Chapter 10. Family Life Cycles
I. The
Developmental Perspective
1. Individ life cycle: school age:fam need encourage sense accomplishment;
adolescent: dev goals, philos of life; adulthood:generativity—bearing offspring;
productivess (e.g. work);creativity;maturity:look back for meaning for whole feel
2. Stages of Family Life Cycle:1
bef children: most have >satisfac;2 childbear:
marital satis decline;3
preschool children 4 schoolchildren 5 fam w/ adolescent
oldest 13-20yrs; satis at nadir;6
launching centers: mar satis rise;7 Middle Yrs 8
aging families: working members have retired, gen husband first since gen older
3. Single-par Fams: 64% of black fams, 36% Hisp fams, 25% white;1/3 overall
4. Divorced women: head ½ of single-par fams; 72% of recently div will remarry
5. unmar moms:birth to=div as path;1/3 birth’96;70% B child; 41% Hisp;26% W
age-range: 2/3 under age 24; half of these adolescents; most preg unintent
multiple disadvantages:to moms &child: poverty,no ed, <productivity
1. background factors affecting div: adolescent marriages prone; after 30 > than
20s; up to 24 yrs, older when marry, > marital happiness; after 24, levels out.
a. educ:gives>mar adjust&stability;give resources, e.g. $,insight, or status
2. childhood environ: > happy if par mar happiness, low parent-child conflict;
3. opposites no attract:repel;we pick w/ sim personality char since >understand
4. those w/ simultaneous part prior to mar: had <marital satisfaction
5. negative communication: after 2 ½ yrs, the >neg communic, the <satisfy mar
6. role failure w/ regard to intimacy & trust: leads to marital dissatisfaction
7. length of engagements: currently average between 12 and 16 months
8. cohabitation no has same social legitimacy: most relatives don’t consider kin
a. divorce risk: some evidence higher if previously cohabitants
9. weddings: word derived from Anglo-Saxon “wedd” that means “pledge”
10 exchanging rings:from ancient Egypt;symbol timelessness since no begin/end
11. African trad jump broomstick:bring to Am by slave;now in some black wed
12 Civil weddings rather than church wed: now account for 1/3 of all wedding
a. causes: <% remmariages & < religious homogamy
13. pregnancy at marriage: about 24% of couples
14. wed signifies: left singlehood and responsible to each other as fully as to self
15. 4 traditional assumptions @ husband/wife responsibilities: 1 husb head
house & 2 responsible support fam; 3 wife respons domes work & 4 child rearing
16. women earn more than men: in about 20% of marriages
17. expectations not changed: Ganong and Coleman 1992: both M&F expect
husband to be more successful, make >$, be >ed, &be >competent than wife
a. even dual-earner couples: hold trad expectations; F resp house tasks
18. Duration of marriage effect: accum over time of unresolved conflicts,
grievances, role overload, heavy work—causing marital disenchantment.
19 Identity bargaining: interactional role adjustment of preconceptions to reality
a. identify w/role:man must feel as husb&be treat such by wife;vice-versa
b. problem: couple rarely agree on what is the role of husband and wife
20. marital satisfaction: >for those with traditional attitudes than for non-trad
21. bonding b/in laws:tends to be b/ women;divorce w>likely than m to keep ties