1. Chapter 11
Family

2. Marriage and Family Around the World
Universal Aspects
Replacing population through reproduction
Regulating sexual behavior
Caring for dependents – children, elderly, disabled
Socializing the young
Providing intimacy, belongingness, emotional support

3. Marriage and Family Around the World
Universal Aspects
Family: A group of persons linked together by blood, adoption, marriage, or quasi-marital commitment. Marriage: The formal socially or legally recognized union of two people.

4. Marriage and Family Around the World
Cross-Cultural Variations
Family Patterns:
◦ Extended – a family in which a couple
and their children live with other relatives.
◦ Nuclear – a family in which parents and
children form an independent household.
◦ Blended – a family that includes children
born to one parent as well as children born to
both parents.
◦ Cross-household – children shift back and
forth between more than one household.

5. Marriage and Family Around the World
U.S. Children’s Living Arrangements
Although the majority of U.S. children still live with two married parents (biological or adoptive), many live in other circumstances.
Children born outside of marriage are more vulnerable. Fewer people are expected to care for the child.

6. Marriage and Family Around the World
Cross-Cultural Variations
Marriage Patterns:
◦ Monogamy – a marriage in which there is only one wife and one husband.
◦ Polygamy – any form of marriage in which a person may have more than one spouse at a time.

7. Family Diversity – Polygamy
Some modern American families, like these fundamentalist Mormons, live a polygamous life despite legal and social opposition from most of their fellow citizens and from most other Mormons.

8. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Childhood
U.S. norms call for childhood to be a sheltered time, but about 1 in 5 children are raised in poverty and many are abused.
28% U.S. children are born to single mothers.
About 66% of mothers of pre-school children work and children spend time in day-care.
Studies show that the preparatory benefits of day-care outweigh the disadvantages, but the quality of the program makes a difference.

9. Sociology and you…
The type of family you grew up in likely affected both your experiences and your future opportunities. If you grew up in a nuclear family, you likely needed to share family resources (time, money, food) with only a few people. If you grew up in an extended family, you had to share resources with more people, but may have benefited from having older members care for you. If you grew up in a blended family, or were raised by a single parent or grandparents, it’s more likely that resources were spread thin and you will need to work harder to support yourself in college.

10. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Adolescence
Contemporary society has ambiguous, often contradictory expectations.
Adolescents are under constant pressure about the future.
This is a difficult transition time filled with mixed messages.
Examples: Be interested in opposite sex – but remain a virgin. Have fun now while you can – but worry about and plan for your future.

11. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Transition to Adulthood
Rites of Passage – Some societies have formal rituals that signal the end of one status and the beginning of another.
In the U.S., transition to adulthood usually means getting a job, living away from parents, becoming financially independent.
Transition period has slowed because of: ◦ Economic crisis – unemployment and high cost of living. Many live with or get money from parents.
◦ Changing attitudes – extend schooling; delay marriage

12. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Early Adulthood
A key issue is deciding if and whom to marry.
Seeking Sexual and Romantic Relationships: ◦ Expectation of early marriage has decreased
◦ By their late 20s, 40% women and 30% men have never married.
◦ Ambivalent about marriage, but most looking for at least a temporary partner.
◦ Propinquity (spatial nearness) is a big factor – frequent interaction, sign of social similarities

13. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Early Adulthood
Sorting through the marriage market
◦ Homogamy – choosing a mate similar in
status to oneself.
◦ Heterogamy – choosing a mate who is
different in status from oneself.
◦ Endogamy – choosing a mate from within
one’s own racial, ethnic, or religious group.
◦ Exogamy – choosing a mate from outside
one’s racial, ethnic, or religious group.

14. Sociology and you…
Your college education is likely to affect whom you marry. Many people find a spouse in college classrooms or activities. If you attend a college linked to your religion, race, or ethnic group, you are more likely to marry within your group (endogamy). If college puts you into contact with many others whose cultural backgrounds are different from your own, you will be more likely to marry someone from a different background (exogamy).

15. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Early Adulthood
Responding to Narrow Marriage Markets
◦ African American women are much less likely to marry than white women.
◦ African American men (stereotyped as hypermasculine) are more likely than women to find exogamous spouses.
◦ Asian women (stereotyped as hyperfeminine) are more likely than men to marry exogamously.
◦ Among all groups, a shortage of males employed in good jobs with adequate earnings sharply reduces the likelihood that a woman will marry or even live with a man outside of marriage.

16. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Middle Age
Between is a quieter time – expectation of empty nest (children leave home)
Many families do not experience empty nests:
◦ Economic crisis – many adult children live in their parents’ home and many middle-aged parents have moved in with their adult children.
◦ Extended families are increasing with cultural preferences of immigrant families and the effects of an aging population – care for aging parents.

17. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
Age 65 and beyond
Men have shorter life spans and tend to marry younger women – marriage is not equally available to aging women.
78% of men aged are still married; 57% of women of the same age are still married.
Grandparent role is important to satisfaction; also in provision of childcare and financial help.
Elderly prefer to live alone; 50% of “old old” will develop memory and thinking problems and rely heavily on family or care workers.

18. The U.S. Family over the Life Course
As people move into the “oldest old” group, most come to rely heavily on their daughters for assistance. This can create considerable strain when the daughters find themselves simultaneously responsible for their parents and their children.

19. Roles and Relationships in Marriage
Gender roles in marriage
Men are considered primary providers for their families, but in 25% of dual-earner families, the wives outearn the husband.
Women do about 66% of housework; chances of happiness for both husband and wife greatest when housework is evenly split.
Paid domestic labor reinforces gender, race and social class divisions. Most employers are white middle-class women; most labor is minority working-class women.

20. Roles and Relationships in Marriage
Gender roles in marriage
The right for husbands to beat or rape wives was built into U.S. law and only was challenged in the 1960s.
About 1 in 10 women have been raped by an intimate partner.
1 in 3 women have been assaulted (1 out of 4 has been assaulted severely).
Violence against men occurs but less often and less severely.
Violence is more common in male homosexual relationships, but rarer among lesbians.

21. Roles and Relationships in Marriage
Although violence among married couples has declined, it remains distressingly common.
Men are more likely than women to beat their spouses because men are more likely to believe that it is their right to control their spouses.
Relationship violence is not restricted to any class or race.

22. Roles and Relationships in Marriage
The Parental Role
Children are expensive and time-consuming.
Having children reduces marital happiness.
Most people desire and have children to guarantee love and affection for years to come.
Parenting roles remain disparate: women still hold more responsibilities to childcare than men.
But there are changes:
◦ More fathers raising children on their own
◦ Growing numbers of “stay-at-home dads”
Stepparent estimates: about 1/3 of all children will live with a stepparent before age 18

23. Fathers 80% of mothers work.
Fathers now take more responsibility for child care and household tasks than they did in previous generations.
Mothers still bear far more of household and childcare burdens, leaving many mothers overworked and feeling underappreciated.

24. Contemporary Family Choices
Marriage or Cohabitation
Cohabitation means living with a romantic or sexual partner before marriage.
More than half of all Americans are expected to cohabit at some point in their lives.
Whether couples cohabit before marrying has no effect on their marital satisfaction or stability.
Deinstitutionalization of marriage – the gradual disintegration of social norms that defined marriage as essential.
The fight for (and against) gay rights to marry suggests that marriage is still very important.

25. Contemporary Family Choices
Having Children…or Not
Non-marital Births
Half of all U.S. births are non-marital. Most of these are to women 20 years of age and older.
Many women are electing to be single parents.
Many women having non-marital births cohabit with the fathers.
Teen childbearing has declined considerably since 1991.
Teen mothers are more likely to be poor. Infant health problems and death are more likely with teen mothers.

26. Percentage of Births to Girls and Women Under Age 21
Births to teenage mothers are least common in wealthier states as well as in Utah, which has an unusually high Mormon population. They are most common across the southern tier of the country, an area with many poor African Americans and poor Hispanic immigrants.

27. Contemporary Family Choices
Having Children…or Not
Delayed Childbearing
Many women are electing to delay having children 5-10 years after marriage.
~25% women ages are childless.
Choosing Childlessness
While many women will eventually want children, increasing numbers have decided that they are uninterested in having children.

28. Contemporary Family Choices
Birth control and abortion have reduced the number of unwanted babies, and fewer single mothers give up their babies.
The availability of healthy white or Asian babies for adoption is low.
Overseas adoptions raise serious issues about the commodification of children – where children are treated as goods available for purchase or theft.

29. Blending Work and Family
Contemporary Family Choices
Blending Work and Family
Couples spend less time together today. Reasons for this are:
◦ 69% of married women aged 25 to 34 work.
◦ Workweeks and workdays are getting longer.
◦ Many working class work more than one job.
Despite the time crunch, mothers spend as much time with children as they did 40 years ago; fathers spend more.
Mothers cut back on housework and have fewer children; those who can afford it hire help.

30. Contemporary Family Choices
Divorce
Estimates indicate that 40-50% of first marriages today will end in divorce.
Predictors of divorce within the first 10 years of marriage:
1. Age at marriage 4. Education
2. Parental divorce 5. Race
3. Premarital childbearing 6. Religion
Societal factors include: cultural changes to expectations in marriage; divorce is socially accepted; economic crises; women have options.

31. Where This Leaves Us…
Families meet economic needs and support for children and social support for adults.
Families provide socialization to social norms.
Despite domestic abuse, divorce, childlessness and non-marital births, there are signs of health in the family:
◦ durability of mother-child bond
◦ frequency of remarriage
◦ economic support of stepfathers
◦ elderly relying on their children

32. Quick Quiz

33. In most cultures, which institution has been assigned the functions of providing economic support, providing intimacy, and socializing the young?
government
religion
education
family

34. Answer: D
In most cultures, the family has been assigned the functions of economic support, providing intimacy, and socializing the young.

35. Susan was attracted to Tim because they had so much in common in the way of religion, social class, age, and interests. What factor was in operation with Susan and Tim?
propinquity
homogamy
opposites attract
physical attractiveness

36. Answer: B
Susan was attracted to Tim because they had so much in common in the way of religion, social class, age, and interests. Homogamy was in operation with Susan and Tim.

37. A form of marriage in which there is only one husband and two or more wives is called:
serial monogamy.
monogamy.
blended.
polygamy.

38. Answer: D
A form of marriage in which there is only one husband and two or more wives is called polygamy.

39. According to your book, marital happiness is negatively affected by:
the presence of children.
the absence of children.
having a husband that takes an active role in childrearing.
nothing specific.

40. Answer: A
According to your book, marital happiness is negatively affected by the presence of children.