Family Flashcards
Family
A social institution containing a group of people with shared biological and/or cultural heritage, affinity or residence.
Adoption
A process involving non-biological parents requesting legal rights and responsibility for a child. Adoption can occur between related family member or unrelated individuals.
Nuclear family
A social group consisting for a mother, a father and any number of dependent children (either their own or adopted) spanning two generations who live together in the same household.
Extended family
Social group containing immediate family member and non-immediate family members spanning two or more generations, such as aunts, uncles, cousins and other descendants from a common ancestor.
Cohabitation
A living situation whereby two or more unmarried adults share a household over a prolonged period.
One parent family
Families based on a person who is not a couple relationship, but forms a parents-child relationship with at least one other person (child) in the household.
Stepfamily
A family structure involving both or one of the adults bringing children from a previous relationship into the current relationship - the stepfamily (sometimes referred to as a ‘blended family’ or a ‘reconstituted family’)
Same sex couple parenting
A social structure that encompasses a range of family arrangements including children raised by same-sex attracted couples, or adult couples with at least one LGBT partner, or a lone-parent identifying as LGBB.
Patriarchy
A social structure with males holding power over woman, and males places as head of the family unit.
Functionalist view of family
The view that the family performs certain functions including socialisation, regulation of sexual activity, social placement and material and emotional security in order to maintain the status quo.
Functionalism
A theory that interprets the social actions of people in terms of their contributions to the essential tasks or ‘functions’ that maintain a stable society.
