Dark Side Of Family Life (Week22) Flashcards
1
Q
Functionalists & The New Right
Dysfunctions of the Family
A
- Functionalists and the New Right have a over-positive view of the family perfoming positive functions.
- Their stance is viewed as naïve and challenged by feminist, Marxist, interpretive and Radical Psychiatry researchers.
- They say that the nuclear family is the best because it fulfills a range of needs and functions for both individuals and society such as; companionship, security (emotional/physical) , raising children
2
Q
Functionalists
Vogel & Bell - Children as emotional Scapegoats
A
- Even the functionalists Vogel and Bell recognise the family can have dysfunctions.
- They see children used by parents as ‘emotional scapegoats’ or punch bags for their everyday stress.
3
Q
Postmodernists
Dysfunctions of the family
A
- Postmodernists focus on individual psychological stablilty
- Cultural globalisation has given people more choice on how to behave
- There is more personal and social responsibility created within families which has wider benefits for the community
- Within the family people show personal sacrifice and commitment to each other and in return receive what Becker calls ‘psychic income’ - the psychological pleasure gained from a relationship involving a sense of personal commitment, love and affection.
4
Q
Marxist view
A
- Emphasise how the family works in the interests of society rather than it’s members
- The unpaid work of women is seen as keeping wages lower than they would be
- Women are seen as reproducing labour on a daily basis.
- Women also constitute a ‘reserve army for labour’.
5
Q
RD Laing - Radical Psychiatry
A
- He saw the family as a key source of madness - especially schizophrenia
- He saw family like as a web of conflict and tensions
- These tensions can pull children apart resulting in psychiatric problems
6
Q
Edmund Leach - negative view of family
A
- He has a very negative view of family life
- He described it as a claustrophobic institution where parents fight and children rebel
- He said family life is like living in a “chicken coop” and families behaving like “overloaded electrical circuits”
7
Q
Marxist
David Cooper
A
- Sees the family as a ‘dangerous socialising agency’ producing obedient citizens’.
- His arguement is how the family helps prop up the capitalist system through encouraging blind obedience to authority figures.
- At the same time, he sees the family as stifling the self.’
8
Q
Critique of radical psychiatry - David Morgan (1996)
A
- He feels Laing concentrates on the suffocating aspects, ignoring the harmonious aspects and postive values of family life.
- Laing presents the family in a social vaccum ignoring culture and the effects of external agencies
- Morgan takes a ‘past-modern view’ and tries to avoid the modern approach to studying ‘the family’ which assumes families have a fixed structure and clear boundaries between themselves and the outside world.
- He would say that the family is not a static entity but is subject to constant change and we should be realistic about the variation in family.
9
Q
Feminist dysfunctions
A
- Feminists see the family as patriarchal - hence dysfunctional to women.
*** Fran Ansley **see women as taking on all of mens stess. - Abbott & Wallace (1997) adopt a third wave feminist analysis so admit how women’s experiences within the family are tempered by class, ethnicity and the degree of patriarchy from their male partner.
10
Q
The New Right - Dysfunctions of non-traditional families
A
- New Right argue non-traditional families are dysfunctional to society and individuals.
- Norman Dennis - sees children as ‘damaged’ by lone parent mothers.
- Boys are seen as particularly damaged by loss of positive male role model.
11
Q
Domestic violence Statistics
A
- Betsy Stanko(2000) found an act of domestic violence is commited every 6secs in UK.
- The WHO (2002) estimates that around 70% of female muder victims are killed by their male partner.
- More than 1/3 women experience domestic violence in their lives.
- Women may not want to admit the violence present in their family as it can make them feel a sense of failure
- Support is not always forthcoming
- The police traditionally were reluctant to intervene
- From 1990s the Home Office instructed the police to treat domestic violence the same as any violence.
12
Q
Dobash & Dobash - Violence against wives
About the study
A
- They conducted research in an atempt to explain why domestic violence occurs in families.
- they argued that women’s are restricted and orientated to serve men.
- “Females are ‘born’ to be wives”
- The main study involved 109 interviews with women who had experienced battering.
- 67 of these women lived in refuges for battered women in Edinburgh + Glasgow
- Women were aged 16-60
- Interviews were conducted by 2 female research assistants who spent many months with the women
- The women were asked about their family and early experiences of violence
13
Q
Domestic violence study
Dobash & Dobash - Findings
A
- They discoved that during early courtship the majority had loving relationships.
- The main sources of conflict were:
1. Husband’s expectation regarding domestic labour
2. Possessiveness and sexual jealousy
3. Allocation of family resources (money) - The main forms of physical force used were slapping, punching and kicking
- Most women experienced at least 2 attacks per week.
- 80% of the attacks were on a friday or saturday night.
14
Q
Dobash & Dobash - Explanations
Domestic violence study
A
- They argue that such an approach exposes violence not as deviant or pathological but as a ‘normal’ part of English culture.
- They relate it to the universal domination of men over women – patriarchal ideology is seen in most societies.
- They also linked it to an ideological preparation which begins in early childhood with the socialisation of girls to be nurturing and boys to be tough and independent.
15
Q
Battered Men
A
- Ian Lockhurst (1999) claims we should accept the fact that violent behaviour can be perpetuated by any individual to any individual
- We have no real idea of the extent of violence inflicted on men since most is not reported.
16
Q
Domestic violence and Men Statistics
A
- 49% of men (compared with 19% of women) told no one they were victims of domestic abuse (2018), according to the crime survey for England and Wales.
- organisational reports say that 95% of callers suffer from emotional abuse and 68% physical abuse
- Behaviours recorded include; partner suspected of spying on them, partner monitoring spending, partner intentionally destroying possessions, took away electronics, partner deprived or limited food
17
Q
Coercive control
A
- Coercive behaviour is an act or pattern of acts of assult, threats, humiliation and intimidation or other abuse that is used to harm, punish or frighten their victim.
- Controlling behaviour is designed to make a person dependent by isolating them from sources of support, exploiting their resources for personal gain.
- Depriving them of independence
- Section 76 of the Serious Crime Act 2015 - created a new offence of controlling or coercive behaviour in an intimate or family relationship.
18
Q
Coercive control - ONS statistics
A
- 41,626 offences of coercive control recordedby police in England/Wales in the year ending March 2022
- Compared to 33,954 in the year March 2021 and 24,856 in 2020
- The rise in coercive control offences may be due to improvements made by the police in recognising incidents of coercive control and using thenew lawaccordingly.
- Coercive control can happen to both men and women.
19
Q
Child abuse - David Morgan
A
- David Morgan(1997) -says that over-private households are anything but a safe haven for children.
- Most abuse of children is bullying (verbal/emotional abuse)
20
Q
NSPCC Child Abuse statistics
A
- 2 children a day will die through physical attack within the home.
- 6% of children suffered physical neglect
- 6% emotionally maltreated
- 1% sexually abused by a parent
- 49% of victims treated violently by their mothers, 40% by their fathers, 8% by a step-parent.
- Child abuse during the pandemic skyrocketed as children were kept home in suffocating environments.
21
Q
Child abuse - Who is likely to be abused?
A
- Youngest age groups
- Babies under a year are most vulnerable
- Boys outnuber girls in most cases of abuse
- Only in sexual abuse cases, girls are 4x more likely to be the victim than boys.
22
Q
Child-Line
Is the Family in Crisis?
A
- Child-line reports abusive parents, growing divorce all suggest the family is in crisis.
- The New Right sees the current decline of ‘traditional family as causing many of societies problems.
- The New Right blame family problems due to divorce, lone-mothers, cohabitation, reluctance to embrace family life on the growth of feminism.
23
Q
Anthony Giddens
A
- He argues family reflect/express changes in the wider society in 5 key changes; 1.Children used to be an economic benefit but now represent a huge cost to parents.
2. The growing equalization of men and women.
3. Participation of women in the labour market.
4. The liberation of sex from reproduction
5. We are no longer resigned to ‘fate’, and now take a much more active role in deciding how to live. - The return to the ‘traditional family’ is neither desirable nor possible.
- Past family life often included infanticide, child abuse and damaging authoritarian relationships.
- A return is not possible because the traditional family was based on a world that has now disappeared.
24
Q
Giddens Conclusions
A
- He argues the challenge is the establishment of a satisfactory family life (partners are equal, relationships are based on communication not violence)
- Giddens Concludes; it is sensible to be worried about the rise in divorce rates.
- To be concerned that 50% of divorced fathers lose contact with their children after a year.
- To be concerned about women struggling to bring up children on their own.
