Survey on Family Life

Survey of Family Life

A social institution is an organized pattern of beliefs and behaviors centered on basic human needs. Family is a major social institution in our society that controls how children are brought up, and are taught how to behave and act in the world. It is a major support system, and a guide to be introduced into our society. In our Society today, when people are asked what a family is, there are many different responses. Because of the media, people often associate what they think is a family is through their favorite television shows, books, and magazines. The problem with programs such as Family Ties, or the Cosby show is that they don't always portray or provide realistic views. Through a survey given to ten random people at Merrimack College, I concluded that families differ in many ways whether it's through marriage or divorce, decision making, and family unity.

One type of family that is typically portrayed by the Media is the nuclear family. A nuclear family is a married couple and their unmarried children living together. From the nuclear family, many larger family groups can be formed. Demonstrated by my survey I found that the average nuclear family has about four members. My survey also showed that the amount of blood related siblings living in the same household was about two per family.

Among the nuclear family there is also extended family, where relatives live in the same home as parents and their children. The results from my survey presented that not many people have extended family, but the extended family that does exist consists mainly of grandparents. There are advantages to the extended family over the nuclear family, such as more emotional, physical, and economical support for the family as a whole. In the television show Family Matters, extended family is demonstrated when the grandmother comes to live with "Winslows". She was portrayed as a loving person who was always there to listen to her family's problems. In this case of the media, we see that extended family is properly used.

In the United States, most people would prefer the nuclear family as their family arrangement, but studies show that only one third of the population actually fulfills this model. Research has shown dramatic increase of divorce rates, and remarriages over the past 30 years. Through my survey taken at Merrimack College, results show that monogamy is still dominant over divorce or serial monogamy but are extremely close. Sixty percent of the respondents had parents that were still married, while forty percent of the respondents had parents that we're divorced. If the respondent's parents were divorced, I asked them to specify if their parents remarried, which parent remarried, and how many times did they practice serial monogamy. The results came back very scattered. I found that one mother was remarried once, one father was remarried once, both parents of a respondent had been remarried once, and that there was one mother remarried twice. This scattered pattern did present that more women had been divorced and remarried then the males. I also asked in my questionnaire whether or not the surveyors had stepbrothers and sisters, and all of them except for one person had no stepsiblings. In Hollywood today, we see more commonly celebrities practicing serial monogamy. The media exposing these relationships may be a factor to why serial monogamy is spreading throughout the United States. People may use stars like "Jennifer Lopez" as a scapegoat to why the can be serial monogamous. This media driven exposure may have contributed to the downward spiral of monogamy in the United States.

For my next survey question, I asked if the parents had been divorced, whom the respondents lived with. The results were unanimous; they all lived with their mothers. In figure 12-1 of our Sociology: A Brief Introduction text, A survey was taken of family households in the United States for the years 1980, 2000, and 2010 (projected) and the results also came back that there was, and would be a majority of female householders over male householders. I found it interesting that the results from my survey at Merrimack College concurred completely to the results taken from the book. The reasons for these results may be attributed to maternal instincts, and increased nurturing given by the mother of the original nuclear family. We often see in movies and in television the mother nurturing the child, or we see the mother always tending to the kids, being labeled the "soccer mom". The males are uncommonly associated with being the single parent, and are portrayed as the one who only has to pay child support. Many cases this isn't true, but from my results we see that the media is mostly correct when showing these roles.

One question I presented on the survey was who made the decisions, and had more authority in the household; the woman, man, or if they were equal. Many societies today are living in a patriarchy where the males make all the decisions. This is the most common in distribution or power within family throughout the world. It is more rare to see a matriarchy where women have greater authority than men. My results indicated that most of the families were egalitarian. In these households spouses are considered equals, but doesn't mean every decision is shared. Wives may hold authority in one field, while husbands in others. In the United States today, the egalitarian households have started to replace the patriarchal family. In other cultures, such as China, and Middle Eastern countries, it will continue to be a Patriarchy driven society. We can learn about these types of male dominating societies mainly through the news, and even through Disney movies such as "Mulan".

From the core, nuclear family, many larger family groups can be formed. These groups are referred to as kinship. Kin groups include aunts, uncles, in-laws, cousin's