SOCIOLOGY FAMILY STRUCTURES
what is a family?
A family is generally regarded by sociologists as based on relationships of blood, marriage or adoption, however some sociologists would now point to the emergence of families of choice, whereby individuals choose to include people as family members who are not traditionally related. For example a cohabiting couple may see one another as family, though not formally married, and some same-sex parents may adopt close friends as honorary aunts and uncles to ensure their children have adult role models of both sexes.
what is a household?
A household is simply a group of people who live at the same address. The majority of households in the UK are still made up of different kinds of families but an increasing proportion of the population now live alone or with people who are unrelated.
what is a nuclear family?
A nuclear family consists of a father, mother and one or more children who could be their adopted or biological children. Up to the 1970's many sociologists saw the nuclear family as the typical family of Western industrial societies. Figures from the ONS 2013 reveal that the most common type of family with children in 2013 was a married or civil partner couple family with dependent children (essentially a nuclear family) of which there were 4.7 million However this was the only family type to decrease in number since 1996 with an increase in other types such as cohabiting couple families and lone parent families over the last decade.
Brannen (2003)
According to Brannen (2003), we are witnessing the emergence of 'beanpole families'. These are extended families of 3, 4 or even 5 generations. However, unlike traditional extended families, members may not necessarily all live in the same households, but may live close together and see one another regularly. According to Brannen, such relationships can offer valuable support to families going through divorce or to lone parents. Such families are like beanpoles because they are tall and thin; low birth rates mean only one or two children may be born in each generation so children may have few brothers and sisters or cousins in their own generation. This means intergenerational ties (between family members in the same generation) are weak but individuals tend to have more intergenerational relationships, such as with grandparents and great-grandparents, who are more likely to be alive today because of longer life expectancy.
According to the annual Cost of a Child Report...
According to the annual Cost of a Child Report, the cost of raising a child from birth to 21 in 2013 was £227,266. It also suggested that one in five parents are delaying having another child due to cuts to child benefit and the increasing cost of parenting.
Klinenberg (2013)
American sociologist Klinenberg (2013) argues that in Western European and North American societies people are living alone in large numbers for the first time in history for 3 reasons: - The cult of the individual- describes the idea that with the emergence of modern industrial societies, individuals are more focused on their own needs rather than on their role in larger social structures such as families, as in pre industrial and tribal societies- the cultural pressure today is to be 'good to oneself' so more individuals choose to opt out of living with others/ part of a family - The communications revolution- individuals can achieve the pleasures of a social life even when they are living alone thanks to new technologies like social media and email etc - The ageing population- because people are living longer it is likely that they will be divorced or widowed in old age. Elderly women in particular are likely to live alone as they have a longer life expectancy than men
Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (1995)
Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (1995) have argued that we are undergoing a process of individualisation, whereby individuals choose their own lifestyles and identities rather than following norms laid down by traditions. Part of this includes deciding whether to maintain ties with extended families or lead more independent lives
Bourdieu (1973)
Bourdieu (1973) argues that cultural differences are important because middle class parents often possess what he calls 'cultural capital'- forms of cultural knowledge that can help their children to do well in education and fit in better with the higher levels of society.
Calhoun (1997)
Calhoun (1997) argues that gay men and lesbians have traditionally been treated as family outlaws who threaten family life; however, she argues that as modern life has come to be characterised by greater choice, gay and lesbian lifestyles have become more accepted.
concerns about family diversity
Concerns about diversity -The strongest concerns about family diversity have come from the New Right, who see diversity as destroying traditional family values. They call for social policies that strengthen marriage and encourage raising children in traditional nuclear families. From their perspective, lone parent, reconstituted, cohabiting and same sex families do not function as effectively in socializing children and providing a stable family life While not agreeing with New Right, some other sociologists have also expressed concern about the trend towards individualisation in personal relationships. For example, Beck and Beck Gernsheim do not advocate the nuclear family as an ideal form but have expressed concern at the way in which individuals' concerns about the risks of commitment have undermined family life
what are reconstituted families and how many are there?
Created where a couple come together and form a family including at least one child from a previous relationship of one of the couple. In 2011 there were 544,000 reconstituted families with dependent children in England and Wales, in which 340,000 couples were married and 203,000 were cohabiting. 11% of couple families with dependent children were reconstituted. Diverse category of family- Parentline Plus suggests there are 72 ways in which step families can be formed.
Crompton (2005)
Crompton (2005) family plays a part in the process of what Marxists refer to as class reproduction. This is the idea that most children will follow their parents into a similar class position in society; most working class children will go on to working class positions etc.
how does ethnicity affect family diversity?
ETHNICITY South Asian families The term 'South Asian' is usually applied to people originating from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. This comprises a diverse set of ethnic groups with most Indians being Hindu or Sikh and the overwhelming majority of Bangladeshis and Pakistanis identifying themselves as Muslims in the 2011 Census Language differences are also important, with languages such as Urdu and Punjabi being spoken in many British Pakistani homes and Gujarati and Hindi in British Indian homes Ballard More recently, there is evidence of change among SA families; for example, younger generations expect more choice in their marriage partners and most SA households are now based around nuclear rather than extended families. There is also evidence that levels of divorce and lone parenthood are starting to increase in Asian communities. Berthoud (2001) Platt (2009) African- Caribbean families Caribbean immigrants brought very different traditions of family life when they migrated to Britain from the 1950s onwards In some of the Caribbean islands, such as Jamaica, the nuclear family is the norm but there is also a strong tradition of matrifocal or mother centred families. These are often LPF's headed by women, but they also entail mothers bringing up children with assistance from grandmothers and aunts. While cohabitation has become more acceptable in the British white population in recent decades, common law families that involve couples cohabiting and bringing up children who may or may not be their biological offspring have been a long established pattern in many parts of the Caribbean Berthoud and Beishon (1997) Chamberlain (1999) Reynolds (2002) Mann (2009)
what are extended families?
Extended families are families that include kin ( or relatives) beyond the nuclear family. A family can be extended vertically (comprising of multiple generations of grandparents etc.) or horizontally comprising of aunts uncles and cousins There is a lot of evidence that extended families were important, especially in working class communities in Britain up until the 1950s however more recently sociologists believe they are in decline Changes in the number of multi-family households may be because of older couples moving in with their adult child and their family, young adults who are partnered or lone parents, remaining or returning to their parent's household and unrelated families sharing a household. Despite this rise, which was also seen in the 2011 Census results, multi-family households still only represented a very small proportion (1.1%) of all households in 2017.
what are same sex families and how many are there?
Families based on same sex couples remain a tiny minority of families in the UK. There were only 8000 civil partnerships and 5000 cohabiting same sex couples with children compared to 5.7 million opposite sex couples with children recorded in 2013.
Giddens (1992)
Giddens (1992) presents a similar perspective to B+B Gernsheim, arguing that in late modernity there has been a TRANSFORMATION OF INTIMACY. Individuals no longer seek the kind of romantic love associated with traditional marriage based on lifelong commitment and instead there has been a growth of conjugal love where relationships are more temporary and fragile with an expectation that each partner is emotionally invested
Grant (2006)
Grant (2006) argues that due to the fact that the majority of children stay with their mother following divorce or separation, most reconstituted families have a stepfather rather than a stepmother. Grant suggests that therefore men are increasingly likely to be living with other men's children while their own grow up elsewhere
how many non family households are there in the UK?
In 2013 there were 7.8 million households in the UK consisting of one person living alone (an increase from 7.2 million in 2003). There were also 800,000 households containing two or more unrelated adults- for example friends sharing accommodation.
statistics on the number of extended families
In recent years a number of sociologists have argued that the extended continues to be important to many people. The ONS 2013 shows that less than 1% of households in the UK are multi family households but thy are the fastest growing type of household. There were 0.3 million multi family households in 2017 according to ONS, up from 0.2 in 2007 Households containing two or more families (multi-family households) were the fastest growing household type over the decade to 2017, increasing by 42.1% from 215,000 households in 2007 to 306,000 households in 2017. This increase is statistically significant. Families in these households may be unrelated, or may be related in some way, for example, a married couple with their son and his girlfriend.
Katz (2007)
Katz (2007) argue that the stress of living in poverty may make it more difficult for parents living in poverty to bring up their children effectively. However, he also points out that there is equally good evidence to show that most parents living in poverty are remarkably resilient and possess strong coping skills in the face of adversity in their lives.
what are lone parent families and how many are there?
Lone parent families are families where at least one child lives with just one parent. In 91% of LPF's the parent is the mother, reflecting the fact that women are more likely to take the main caring responsibilities for children when relationships break down. The number of lone parent families in the UK has been decreasing in recent years from 3.0 million in 2015 to 2.8 million in 2017, a statistically significant decrease. LP's with dependent children represented 25% of all families with dependent children in 2013. For many individuals, being part of a LPF is a stage in the life course- many children will spend part of their childhood in a LPF but ,ost parents remain alone for only an average of about 5 years. According to government statistics, children in lone parent families are twice as likely as children in couple families to live in relative poverty. Over 4 in 10 children in LPF's are poor, compared to just over 2 in 10 of children in couple families
why do more men live alone than women?
Of the 7.7 million one-person households in the UK, 53.8% of them in 2017 contained one woman and 46.2% of them contained one man. There were 3.9 million people living alone aged 16 to 64 years in 2017; a larger proportion were male (58.5%) than female. This could be because of the following: - higher proportions of men than women never marry - men marry at older ages than women and marry women younger than themselves - partnership dissolution, leading to men living alone while women may live with any children from the relationship
how does sexuality affect family diversity?
SEXUALITY Some sociologists note how grater acceptance of same sex relationships has led to the emergence of new types of families and intimate relationships Giddens (1992) notes how there has been a 'transformation of intimacy' whereby individuals have much greater freedom to choose what kinds of intimate relationships they engage in. Weeks, Donovan and Heaphy (1999) Calhoun (1997) In 2012 there were 2,893,000 opposite sex couples in the UK and 69,000 same sex couples (ONS 2012), so though gay and lesbian partnerships contribute to family diversity, they remain a relatively small minority.
how does social class affect family diversity?
SOCIAL CLASS Families play a considerable part in equipping their children for their future roles in society, whether as business leaders, doctors, plumbers or factory workers. Crompton (2005) This is partly for economic reasons, wealthier parents can pass on money, family businesses or other financial assets to their children, giving them an obvious advantage. They may also invest in their children's education, such as by paying for university fees. Bourdieu (1973) Children from families in poverty are particularly likely to be disadvantaged. This may simply be due to lack of resources- for example insufficient income to ensure a decent standard of housing, diet and access to leisure activities. Katz (2007)
Spencer (2005)
Spencer (2005) studied over 15,000 children and found that children from LPF's were more at risk from poorer health, lower educational achievement and increased risk of anti social behaviour.
support for family diversity arguments
Support for diversity Against these concerns, other sociologists have celebrated the freedom offered by family diversity. Giddens argues that there has been a 'democratisation of intimate relationships', meaning that individuals are not forced into relationships but only engage with them when they find them fulfilling, meaning that there is more equality between partners Feminists have also welcomed many aspects of family diversity, arguing that the traditional nuclear family was patriarchal. The fact that women can opt out of marriage, bring up children without a male partner or engage in lesbian relationships are all seen as extending socially acceptable lifestyles for women
Murdock (1949)
The American social anthropologist George Murdock (1949) compared research on 250 societies ranging from small hunter gathering bands to large scale industrial societies. He concluded that some form of family could be found in every society. Murdock argued that in all societies the nuclear family (father, mother and one or more children) is the basis of the family unit, though in many societies it can include other relatives (extended family) while in polygamous societies it may be acceptable for a man to have more than one wife (polygyny) or for a woman to have more than one husband (polyandry)
The British Social Attitudes Survey (2012) and sexuality and family diversity
The British Social Attitudes Survey 2012 found that 28% of respondents still thought that sexual relations between two adults of the same sex were 'always wrong' or 'mostly wrong'
Weeks, Donovan and Heaphy (1999)
Weeks, Donovan and Heaphy (1999) observe that many gay and lesbian people describe their households and even friendship networks as chosen families because, rather than following traditional heterosexual norms, they are able to choose who to include in their families and negotiate much more egalitarian relationships.
Young and Willmott (1973)
Young and Willmott (1973) argued that a new type of family- the symmetrical family- has spread to all social classes. This was based on a nuclear family centred on the relationship between husband and wife According to Young and Willmott, the symmetrical family has three main characteristics: 1. Conjugal roles are joint, the roles of husband and wife are symmetrical, because both paid work and unpaid domestic tasks are shared by both partners 2. The family is nuclear, the focus of the family is on the relationship between husband, wife and children, and extended family ties have weakened 3. The family is privatised, husbands and wives spend more time in the privacy of their home together, rather than with other extended family members or in community activities. This means that husbands are more involved in domestic life and more likely to share responsibilities with wives and spend time with their children. Young and Willmott's study contradicted the functionalist view that segregated conjugal roles are necessary and functional. They implied that there has been a historical march towards greater gender equality in men and women's roles in the family, though this has progressed further in some sections of society than others Today, most extended families are what Willmott calls dispersed extended families which means that kin do not live together in the same household, nuclear families are the main living unit but can rely on a network of extended family members who offer support and come together on special occasions.- transport, technology = connected
