ConceptDefinition Marriage Marriage rate Divorce Divorce rate Cohabitation Marital breakdown 1969 Divorce Law Reform Act Lone-parent family Separation Single-hood Childless /11 Test on theories of cohabitation, marriage and divorce. Name:________________________________ 1. Define the following level one concepts. (1 mark for each correct definition).

2. Define the following level two concepts. (2 marks for each correct definition). ConceptDefinition Empty shell marriage Serial monogamy Irretrievable breakdown First marriage Remarriage Childfree Creative singlehood /14 3. Identify and explain the following trends below: First marriages: Id: Exp: Remarriages: Id: Exp: /4

ConceptDefinition Ideology of romance Confluent love Plastic sexuality Individualisation Secularisation Matrimonial offence 4. Define the following level three concepts. (3 marks for each correct definition). /21 Using data from a number of British Social Attitudes Surveys, they found clear evidence of changing public attitudes to cohabitation. A sociologist who observed a decline in the popularity of marriage in Europe and explained it as a delay, not a total rejection. Sociologist who examines the reasons behind the declining fertility statistics. Sociologists who examined the reasons for the rise in the divorce rate and focused particularly on the romantic nature of marriage. He focuses on the factors of freedom of choice & the ease of divorce in examining why so many marriages are ending in contemporary Britain. 5. Match the study summaries to the correct sociologist. Barlow et al Allan & Crow Morgan Gibson Chester /5

6. Complete the following statements regarding Barlow et al’s study; Just a Piece of Paper? More people were beginning to see it as ______________________ to have ______________ without getting _______________. In 1994, 70% agreed that ‘People who want children ought to get married’, but by 2000 this was down to 54%. They found increasingly liberal attitudes towards ______________________, with the number thinking it was ‘not wrong at all’ increasing from 42% in 1984 to 62% in By 2000 more than two thirds of respondents (67%) agreed it was ‘____________ for a couple to live together without intending to get ________________’ & 56% thought it was a good idea to ____________________ first. They found __________________ people were more likely to agree with cohabitation than ____________ people. /13 Barlow et al found that marriage was still _________________; in 2000, 59% agreed that ‘marriage is still the best kind of relationship’. Only 9% thought there was no point to marriage, that it was ________________________________. They concluded that society would become one where “long- term ___________________ is widely seen as quite normal, and where marriage is more of a ________________________ than an expected part of life.” 7. Suggest three reasons for the decline in first marriage. i) ii) iii) /3

8. Complete the following statements regarding Chester’s study. Writing in the 1980s, Chester was among those who noted that marriage rates among young adults had __________________ in many Western countries. First, Sweden & Denmark experienced falling marriage rates among the under-thirties, then the trend continued in the UK, the USA and West Germany in the early ________s and later spread to France. In England and Wales the ___________________________ (number of marriages per 1,000 single people), was 74.9 in 1961, rising to 82.3 in 1971 but by 2004 it was just For women the rate was 83 in 1961, 97 in 1971 and 30.8 in The number of first marriages fell from a peak of nearly 400,000 per year in the mid-1960s to well under 200,000 per year by However, Chester did not see these figures as conclusive evidence for a decline in the ____________________ of marriage. He said “Mainly we seem to be witnessing a __________ in the timing of marriage, rather than a fall-off in getting married at all.” He thought ______________ generations might marry less frequently, but he believed there would be only a ____________________________ in marriage rates. /7 A small number of older women are able to benefit from reproductive technology which boosts their fertility as they get older. The marriage rate reduced enormously He was wrong! 9. Identify which evaluative statements relate to which theorists’ work. Provides a detailed examination of divorce that goes beyond just looking at economic factors, it looks at emotional ones, too. Lacks empirical rigor – he needs to get out there and listen to divorced couples and find out exactly why they got divorced. /4 10. Create speech bubbles in order to illustrate the impact of individualism on the divorce rate. /1

11. Complete the following statements regarding Morgan’s study. She points out that _______________________________ have fallen. In the 1870s around _______ children were born per woman, but this declined to below________ in the 1930s. Many people delayed getting married or having children during the Second World War, but after the war there was a _______________________. This led to the total fertility rate peaking at 2.94 in by 1995 it had fallen to 1.77 and fell further to 1.63 in The decline in fertility is a result of women having children ________ in life. The later women leave it before they have their first child, the fewer ____________________ they have remaining, making it likely they will have ______________ children. Morgan sees the decline in fertility as part of the general decline in family life. She links it to the rise in ______________________, noting that women who are cohabiting rather than married are more likely to have only _____ child. She points out that the birth rate would be even lower and the average age at birth even higher were it not for a rise in the number of pregnancies amongst ___________________________ ____________________________. / Identify and explain three factors in the increase in the divorce rate since the early 1970s. i) Id: Exp: ii) Id: Exp: iii) Id: Exp: /6 13. Create speech bubbles in order to illustrate the concept of an empty shell marriage. /1

14. Complete the following statements regarding Allan and Crow’s study. Because families are no longer units of _____________________, couples are not willing to ________________ conflict as they do not rely _______________________ on each other as much as they had done in earlier family forms. “Incompatibilities which were tolerated are now seen as intolerable; and the absence of ___________, once seen as unfortunate but bearable, is now taken as indicative of the _________________________ breakdown of marriage.” They argue that marriage is increasingly viewed as a ‘_______________________ rather than a ___________________’. By getting married, people do not see themselves as entering a binding, ____________________ contract; rather, they are hoping to establish a personally ____________________ relationship: “Love, personal commitment and intrinsic satisfaction are now seen as the cornerstones of marriage. The absence of these emotions and feelings is itself justification for ___________________ this relationship.” / Complete the following statements regarding Gibson’s study. He claims that the development of _____________________ has increased the likelihood of ________________ between spouses (husbands and wives). The way modern life has developed puts increasing emphasis upon the desirability of individual _______________________. Gibson argues that people now live in an “enterprise and free-market culture of __________________________ in which the licence of choice dominates.” He adds “a higher divorce rate may be indicative of modern couples generally anticipating a higher standard of personal marital _________________________ than was expected by their ___________________________.” People increasingly expect to get most of their personal satisfaction from their _________________________, and ‘_____________________________________reinforce the feeling that togetherness is the consummate life style.’ But the emphasis on togetherness is somewhat undermined by ‘the Thatcherite manifesto of unfettered self- seeking interest’, so that conflict between spouses becomes more likely if self-fulfilment is not delivered by the _____________________. /9

Why do New Right sociologists argue that cohabitation is less stable than marriage? What do surveys generally tell us about people’s attitudes towards cohabitation? What do the official statistics tell us about marriage compared with thirty years ago? What ethnic differences can be perceived in marriage statistics? How does the New Right interpret the decline in marriage? How is divorce generally organised for most people today? According to Functionalist sociologists, why has the divorce rate risen since the 1970s? How might the decline of the extended family and community have contributed to a rise in divorce? What divorce statistics can be used to challenge the New Right argument that the family is in decline? High divorce rates are a sign that people are demanding higher standards from their partners compared with the past & that marriage is highly valued. Although four in ten marriages end in divorce, six in ten are successful, which suggests that marriage and family life are still reasonably healthy. They claim that cohabiting couples are less happy than married couples & are more likely to be abusive, unfaithful, stressed and depressed. It’s another symptom of general moral decline. Specifically, it’s another sign that the traditional family life they encourage is under attack. The number of people getting married has declined steeply. They suggest people see it as a dress rehearsal for marriage & see it as a temporary phase rather than an alternative to marriage. These people are no longer on hand to give advice, guidance or support, or to exert pressure on the couple to remain together. If both partners agree, two years of separation is defined as irretrievable breakdown of marriage and divorce is granted. African-Caribbeans are less likely to get married than whites, while Asians are more likely to be married than any other group. 16) Match the questions to the correct answers… /9 Total score: /128 Grade: