Changing Family Patterns

Question 1

Divorce

Answer 1

Divorce is a a major cause of changing family patterns and greater family diversity. For example, most re-marriages involve a divorce and divorce creates both lone parent families and one person households.

Question 2

Changing patterns of divorce

Answer 2

• Since the 1960’s there has been a great increase in the number of divorces in the United Kingdom.
• The number of divorces doubled between 1961 and 1969, and doubled again by 1972. This trend continued, peaking at 165,000 in 1993
• It has fallen to 118,000 in 2012 but is still very high. These numbers mean that 40% marriages will end in divorce
• One reason for the fall in the number of divorces since 1990’s is the fact that less people are getting married in the first place
• Some couples are more likely to get divorced than other due to getting married at a young age or having a child before marriage

Question 3

What are the 7 explanations for the increase in divorce

Answer 3

1. Changes in the law
2. Declining stigma and changing attitudes
3. Secularisation
4. Rising expectations of marriage
5. Women’s increased financial independence
6. Feminist explanations
7. Modernity and individualisation

Question 4

1. Changes in law

Answer 4

• Divorce was extremely hard to obtain in early 1900’s, especially for women. Gradually changes in the law have made this easier such as: equalising the ground for divorce between sexes, widening the grounds for divorce, making divorce cheaper.
• The widening of grounds in 1971 to ‘irretrievable breakdown’ made divorce easier to obtain and produced a doubling of the divorce rate overnight
• Despite divorce being the legal termination of marriage, there are also other solutions to the problem of unhappy marriage like: desertion; where on partner leaves the other but the couple remain legally married, legal separation; court separates financial and legal affairs of the couple but they remain married, empty shell marriage; where the coup,e live under the same roof but remain married in name only.

Question 5

4. Rising expectations

Answer 5

• Functionalist sociologists such as Ronald Fletcher (1966) argue that the higher expectations place on marriage today are a major cause of rising divorce rates as they make couples less willing to tolerate unhappy marriage
• The expectation that marriage is based solely on love and when the love is not there anymore then they see no reason to stay married

Question 6

Marriage

Answer 6

There have been a number of important changes in the recent years: fewer people are marrying, there has been an increase in remarriages, people are marrying at a later age, couples are less likely to marry in church.

Question 7

Reasons for changing patterns of marriage

Answer 7

1. First marriages
2. Changing attitudes to marriage
3. Secularisation
4. Declining stigma attached to alternatives to marriage
5. Changes in the position of women
6. Fear of divorce

Question 8

3. Declining stigma attached to alternatives to marriage

Answer 8

-Cohabitation, remaining single, and having children outside marriage are all now widely regarded as acceptable, so that pregnancy no longer leads to wedding.

Question 9

2. Secularisation

Answer 9

• The churches are in favour of marriage but as their influence declines people feel freer to choose not to marry
• 2001 census, only 3% of young people with no religion were married against 17% of those with a religion

Question 10

Parents and children

Answer 10

Lone parent families, step families

Question 11

Lone parent families

Answer 11

• Lone parent families make up 22% of all families with children
• One in four children live in lone parent families: over 90% of these are headed by lone mothers
• A child living with a lone parent is twice as likely to be in poverty as a child living with two parents

Question 12

Reasons for increase in lone parent families

Answer 12

• Mainly due to an increase in divorce and separation, and also never married women having children
• This could be linked to the decline in stigma attached to births outside marriage
• Lone parent families tend to be female headed for several reasons: belief that women are more nurturing so they should look after children, divorce court usually gives custody to mothers, men may be less willing to give up work for children
• Also, many women nowadays are single by choice as they may wish not to marry or cohabit

Question 13

Lone parenthood and poverty

Answer 13

• Lack of affordable childcare prevents lone mothers from working: 60% are unemployed
• Inadequate welfare benefits
• Most lone parents are women who generally earn less than men

Question 14

Step families

Answer 14

• Account for over 10% of all families with dependent children
• 85% of stepfamilies at least on child is from mothers previous relationship compared to 11% from men’s and 4% from both
• Elsa Ferri and Kate Smith argue that step families are very similar to first families in the sense that involvement of step parents is positive however they argue that they are at higher risk of poverty
• Graham Allen and Graham Crow argue step families may face problems of divided loyalty and issues such as contact with non resident parent can cause tension- not good for child

Question 15

Applying material from Item C, analyse two ways in which changing patterns of marriage and divorce have affected the experience of childhood. 10 marks

Answer 15

1) single person households.

one way in which changing patterns of marriage and divorce has affected childhood is increase in single parent households.

new rights argue that due to social policies making divorce easier , this has increased the rate in divorce which has allowed the growth of single parent households.

this may affect children’s experience of childhood to lack self discipline become deviant.

this is because these families lack a firm father figure therefore children may have a more negative experience in childhood as they are not going up in a stable household and more likely to perform poorly in school and get in trouble with police.

however feminist argue that this view that single parent household only cause negative affects on childhood is unfair
many situations is escaping abusive relationships therefore single parent households more beneficial for child than abusive nuclear family

also negative labels given to this family may cause a self fluffing prophecy

2)
Serial monogamy has also become a common pattern, with many divorced people remarring

De’Ath and Slater suggest that reconsrtuied family can be problematic and complicated particullary ly on the children.

this may affect children’s expeeicne of childhood to become more strained. Due to children feeling disloyal to natural parent they may feel unwilling to accept newcomer as mother or father.

this means children may have resentment about change in life and step parent becomes ‘wicked’

in addition step parent may see children as symbol of partners love to previous relationship so may resent child. this could lead to abuse.

therefore this causes conflict and a strain in the relationship between step parent and children and the experience of childhood is highly unstable and negative.

however ferri and smith suggest that reconstructed families can be similar to first family and in fact the bond between step parent and child can be positive
and therefore important not to overgeneralise family structure and vastly different.