Chapter 2 Flashcards
Theory
- A way to apply logic to a pattern of facts
- Applies a structure to the way we think about a subject
- Helps us generate ideas for research to enrich our understanding
Theories used in Family Sociology
- Structural Functionalism
- Social Conflict
- Symbolic Interactionism
- Social Exchange Theory
- Family Development
- Life Course Perspective
Structural Functionalism
- Society as the collective expression of shared norms and values
- Dominant theory during the 20th century
- Family is a social institution that performs essential functions for society to ensure stability
Parsons
The nuclear family structure works because it provides a basis for stability and cooperation
Families function best when (Structural functionalism)
- Men specialize in instrumental roles
- Women specialize in expressive roles
- The harmony created by these complementary roles is essential to the preservation of family as an institution
3 Primary Functions of Family (Structural Functionalism)
- Ensure that society has ongoing supply of new members, and a source os socialization
- Provide economic support for family members
- Emotional support for family members
Critiques of Structural functionalism
- Rationalization of the male-dominated status quo
2. Serves a conservative political agenda
Social Conflict
- Opposition and conflict define a given society, necessary for social evolution
- Families as sites of reproduction of labour power that benefits capitalists
- Focus on power relations and inequality
Macro Power Relations
Ex. *Family systems vs work/economic system
*Men vs. Women
Micro Power Relations
Ex. Competing interests of family members
Political Economy
Role of economic processes in shaping society and history *Assumes dominant class is advantageously placed to exact compliance from subordinate classes
Manufactured Consent
Capitalist economy shapes our choices, often through the media
Feminist Perspective
- Seeks to understand and reduce inequality between men and women
- Sees male dominance within families as part of a wider system of male power, that is not natural or inevitable
5 Basic themes of Feminist Perspective
- Emphasis on the female experience
- Gender is an organizing concept of social theory
- Gender and Family relations need to be contextualized in respective cultural and historical situations and vary by social class, ethnicity and geographic location (intersectionality)
- No one single unitary definition of “the family”
- Inequality exists and should be eliminated
Marxist-feminist Perspective
Focus on examining the historical conceptualization and social construction of masculinity
Symbolic Interaction
- Developed in 1920’s (Cooley & Mead)
- Focus on the ability of humans to see themselves through the eyes of others and enact social roles based on others’ expectations
- Social roles are symbols that only have meaning when they are acted out relation to other people
- Family interactions result of reciprocal acts whereby individuals are acting, negotiating and responding to one another as minded beings
- Families viewed as the creation of its members as they spontaneously interact with one another
Social Exchange Theory
- Micro level theory that focuses on the interaction between individual actors
- Family life and decision making viewed in terms of cost and benefits
- Individuals are rational and enter into mutual relationships to maximize their own gains
- People can have competing interests and different resources- bargaining
Family Development Perspective
- Attempts to synthesize several approaches
1. Stages of the family life cycle
2. Developmental needs and tasks
3. Family functions
4. Sex roles
5. Family as interacting actors - Families accomplish developmental tasks as they move through stages of the family life cycle
Developmental Period
- Married couple with no children
- Childbearing Family
- Family with preschoolers
- Family with school aged children
- Family with adolescents
- Family as launching pad
- Middle age empty nest family
- Aging family
Life Course Perspective
- Life course is a sequence of socially defined events and roles that individuals enact over time
- Transitions and trajectories
4 main themes of Life Course Perspective
- Lives in historical time and socio-geographic space
- Timing of lives
- Linked Lives
- Human Agency
Research Methods
Methods of gathering information to answer our research questions or learning more about a topic/issue/problem
Scientific Approach
There are objective truths, processes or realities to be discovered about families
Interpretative Approach
Understanding the world view of how individuals understand their personal lives
Critical Approach
Emancipation of empowerment of oppressed peoples and social groups
Quantitative
- Deductive
* Scientific epistemology
Qualitative
- Inductive
* Interpretive epistemology
Participatory Action Research
The individuals you are studying are apart of the research
Sample Surveys
A random selection of people which would be representative of the larger population that you are trying to generalize to
Quantitative methods
- Sample surveys
- Time use surveys
- “Big Data”
Qualitative methods
- In-depth interviews
2. Ethnography
Bias
- Researchers hold values orientations
* Must be self-reflective to understand how own values influence work
Tearoom Trade Study
Wanted to learn about the culture of men having sex with men. Infiltrated groups and would go to individuals homes and pressure them to talk to him
Tri-council policy statement for ethical conduct for research involving humans
- Respect for human dignity
- Balancing of harms and benefits
- Free, informed, voluntary consent
- Privacy and confidentiality
- Conflicts of interest
- Protection of vulnerable populations
- Research with Indigenous peoples (OCAP)
August Comte & Emile Durkheim
- Structural Functionalist theorists
* sought to establish the study of society as a science
Communal Family Systems
technologically simply societies seem more egalitarian than patriarchal, monogomous families that are based on private property
Frederick Engels
*wrote the first conflict framework for the family. Traced the relationship between the mode of production and the type of family that exists in society
Family Forms (political economy view)
historically embedded outcomes of global capitalist practices and changes in work patterns and technology.
*Reduces family to units of consumption that foster cultural values of individualism and hedonism rather than collectivist goals
Barkley (2003)
- Political economist theorist
- we live in a culture that has commodified parenting through a constant barrage of parenting magazines, books, tv, and programs, yet parents have not voluntarily participated in the process
Intersectionality
promotes an understanding of human beings as shaped by the integration of different locations.
*We cannot be explained by only one category (ex. gender) we are multidimensional
Social constructionism
social phenomena are created or constructed in particular social and cultural contexts.
Symbolic interactionism
emphasizes micro or internal family interactions, and the ongoing action and response of family members to one another
Family interactions
The results of reciprocal acts whereby individuals are acting, negotiating and responding to one another as minded beings. Interactions occur via symbols, or gestures or words that have shared meaning
Thomas theorem
if people define situations as real, they are real in their consequences
Family Systems theory
a family is viewed like a machine, with parts or family members that interact in a meaningful way
Deductive
researcher begins with a theory and develops a hypothesis about what he or she expects to observe
Inductive
Begins with systematic observation
Narrative analysis
the knowledge base and stories that people and groups use to give meaning to their experience
discourse analysis
the critical reading of language and texts that make up our social locations
anti-opressive practices
emphasizes critical reflexivity in addition to participatory methods
