Sociology-Families and Households-Couples Flashcards
1
Q
What does the domestic division of labour refer to?
A
The roles that men and women play in relation to housework, childcare and paid work
2
Q
What are the roles like in the traditional nuclear family?
A
The roles between husband and wife were segregated (separate and distinct from one another)
3
Q
What is Parsons (1955) functionalist model of the family?
A
Shows a clear division of labour between spouses, where the husband has an instrumental role, and the wife has an expressive role
4
Q
What is an instrumental role?
A
Geared towards achieving success at work, so he can provide for the family financially (breadwinner)
5
Q
What is an expressive role?
A
Geared towards primary socialisation of children and meeting family’s emotional needs (homemaker, full time housewife rather than wage earner)
6
Q
What does Parsons argue that the division of labour is based on?
A
Biological factors, which make women naturally suited to the nurturing role and men to the role of the provider and it is beneficial to both men and women, their children and society
7
Q
Who else holds this view?
A
Some conservative thinkers and politicians, known as the New Right
8
Q
What are criticisms for Parsons roles?
A
- Young and Willmott argue men now take a greater share of domestic tasks and wives are becoming wage earners.
- Feminists reject the view that the division is natural and say it only benefits men
9
Q
How does Bott 1957 distinguish between two types of conjugal (within marriage) roles?
A
Segregated conjugal roles and joint conjugal roles
10
Q
What are segregated conjugal roles?
A
Where the couple have separate roles (male breadwinner and female housewife/carer) like Parsons roles. Leisure activities also tend to be separate
11
Q
What are joint conjugal roles?
A
Where the couple share tasks such as housework and childcare, and spend leisure time together
12
Q
What did Young and Willmott identify in their study of traditional working class extended families?
A
A pattern of segregated conjugal roles
13
Q
What sort of view do Young and Willmott take?
A
A march of progress view
14
Q
What is the march of progress view?
A
They see family life as gradually improving for all its members, becoming more equal and democratic, and there has been a long term trend away from segregated roles and towards joint roles, creating a symmetrical family
15
Q
What is the symmetrical family?
A
One in which the roles of husbands and wives, although not identical, are more much more similar
16
Q
What is evidence for the symmetrical family?
A
Women now go out to work, though it may be part time. Men now help with housework and childcare. Couples now spend leisure time together instead of separately with work friends or female relatives
17
Q
Where did Young and Willmott find the symmetrical more evident?
A
Among younger couples, those who are geographically and socially isolated, and the more affluent
18
Q
What do Young and Willmott say caused the symmetrical family?
A
Changes in women’s position, geographical mobility, new technology and higher standards of living
19
Q
What do feminists say about the march of progress view?
A
They reject this view, arguing that little has changed. Men and women remain unequal within the family and women still do most of the housework
20
Q
Where do feminists say that this inequality stems from?
A
The fact that family and society are patriarchal. Women occupy a subordinate and dependent role within the family and in wider society
21
Q
What does Oakley 1974 say about the march of progress?
A
March of progress is exaggerated, though husbands may help their wives at least once a week, it may include just taking the children for a walk or making breakfast on occasion, which isn’t evidence of symmetry
22
Q
What did Oakley find in her own research?
A
only 15% of husbands had high level of participation in housework and 25% in childcare
23
Q
What did Boulton 1983 find?
A
Although fathers may help by performing specific childcare tasks, its usually mothers who take responsibilities for the child’s security and well being and fewer than 20% had a major role in childcare
24
Q
What did Warde an Hetherington find in the 1990s?
A
Found sex typing of domestic tasks remained strong eg wives were 30 times more likely to be the last person to have done the washing, and husbands were 4 times more likely to have been the last person to wash the car-Men take on female tasks only when wife isn’t there, and also slight change of attitude among younger men
25
What did Gershuny 1994 find relating to the impact of paid work?
Women working full time is leading to a more equal division of labour at home and used time studies to show these women did less domestic work than other women
26
What did Sullivan 2000 find?
Analysis of nationally representative data in 1975, 1987 and 1997 found trend towards women doing a smaller share of domestic work and men doing more, and an increase in couples with an equal division of labour where men also participated in traditional ‘women’s’ tasks
27
What do these trends of a more equal division of labour reflect?
A change in attitudes to the traditional division of labour
28
What is an example of these changing attitudes?
British Social Attitudes Survey 2013 which found a fall in number of people who thought it was the man's job to earn money and women's job to look after home and family. About 45% agreed with this in 1984, but roughly 12% in 2012
29
What is the feminists view on the impact of paid work?
Hasn't led to greater equality in the division of domestic labour, and there is little sign of the 'new man' who does equal shares of housework and childcare, and so women now carry a dual burden of paid work and domestic work
30
What did the British Social Attitudes survey show for how much work men do?
In 2012, men did on average 8 hours of housework each week, but women did 13. Men spent 10 hours on caring for family members, but women spent 23 hours. women did twice as much as men, and 60% of women thought this was unjust as they did more than their fair share
31
What did the British Social Attitudes survey show for who does what job?
Couples still divided household tasks due to traditional gender roles, the same as in 1994(women more likely to do laundry, care for sick family, shop, clean cook and men more likely to do repairs around the house)
32
What does Allan 1985 argue?
Women's tasks are less intrinsically pleasing, and this can't be shown in the survey
33
Who supports Boulton's 1983 view?
Ferri and Smith 1996, Dex and Ward 2007, and Braun, Vincent and Ball 2011
34
What did Ferri and Smith 1996 find?
In a study, 4% of fathers took responsibility for childcare
35
What did Dex and Ward 2007 find?
In a study, though 78% played with their children and claimed to have high levels of involvement, only 1% of fathers took the main responsibility for caring for a sick child
36
What did Braun, Vincent and Ball 2011 find?
3 out of 70 families studied had the father as the main carer, most were just ‘background parents’ with a provider ideology
37
What idea did Hochschild 2013 come up with, explaining responsibility for children?
Emotion work, where women are responsible for family members emotions eg jealousies and arguments between siblings, and ensure everyone is happy and controlling their own emotions
38
What do Duncombe and Marsden 1995 say that emotion work creates?
A triple shift, of housework, paid work and emotion work
39
What does Sourtherton 2011, also argue is up to mothers?
Responsibility of coordinating, scheduling and managing 'quality time’ together
40
Why has coordinating, scheduling and managing quality time become difficult in todays society?
Emergence of the 24/7 society and flexible working patterns, which lead to people's time being more fragmented and 'de-routinised'
41
What does Southerton also note about leisure time?
It is unequal and different between men and women, as men have more consolidated blocks of uninterrupted leisure time, whereas women's leisure time is often punctuated by child care and have to multi task, indicating their dual burden
42
Who identified two explanations for the gender division of labour?
Crompton and Lyonette 2008
43
What are their two explanations?
The cultural/ideological explanation of inequality and the material/economic explanation of inequality
44
What is the cultural or ideological explanation of inequality?
The division of labour is determined by patriarchal norms and values that shape the gender roles in our culture. Women perform more domestic labour simply because that is what society expects them to do and has socialised them to do
45
What is the material or economic explanation of inequality?
The fact that women generally earn less than men means it is economically rational for women to do more of the housework and childcare while men spend more of their time earning money
46
According to the cultural explanation, when will equality be achieved?
When norms about gender roles change, which would involve changes in men and women's attitudes, values, expectations, role models and socialisation
47
Who supports/acts as evidence for the cultural explanation?
Gershuny 1994, Man Yee Kan 2001, The British Social Attitudes survey 2013, and Dunne 1999
48
What did Gershuny 1994 find?
Couples whose parents had a more equal relationship are more likely to share housework due to equally-parental role models, and social values are gradually adapting to women working, establishing a new norm of men doing domestic work
49
What did Man Yee Kan 2001 find?
Younger men do more domestic work, suggesting a generational shift in behaviour as most men claimed they did more work than their father and most women claimed to do less work than their mother
50
What did the British Social Attitudes survey 2013 find?
Less than 10% of under 35's agreed with traditional division of labour, against 30% of over 65's, indicating a long term change in norms, values and attitudes, reflecting changes in gender role socialisation of the young in favour of equality in relationships
51
What did Dunne 1999 find?
Lesbian couples have a more symmetrical relationship as they are the same gender so decide themselves what jobs they will do, due to absence of traditional heterosexual 'gender scripts'
52
According to the material explanation, when will equality be achieved?
When women join the labour force and earn as much as their partners, therefore there will be an equal share of domestic tasks?
53
Who supports the material explanation?
Kan, Arber and Ginn 1995, Ramos 2003 and Sullivan
54
What did Kan find?
For every £10000 a year more a woman earns, she does two hours less housework per week
55
What did Arber and Ginn 1995 find?
Better paid, middle class women are able to buy better products and services so they have to spend less time on housework and child care tasks
56
What did Ramos 2003 find?
Women in full-time employment with a husband who is unemployed do the same amount of domestic work
57
What did Sullivan find?
Working full time rather than part time makes the biggest difference in terms of how much domestic work each partner does as it brings women's earnings much closer to those of their partners
58
What does Crompton 1997 conclude?
There is no immediate prospect of a more equal division of labour if this depends on economic equality between the sexes
59
What is the conclusion for equality in couples?
Evidence that women in paid work leads to a more equal division of labour though many feminists argue the extent of this is limited and women still have a dual or triple burden-the root of the problem is patriarchy
60
What do Barrett and McIntosh note?
Men gain more from women’s domestic work than they give back in financial support, financial support is often unpredictable with strings attached, and men usually make the decisions about spending on important items
61
What did Kempson 1994 find?
Among low income families, women denied their own needs, stopped going out and ate smaller portions or skipped meals in order to make ends meet
62
How are women treated when their is an inequality in resources and decision-making?
They have no entitlement to a share of household resources and so sees anything she spends on herself as money that should have been spent on children or essentials. Even in households with adequate incomes, unequal sharing of resources can leave women in poverty
63
What do Pahl and Vogler 1993 identify?
Two types of control over family income: Allowance system and pooling
64
What is the allowance system?
Where men give their wives an allowance out of which they have to budget to meet the family's needs, with the man retaining any extra income for himself
65
What is pooling?
Where both partners have access to income and joint responsibility for expenditure; eg a joint bank account
66
What is the most common form of money management today?
Pooling
67
Does pooling indicate equality in decision making?
Although it seems like it would, where income is pooled and controlled by the husband, it tends to give men more power in major financial decisions, but not as much as in the allowance system
68
What did Pahl and Vogler 2007 find about decision making?
Even where there was pooling, men usually made the major financial decisions
69
What did Hardill 1997 find?
Study of 30 dual career professional couples found important decisions were made jointly or by husband alone, and his career normally took priority when making decisions about moving house for a new job
70
What did Finch 1983 observe?
Women’s lives tend to be structured around their husband’s careers
71
What did Edgell's 1980 study of professional couples find?
Very important decisions (finance/job change/house move) made by husband or jointly with husband as final say, important decisions (holiday/children’s education) made together or by wife, and less important decisions (home decor/clothes/food purchases) made by wife
72
Why does Edgell say the patterns for decision making exist?
Men are likely to take the decisions because they earn more. women usually earn less and are economically dependent on them, so have less say in decision making
73
What did Laurie and Gershuny 200 find?
By 1995, 70% of couples said they had equal say in decisions, though high earning, well qualified professional women were more likely to have an equal say
74
Who offers a material explanation of gender inequality in resources and decision making, as explained by Crompton and Lyonette?
Laurie and Gershuny
75
Who offers a cultural explanation of gender inequality in resources and decision making, as explained by Crompton and Lyonette?
Feminists, who argue its due to a patriarchal society where the cultural definition of men as decision makers is deeply ingrained in men and women, and instilled through gender role socialisation. Until the definition is challenged, decision making will remain unequal
76
What does Pahl note about the meaning of money?
Just pooling money doesn’t mean there is equality, you need to look at who controls the pooled money and whether each partner contributes equally
77
What did Vogler et al find about the meaning of money?
Cohabiting couples were less likely to pool money, as they may wish to maintain independence, yet they are more likely to share domestic tasks equally
78
What does Nyman 2003 note?
Money has no automatic, fixed or natural meaning and different couples can define it in different ways. These meanings can reflect the nature of the relationship
79
What does the personal life perspective focus on, when talking about money?
The meanings couples give to who controls the money, and the meanings that money may have in relationships cannot be taken for granted
80
What did Smart 2007 find?
Found some gay men and lesbians attached no importance to who controlled the money and were perfectly happy to leave this to their partners. They didn’t see control of money as meaning equality or inequality in a relationship
81
What did Weeks et al 2001 find?
Typical pattern was pooling for household spending, and separate accounts for personal spending. Reflects a value of co-independence, where there is sharing but also a sense of independence, and this is more common in cohabiting couples, found by Vogler et al
82
Why does Smart suggest there is greater freedom for same sex couples to do what suits them as a couple?
They don't enter into relationships with historical, gendered, heterosexual baggage or cultural meanings around money, and so don't see money as a source of power
83
What is the Home Office 2013 definition of domestic violence and abuse?
Any incident or pattern of incidents of controlling, coercive or threatening behaviour, violence or abuse between those aged 16 or over who are or have been intimate partners or family members regardless of gender or sexuality
84
What is a common view of domestic violence?
That is is the behaviour of a few disturbed or 'sick' individuals, and that its causes are psychological rather than social
85
How have sociologists challenged this view?
By showing that domestic violence is far too widespread, and that domestic violence doesn't occur randomly
86
How is domestic violence too widespread?
Too widespread to be the work of a few disturbed individuals and Women's Aid federation 2014 found domestic violence accounts for 1/6-1/4 of all recorded violent crime. Also Crime survey for England and Wales 2013 found 2 million people reported being victims of domestic abuse in the previous year
87
How does domestic violence not occur randomly?
Follows particular social patterns that have social causes. Most obvious pattern is violence by men against womrn
88
What did Coleman et al 2007 find to support the fact that domestic violence doesn't occur randomly?
Women were more likely than me to have experienced ‘intimate violence’ across all four types of abuse (partner abuse, family abuse, sexual assault and stalking)
89
What did Coleman and Osbourne 2010 find?
Two women a week, (or 1/3 of all female homicide victims) are killed by a partner or former partner
90
What did Dobash and Dobash find?
Their research confirmed the pattern of men abusing women, and found violent incidents could be set off by what husband's saw as a challenge to his authority eg wife asking why he was late home. Marriage legitimates violence against women by conferring power and authority on husbands, and dependency on wives
91
What did the crime survey for England and Wales 2013 find about gender differences in domestic violence?
Although women are more likely to be victims, they found a relatively narrow gender gap of 7.3% women, compared to 5% men reporting domestic abuse in the previous year, however other studies show a wider gap
92
What is a disadvantage of things such as the crime survey?
They just show how many victims, but don't show anything about frequency, severity or effects of the abuse, which would show a very significant gender gap
93
What did Walby and Allen 2004 find?
Women were more likely to be victims of multiple incidents of abuse and of sexual violence
94
What did Ansara and Hindin 2011 find?
Women suffered more severe violence and control, with more serious psychological effects, and also found that women were much more likely than men to be fearful of their partners
95
What did Dar 2013 point out?
Can be difficult to count separate domestic violence incidents, as abuse can be continuous or occur so often that victims can’t reliably count the instances
96
What are two reasons why official domestic violence statistics understate the extent of the problem?
Victims may be unwilling to report it to the police, and police/prosecutors may be reluctant to investigate or prosecute cases reported to them
97
What did Yearnshire 1997 find about the first reason, of victims being unwilling to report?
On average a woman suffers 35 assaults before making a report and domestic violence is the violent crime, least likely to be reported
98
What does Dar argue about victims?
Victims of domestic violence are less likely than victims of other forms of violence to report the offence as they believe that it isn't a matter for the police, or it is too trivial, or fear reprisals
99
What did Cheal 1991 find about police and prosecutors in regards to domestic violence?
Reluctance to prosecute or investigate domestic violence is due to the fact that police and other state agencies aren’t prepared to become involved in the family
100
What assumptions do the police and state agencies make about family life?
That it is a private sphere so access by state agencies should be limited, that its a good thing so state agencies neglect the 'darker side' of family life, and that individuals are free agents and so if women are suffering, they are free to leave
101
Why isn't it true that domestic violence victims are free agents?
Male violence is often coupled with male economic power: women are financially dependent and so are unable to leave. Also leaving doesn't always solve the problem: Approximately 75% of women who are killed by their partners are murdered when they attempt to leave or after they have left an abusive relationship
102
What does lack of action by police and prosecution mean?
It means that cases successfully prosecuted are only the tip of a much larger iceberg of abuse, eg during 2006-11 conviction rates stood at only 6.5% of incidents reported to the police
103
What are the two explanations of domestic violence?
The radical feminist explanation (emphasises role of patriarchal ideas, cultural values and institutions) and the materialist explanation (emphasises economic factors such as lack of resources)
104
What do feminists use as evidence of patriarchy?
Findings, such as those of Dobash and Dobash
105
What do Millett and Firestone 1970 argue?
All societies have been founded on patriarchy and the key division in society is between men and women, where men are the enemy; oppressors and exploiters of women
106
How do radical feminists see family and marriage?
As key institutions in patriarchal society and the main source of women's oppression. Within family, men dominate through domestic violence or threat of it. Domestic violence is an inevitable feature of patriarchal society and serves to preserve the power that all men have over womenn
107
How do radical feminists help explain why most domestic violence is committed by men?
Patriarchal society, they also give a sociological, rather than psychological explanation, by linking patterns of domestic violence to dominant social norms about marriage, and explain the reluctance of police and courts as the fact that they are male dominated
108
Why does Faith Robertson Elliot 1996 reject the radical feminist view?
Rejects the radical feminist claim that all men benefit from violence against women, not all men are aggressive and most are opposed to domestic violence, but radical feminists ignore this
109
What do radical feminists fail to explain?
Female violence, including child abuse by women, violence against male partners, and within lesbian relationships, (crime survey for England and Wales 2013 found 18% of men experienced domestic violence since turning 16)
110
What do radical feminists wrongly assume?
Use concept of patriarchy to explain why women are most likely to be victims, but wrongly assume all women are equally at risk, and don't explain which women are more at risk
111
What social groups does the Office for National Statistics 2014 suggest are most at risk of domestic violence?
Young women, those in the lowest social class/living in deprived areas, those on low income/in financial difficulties, those living in shared/rented accommodation, those with high levels of alcohol/drug consumption, those with long term illness/disability
112
What does the materialist explanation focus on?
Economic or material factors such as inequalities in income and housing to explain why some groups are more at risk than others
113
What do Wilkinson and Pickett 2010 suggest?
Domestic violence as a result of stress on family members caused by social inequality
114
What does inequality mean for families?
Some have fewer resources than others. Those on low incomes or in overcrowded accommodation are likely to have higher stress levels, reducing chances of maintaining stable and caring relationships, increasing risk of conflict/violence
115
What is an example of how the materialist explanation can cause domestic violence?
Worries of money, jobs, housing may lead to domestic conflict due to anger, and lack of money, time restricts peoples social circle and reduces social support for those under stress
116
What is an advantage of the materialist explanation?
Wilkinson and Pickett's approach is useful to show how social inequality produces stress and triggers conflict/violence in families. Those in lower social classes face greater hardship/stress so explains the class division on domestic violence
117
What is a disadvantage to the materialist explanation?
Unlike the radical feminist approach, Wilkinson and Pickett don't explain the gender differences?
118
How do marxist feminists support the materialist explanation?
See inequality as cause, eg Ansley 1972 describes wives as 'takers of shit' and that domestic violence is product of capitalism as male workers are exploited at work and take out stress on their wives, which explains male against female violence, but not female violence or why all males don't commit domestic violence
