignores the role of the actual controller of family businesses. Based on the empirical data of listed family businesses in China from 2003 to 2019, this paper investigates the impact of poverty experience of the actual controllers of family businesses on the change of enterprise strategy. The study finds that the poverty experience of the actual controller has a negative effect on strategic change, which is still robust after the endogenous test. Furthermore, this study confirms that the risk preference of the actual controller and the irrational precautionary saving motivation are two mechanisms of this effect. At the same time， the level of digital economy has a negative moderating effect on the above-mentioned relationship， and intergenerational inheritance has a positive moderating effect on the above-mentioned relationship. The study enriches the literature on the experience of the actual controller of the family business and the change of the enterprise strategy， and provides empirical evidence for a better understanding of how the actual controller of the family business affects strategic decision-making.