WASHINGTON — Consumers are snapping back to life, kindling springtime hopes that the recession is losing steam.

Even though the economy shrank again in the first three months of the year — and by a lot — Americans stepped up their purchases of cars, furniture and appliances. The surge in consumer spending, which accounts for about 70 percent of the economy, could set the stage for a rebound later this year.

Hopes for revival depend on those consumers, who have been fortified by fatter paychecks from tax cuts and smaller mortgage payments from refinancings. If they keep buying, businesses will need to boost production, feeding yet more economic activity.

Against that backdrop, many analysts think the economy is sinking less now than it did from January through March. Most believe it could start growing again by summer or, more likely, by the final quarter of this year.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues, opting against further action yesterday to shore up the economy, detected glimmers that the recession might be easing.

"The pace of contraction appears to be somewhat slower," Fed policymakers said in a statement a few hours after the government released its report showing a second straight big quarterly drop in the nation's gross domestic product.

Though the Federal Reserve noted that spending "has shown signs of stabilizing," it also said people's buying is still constrained by rising unemployment, falling home values and hard-to-get credit.

Those negative forces — or the emergence of new ones, like the swine flu outbreak — could cause consumers to do an about-face and ratchet back spending, throwing the economy into another tailspin.

The economy logged a worse-than-expected 6.1 percent annualized drop in the first three months of the year despite the rebound by consumers, the Commerce Department reported. The culprits behind the poor overall performance: sharp cutbacks by businesses, especially in inventories of unsold goods, and the biggest drop in U.S. exports in 40 years.

The decline was nearly as sharp as in the final three months of last year. That's when the economy shrank at a 6.3 percent pace, the worst showing in a quarter-century. The biggest pullback by consumers in 28 years figured prominently in that downward spiral.

All told, the economy logged its poorest six-month performance since the late 1950s.

The bleak picture underscores the damage caused by the housing, credit and financial crises — the worst since the 1930s.