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Families and Intimate Relationships: Perspectives, Issues, and Future

Explore the global perspective on families, theoretical perspectives on families, the development of intimate relationships, and the challenges and transitions that families face. Learn about child-related family issues, parenting, and the future of family dynamics.

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Families and Intimate Relationships: Perspectives, Issues, and Future

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  1. Chapter 11 Families and Intimate Relationships

  2. Chapter Outline • Families in Global Perspective • Theoretical Perspectives on Families • Developing Intimate Relationships and Establishing Families • Child-Related Family Issues and Parenting • Transition and Problems in Families • Family Issues in the Future

  3. Definition of Family • Traditional: • A group of people who are related by blood, marriage, or adoption, live together, are an economic unit, and bear and raise children. • New: • Relationships in which people live together with commitment, form an economic unit and care for any young, and consider their identity to be significantly attached to the group.

  4. Household Composition: 1970 and 2000

  5. Marriage • Legally recognized arrangement between two or more individuals that carries certain rights and obligations. • Monogamy is the only form of marriage sanctioned by law in the United States. • Establishes a system of descent so kinship can be determined.

  6. Functionalist Perspective: Four Functions of Families • Sexual regulation • Socialization • Economic and psychological support for members. • Provision of social status and reputation.                  

  7. Conflict Perspective Families in capitalist economies are similar to workers in a factory: • Women are dominated at home the same way workers are dominated in factories. • Reproduction of children and care for family members at home reinforce the subordination of women through unpaid labor.

  8. Symbolic Interactionist Perspective How family problems are perceived and defined depends on: • Patterns of communication. • The meanings people give to roles and events. • Individual interpretations of family interactions.

  9. Postmodern Perspective • Families are diverse and fragmented. • Boundaries between workplace and home are blurred. • Family problems are related to cyberspace and consumerism in an age characterized by high-tech “haves’ and “have-nots.”

  10. Why People Get Married • Being "in love." • Desiring companionship and sex. • Wanting to have children. • Social pressure. • Attempting to escape from their parents' home. • Believing they will have greater resources.

  11. Deciding to Have Children • Society's bias is to assume having children is the norm. • Approximately 6.4 million women become pregnant each year in the United States. • 44% of pregnancies are intended, 56% are unintended.

  12. Who’s Minding the Children?

  13. Myths of Teenage Fathers • They engage in sexual activity early and often. • They sexually exploit unsuspecting females. • They have a need to prove their masculinity. • They have few emotional feelings for the women they impregnate. • They are rarely involved in caring for and rearing their children.

  14. Marital Status of U.S. Population15 and over by Ethnicity

  15. Single Parenting • About 42% of white children and 86% of African American children spend part of their childhood in a single parent household. • Lesbian and gay parents are often counted in studies as single parents, however many share parenting with partner.

  16. Two-Parent Households • Parenthood in the United States is idealized, especially for women. • Children in two-parent families are not guaranteed a happy childhood simply because both parents reside in the same household.

  17. Elder Abuse • More than 1.5 million older people in the United States are the victims of physical or mental abuse each year. • Most are white, middle-to-lower-middle-class Protestant women, aged 75–85, who suffer some form of impairment • Sons, followed by daughters, are the most frequent abusers of older persons.

  18. Characteristics of Those Likely to Get Divorced • Marriage at an early age. • A short acquaintanceship before marriage. • Disapproval of the marriage by relatives and friends. • Limited economic resources.

  19. Characteristics of Those Likely to Get Divorced • Having a high-school education or less. • Parents who are divorced or have unhappy marriages. • The presence of children at the beginning of the marriage.

  20. Remarriage • 1/2 of all persons who divorce before age 35 will remarry within three years. • At all ages, more men than women remarry and often relatively soon after divorce. • Women with a college degree and without children are less likely to remarry.

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