Family and Gender Communication

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Family and Gender Communication

• North Seattle Community College

Lecture 1 Introduction to Families
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Introduction to Families1. Family Types

• Essentially, there is no single, widely
  agreed-upon definition of the term family.
  Families have been viewed according to blood ties
  and legal ties, described as networks of persons
  who have lived together over periods of time, and
  defined as groups of people who have ties of
  marriage and kinship to one another.

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Family Types continued

• The American family does not exist. According to
  a family historian, Ethnic, racial, cultural,
  class differences have resulted in diversity in
  family behavior (Harevan 461).

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Family Types continued

• Today a family may be viewed more broadly as a
  group of people with a past history, a present
  reality, and a future expectation of
  interconnected mutually influencing relationships
  (Family Communication 5).

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Family Types continued

• Wamboldt and Reiss (1989) developed a process
  definition of family as a group of intimates who
  generate a sense of home and group identity
  complete with strong ties of loyalty and emotion,
  and experience history and future.

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Family Types continued

• In her essay on redefining families, Minow (1998)
  argues that it is not important whether a group
  fits a formal legal definition instead what is
  important is whether the group of people
  function as a family do they share affection and
  resources, think of one another as family
  members, and present themselves as such to
  neighbors and others?

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Family Types continued

• Family types may include two-parent biological
  family, single-parent family, blended family,
  extended or intergenerational family,
  voluntaristic family, and committed partners.
  These are not discrete categories many families
  belong to more than one.

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2. Families Current Status

• Changing Demographics

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Changing Demographics

• Married couples account for 51.7 of U.S.
  households 23.5 have children under 18 the
  median age for women at first marriage was 21 in
  1975 and 25 in 1997. For men, it was 26.5 in 1992
  and 26.7 in 1997. The average length of a first
  marriage ending in divorce ranged from 7.3 years
  in 1975 to 6.9 years in 1980.

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Changing Demographics

• The divorce rate is stabilizing. Now 43 of first
  marriages break up in the first 15 years.

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Changing Demographics

• Remarriage rates are dropping. About 5 out of
  six men and three out of four women eventually
  remarry after a first divorce. The mean length of
  time between divorce and remarriage is four
  years.

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Changing Demographics

• Stepfamilies continue to increase through
  remarriage and cohabitation. One out of every
  three Americans is now a step parent, a
  stepchild, a step sibling, or some other member
  of a step family.

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Changing Demographics

• The number of single-parent families continues to
  increase.
• Families continue to be constructed through
  adoption.

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Changing Demographics

• More adult children are living at home.
• Some families are constructed or expanded through
  scientific technologies.
• The number of cohabitating partners is growing
  rapidly .

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Changing Demographics

• Families of lesbians and gay males are
  increasing.
• Extended families continue to flourish.
• Families increasingly represent four or five
  generations.

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3. Economic Factors

• Economic issues affect families

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Economic Factors

• Two income couples are becoming the norm. Yet 70
  of all parents do not feel they spend enough time
  with their children (Families and Work Institute,
  1998).
• Over 70 of single mothers are working.

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Economic Factors

• Children have replaced seniors as the poorest
  segment of the population. One third of the
  homeless are families with children. Although a
  large number of poor families contain two
  parents, the female single-parent is five times
  more likely to live in poverty than two-parent
  family (Coontz and Folbre, 2002). In addition,
  there is an increasing gap between rich and
  middle-class families.

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4. Ethnic Issues

• Ethnic heritage has a long term effect on family
  functioning
• Unequal impact of poverty across racial and
  ethnic groups
• Ethnic composition of U.S. families is changing.

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Ethnic Issues

• Current census data indicate the number of
  foreign-born residents and children of immigrants
  has reached the highest level in history 56
  million people (20 of the population).

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• This information was excerpted from Chapter 1,
  Family Communication Cohesion and Change by
  Kathleen Galvin, Carma Bylund, and Bernard
  Brommel. Pearson Education Inc. 2004.