Family Development
Family
 Key


social institution
Caregiving
Socialization
 Definition?
 “group
of people related by blood,
marriage, or adoption”
 Changing definition


Structures
Blended families
 Nuclear
(co-residing)
 Extended (do not co-reside)
 Family of orientation (birth/adoptive)
 Family of procreation (having own
children)
Statistics Canada
 Census


Family
Married (legal, common-law) with or without
never-married children, or
Lone parent with at least one never-married
child
 Economic


Family
2 or more people related by blood, marriage,
common-law, adoption
Living in same household
Stats Can
 Private

Person or group of people who occupy a
private dwelling
 Family

Household
Household
Private household that contains at least one
census family
 Non-Family

Household
Private household that consists of one person
living alone or group of people who do not
constitute a census family
 Complexities
of categorizing
 Change over lifespan



Problem in “co-residency” as defining
characteristic of families
Why?
E.g., widowed woman living with
granddaughter – family member but in “nonfamily household”
Family Development
Family Development
 Dynamic


Reciprocity
Changing
 Birth

Rates in Canada
Dropping – Why?
 Economics
 Delayed
Parenthood
Average age at first birth increasing
Increased percentage of women in
labour force
Economics of Parenthood
Family Life Cycle
 Evelyn
Mills Duval (1997)
 8 stages
 Relation to marital satisfaction


Changing perceptions of equity (fairness)
Why?

Robert Havinghurst (1953)
 Family Developmental Tasks


Growing responsibilities
Problems (Butler, Duval, Havinghurst Family
Development models)



Assumption of universality
Increase in off-time childbearing (applicability to late
life families?)
Increased life expectancy, earlier retirement: need for
pre-, early-, and post-retirement stages?
Assumption of Universality
 No
accommodation of individual variations
 Increase in blended families
 Increase in lone-parent families
 Reduced family size
 Changing parental roles
Myths about families in the past
 Traditional
nuclear family
 But: demographics of past generations



High infant, child mortality rates
Maternal mortality
Life expectancy
% People with one parent alive
Age of Parent
Birth Year of
child
1860
1960
40
42%
82%
50
16%
60%
60
2%
23%
 Multigenerational
families rare in past
 Wealth of elderly family members
determined treatment/status
Structure of Aging Families
 Marital

status of males and females
Middle to late adulthood
Males
Females
Gender differences
 Older
men more likely to be married than
older women
 Widowhood “expected life event” for
women in late adulthood


Greater life expectancy
Age difference between spouses
 Men


more likely than women to remarry
Demographic reality: fewer unmarried older
men
Sexist social norms: age differences
Divorce

More commonly experienced life event


Data unclear with growing incidence of common-law
marriages
Preceding cohabitation more likely to end in divorce

Negative economic consequences for women,
not as likely for men
 Remarriage after divorce decreasing



Partly due to increases in cohabitation
Men more likely to remarry after divorce
Current elderly not likely to have experienced
cohabitation, divorce, remarriage


Implications for future generations?
More complexity, financial security?
Living
Arrangements

Living with
spouse



60% elderly
men
40% women
Living alone


Women: 3050%
Men: 13-20%
 Increases
in female life expectancy
 Declining fertility
 Economic feasibility not a significant factor

But pension improvements may be important
 Normative
changes related to
independence, privacy, individualism
Multigenerational Living
 Approximately
13% of Canadian elders
 Influence of ethnic origin

Foreign-born, more likely to live in 3generation household
 “beanpole”



families
4-5 generations
Not common
Late childbearing age: age gap between
generations
 Sandwich


Needs of dependent children and elderly
parents
Not commonplace in Canada
 Empty


generation
nest vs. “cluttered nest”
Children leaving home at older ages
Adult children more likely to “boomerang”
back
Grandparenthood
 Majority
of elderly
 Contribution to grandchildren
 Gender differences: affect
Affect differences

Women more likely to be grandparents for
longer time
 Grandparent-child tie more emotionally close
among grandmothers
 Mediated by middle generation: opposite effects


Divorce in middle generation: possible denial of
contact
Grandparents as “parents” if middle generation
unable to care for children
Widowhood
 “expected”
life event
 Associated with financial difficulty
 Stress


Change in identity
New relationships with children, other family
members, friends, other men
Adult sibling relationships
 Importance
 Later

life
Growth in importance
 Influenced




varies over life course
by
geographical proximity
Gender (sisters closer)
Marital status (more importance to nevermarried)
Parental status (more important to childless)
Family Conflict
 Elder Abuse





Extreme form of conflict/elder maltreatments
Physical, psychological, financial
Not as common as other forms
4-8 percent victims of abuse/neglect in home
and institutional settings
Family
• Spouses more likely to be perpetrators than
children
• Men more likely to be physically abusive
• Women more likely to be abusive through neglect
Violence against elderly
 Related




to four factors
Problems of abuser (mental illness, drug
addiction)
Dependency of abuser on victim (especially
financial dependency)
Social isolation
External stresses on family members
 Perpetuation
of wife abuse into later life
 Need for social solutions
Review

Cognitive development
• Intelligence: change, stability, growth
• Distinction: cross-sectional vs. longitudinal

Social development
• theories, friendship, mate selection, sexuality

Family development
• structure, changes, relations