Slide 1
Sociology 640
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Class 1:
• Overview of trends and explanations
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• What is Family Sociology?
• How do Sociologists View Family Behavior?
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• How do Sociologists Study Family Behavior?
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Slide 2
General Trends
• Later marriage (less marriage?)
• More divorce
• More cohabitation
• More non-marital childbearing
• More remarriage/stepfamilies
• More maternal employment
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Slide 3
Explanations
• Social – increasing educational
attainment
• Economic – declining economic
opportunities
• Normative – changing attitudes
toward marriage and family
“second demographic transition”
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Slide 4
Questions for thought
• What does it mean to say the family is “in decline”?
• What do you think? Is the American family in decline?
Is it “evolving”?
• What about other countries you may know? What
about subgroups of the U.S. population?
• Is family change a bad thing? A good thing?
• What do you feel are the most important reasons for
family change between 1960 and 2000?
• Is “family decline” inevitable or can it be
slowed/stopped via policy measures?
• Can it be slowed/stopped via other mechanisms?
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Slide 5
A couple of comments on Popenoe
• Definition of family is both unconventional and
conventional.
• Unconventional in criteria for meeting definition of
“family” – but this is clearly acknowledged
• Conventional in definition of what a family does
– Functions or role in social organization
– Reproduction, socialization, provision of
care/love/companionship, pooling of economic resources,
sexual regulation.
• Stacey’s approach to family is intuitively appealing but,
if seriously adopted, would make family sociology
research exceedingly difficult.
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Slide 6
What is Family Sociology?
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Study of complex set of relationships
between society, individuals, and
families.
Interested in both causes and
consequences of family behaviors.
Interested in causes and consequences at
both macro and micro levels.
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Slide 7
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What is Family Sociology?
Societal
Forces
Other
Individual
Characteristics
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Other
Individual
Characteristics
Individual &
Family
Other Char.
Characteristics
Family
Behavior
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Slide 8
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Trend Toward Later Marriage
Economic,
cultural change
Other
Individual
Characteristics
Education,
earnings,
attitudes, sex,
cohab., etc.
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Other
Individual
Characteristics
Other Char.
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Later age at
marriage
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Slide 9
Sociological Approach to
Analysis of the Family
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1. Derive testable hypotheses from theoretical
framework(s)
2. Locate/collect data most appropriate for
testing of hypotheses
3. Analyze data to confirm or reject
hypotheses
4. Recognize inherent limitations
(importance of using various theories, methods,
and data)
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Slide 10
An important point
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• Family sociology, as with all social sciences, is
ultimately interested in averages and variations.
• Individual cases are important,but only to the
extent that they allow us to generalize.
– Developing an appreciation of this insight is perhaps
one of the most important practical goals of this class
• Relative advantages and disadvantages of survey
data and ethnographic data.
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Slide 11
Theoretical Frameworks for
Studying the Family
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• Functionalism
• Exchange Theory
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• Conflict Perspective
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• Symbolic Interaction
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• Feminist Theory
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Slide 12
Study of the Family
Analysis of variation and change
• Historical approach
• Comparative approach
• Group differences
• Life Course approach
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Slide 13
Data used to Study the Family
• Survey data
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Random sample
Large scale
Allows for generalization
Allows for comparison of many groups
• Ethnographic data
– Usually non-random sample
– Small scale
– Allows for much more nuanced analysis
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Slide 14
Methodological notes
• Pay attention to the variety of measures cited in
these early articles.
• For example:
– divorce rates vs. probability that marriage ends in
divorce
– proportion of children living in single-parent
families vs. likelihood of ever living in a singleparent family vs. proportion of childhood spent in
single-parent family
– Mean age at marriage vs. median age at marriage vs.
proportion never marrying
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Slide 15
What does Family
Sociology contribute?
• Attempts to accurately describe trends/changes in
family behavior (e.g., emergence of nuclear family,
emergence of cohabitation).
• Recognizes complexity of factors influencing family
change/variation. Attempts to theoretically untangle
causal relationships (e.g., attitudes and divorce).
* Recognizes that correlation does not imply causation
(e.g., women’s education and marriage).
• Attempts to objectively assess implications of family
behavior and changes therein (e.g., impact of
divorce/stepfamilies on children). (But see Cowan note
for alternative view)
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Slide 16
More questions for thought
• Are you optimistic about family change over
the next 30 years? Pessimistic?
• What do you think will be important family
changes/issues for your generation?
• What do you think will be important family
changes/issues for you?
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