2.  Cohabitation  Divorce Rate  Family  Heterogamy  Homogamy  Maladjustment  Nuclear Family  Primary Group  Stepfamily

3.  Some important terms to discuss before answering this question include:  A family is a group united by marriage, blood, and/or adoption in order to satisfy intimacy needs and/or to bear and socialize children.  A nuclear family includes a husband, wife, and children, if any.  The divorce rate is, typically, the number of divorces per 1,000 marriages.  Cohabitation is living together without getting married.  When considering this question, issues of interest include:  Alternative Forms of the Family  The Changing American Family  Functions of the Family

4.  Group marriage  All males and females have access to each other for sex and companionship  Trial marriage  Renewable contracts  Open marriage  Each partner has the right to sexual/companionate relationships with others  Cohabitation  Conclusion is that family is changing, but not doomed.

5.  Important changes include increases in:  Age at first marriage  Proportion of young adults remaining single  Divorced adults  Adults living alone  Unmarried couples  Families maintained by adults with no spouse present  Children living with only one parent  Wives and mothers working  Dual-career families  Americans still value traditional nuclear family, with increasing tendency to prefer nontraditional roles and egalitarian arrangements.

6.  Regulating sexual behavior, reproduction, and rearing children  Provide a primary group for individuals  Primary group consists of the people with whom one has intimate, face-to-face interaction on a recurring basis, such as parents, spouse, children, and close friends  Primary groups are important for adults and children.  Give you personal status  Help you learn norms  Crucial to your well-being  The family is not always a solution. Sometimes, it is a problem.

7.  Family becomes a problem when it does not fulfill its purposes, especially as a primary group.  American ideal of family:  Structurally complete  Mother and father  Supportive group  Structural and supportive problems of family include:  Disrupted and Reconstituted Families  Family Violence

8.  Divorce rates have fluctuated in the US.  Upward trend from 1860 to 1980.  Rates began to decline after 1980.  During 1960’s and 1970’s, divorce was the major cause of single- parent families.  Delayed marriage and out-of-wedlock births are responsible since then.  About ¾ of people who divorce eventually remarry.  A stepfamily is a family formed by marriage that includes one or more children from a previous marriage.  Strain and conflict with or about stepchildren is common in such families.

9.  Violence in families is not a rare phenomenon.  The likelihood of being a victim of family violence varies by a number of demographic characteristics.  ¾ of victims are females  Whites and African-Americans have higher rates of victimization than other races  35-54 age group has higher rates than other age groups  There is a high level of violence in intimate relationships generally and in families in particular.  ¼ of children are exposed to at least one form of family violence in their lifetime

10.  Family violence is a worldwide problem  Three forms of family violence:  Spouse abuse  Involves wives beating husbands as well as husbands beating wives  Child abuse  More likely when one of the natural parents is missing  Abuse of parents  Less common than others  Substantial number of violent children report being maltreated by their parents in earlier years

11.  Sexual victimization in the family also occurs around the world  Incest is extremely traumatizing  Girls are more likely than boys to be victims  Intense conflict or alienation within the family  Neglect  Affects over a half million children each year

12.  Alienation from those in one’s primary group is emotionally traumatic.  Problems include:  Physical and Emotional Difficulties  Divorce  Abuse  Poverty  Deviant Behavior  Maladjustment  Most of these problems involve a contradiction between interaction patterns and American values.

13.  Children growing up with both biological parents receive more social, emotional, and material support than children in any other kind of family.  For adults, adjustment to divorce has striking similarities to the bereavement process.  In both death and divorce, a primary relationship has been disrupted  In first months, divorce is more likely to bring emotional and physical disturbances, so divorce is a major health problem in the nation.  Distress of divorce also affects friends and family members.  Children face problems of adjustment that range in severity based on many factors, including how well the parents handle the divorce.  Discord that leads to divorce is probably more stressful for the child than is divorce itself.

14.  Effects of abuse lead to both short-term and long-term trauma  Abused children may:  Become withdrawn and isolated  Feel shame, guilt, or unworthiness  Become anxious or depressed  Problems of abused children tend to persist into adulthood  Adults as well as children suffer physical and emotional harm from both psychological and physical abuse

15.  Female-headed families are more likely to experience poverty than male-headed families  Children who grow up in poverty have challenges in many areas of their lives, including education.  Poverty is associated with lower educational achievement, which = lower earnings in the labor market  Lower achievement reflects fact that children living in poverty are unprepared for school

16.  Higher rates of a wide range of deviant behavior among children in single-parent households, including:  Antisocial behavior  Aggression  Anxiety  Depression  School problems  Drug use  Early sexual activity and teen pregnancy  Dropping out of high school  The deviant behavior is likely to continue into adulthood.

17.  Maladjustment is poor adjustment to one’s social environment.  Difficulties that fall into this category include:  Antisocial behavior (bullying and aggression)  Insecurity  Overconformity to peers  Tendency to withdraw from relationships  Difficulty in relating to others  Personal identity problems  Problems follow children into adulthood  Child views abuse as a form of rejection, but hostility and inconsistency in discipline can also lead to maladjustment  A child’s sense of self-esteem is related to family experiences.

18.  Social Structural Factors contributing to family problems include:  Social Norms  Role Problems  Family Continuity  Stratification and Family Problems  The Family in a Changing Structure

19.  Norms about divorce have changed  Stigma formerly attached to divorce has now changed due to the norm of happiness – each individual has the right to be happy  Divorce is more likely if people marry at a young age and have a short or no engagement period  Social norms define the appropriate time for marriage  For most this time has been soon after high school or college, at the latest.  Norms also contribute to the amount of family violence in the nation  Use of physical punishment with children

20.  Modern marital roles place an emotional burden on people that is probably unprecedented in human history  Role problems that contribute to both structural and supportive problems include:  Role obligations are more ambiguous than that of traditional settings  Couples wanting to participate in activities traditionally for other genders, while still wanting to maintain their traditional gender roles  Women not having the role flexibility to be able to work outside the home  Defining roles in stepfamilies

21.  People who are reared in problem families tend to perpetuate the problems in their own families.  People who come from families with divorce or separation tend to follow this pattern.  Family violence tends to be continued from one generation to the next  The mere fact of witnessing violence between one’s parents tends to lead to problems of adjustment  A family can perpetuate its problems into the next generation simply because it is such an important factor in the socialization of the child.

22.  Divorce is more common in the lower strata than in the middle and upper strata.  The well-to-do can afford the costs of divorce more easily than the poor, but financial problems put enormous trains on marital and family relationships  Income is one of the best predictors of family stability  Divorce is more difficult and expensive when it involves a division of assets  Combination of higher rates of unmarried mothers and higher divorce rates means that fewer children in the lower socioeconomic strata live with both parents  Neglect and abuse seem to be more prevalent in the lower than in the middle or upper strata.

23.  Rapid change of social structure creates problems for families.  If roles are in a state of flux, potential for conflict within the family is increased and probability of divorce becomes greater.  Current society is in a time of rapid change  Divorce rate in the US is positively related to urbanity, population change, and lack of church membership, all of which are indicators of a lack of integration into a local community.

24.  Social Psychological Factors contributing to family problems include:  Attitudes  Values and Homogamy  The Value of Success  Ideology of the Family

25.  Attitudes about single parent families are a factor in family problems  Single parent families are considered:  At best, less than what is desirable  At worst, something that exists but should not exist or be approved  Attitudes about abuse are a factor in family problems  Men who sexually abuse their children have several rationales:  No intercourse so it wasn’t really sex  Define intercourse as adult-to-adult rather than adult-to-child to maintain that child was a willing participant  Blaming the victim is one of the more common characteristics of husbands who abuse their wives.  Attitudes toward the self are important, as well

26.  Heterogamy involves marriage between partners with diverse values and backgrounds  Homogamy involves marriage between partners with similar values and backgrounds  Some social scientists argue that heterogamous couples will complement each other, while others argue that homogamous couples are more likely to produce a rewarding and lasting marriage.  Research generally supports the view than homogamy is more conducive to a lasting marriage

27.  The American value of success can lead to supportive failure in the family.  Monetary success often requires long hours at work and minimal contact with family  Research has shown that the more time individuals spent at work, the greater the interference with family life and the higher the level of distress  Family members may feel neglected by the person who is working the long hours

28.  Unfulfilled or conflicting expectations about role obligations can lead to marital dissatisfaction and dissolution.  American ideology of the “good” family generates a set of expectations that can lead to family problems  A good family is a happy family and happy families are harmonious  Condemns conflict  Good family maintains healthy relationships via free expression of feelings  Encourages too much anger and aggression  The man should be the breadwinner  Can lead to violence or problems if wives earn more  Outsiders should not interfere in family affairs  Can prevent abused family members from getting help

29.  Both therapeutic and preventative measures can be applied  Government and/or business can help families that are poor  Legalized system of trial marriage  Make it harder to divorce  Covenant marriages – spouse signs a legal contract they will not seek divorce except for abuse or adultery  Family life education  Marriage enrichment programs  Law, education, and practical aids to address problem of family violence  Ideology of domestic violence as a private matter needs to be changed  Additional shelters for battered women