(Hammond & Cheney, 2018b)

1A - Family Theories and Research

Learning Outcomes

At the end of this chapter you will be able to do the following.

• Explain the major assumptions of each of the theoretical perspectives.

• Compare and contrast major theoretical perspectives.

• Apply theory to issues of the family.

• Compare pre- and post-industrial family patterns.

• Define family structure.

• Define the functions of the family.

• Relate group complexity to number of members.

• Compare and contrast types of statuses.

In all societies, the family is the premier institution for socialization of children, intimate adult relationships, economic support and cooperation, and continuity of relationships along the life-course. Sociologists have functioned in a core role for describing, explaining, and predicting family-based social patterns for the United States and other countries. Sociologists help others to understand the larger social and personal level trends in families.

FAMILY STRUCTURES

The family structures that were very common a century ago are not nearly as common today. In the U.S. around the year 1900, most families had three generations living in one home (e.g., children, parents, and uncles/aunts/grandparents) and most did manual labor. Today, very few families live with multiple generations. Most modern families fall into one of two types: nuclear or blended. The nuclear family is a family group consisting of parents and their biological or adopted children. This is the family type that is mostly preferred. One variation of this type is the single-parent family (one parent and his or her biological or adopted children), which can be created by unwed motherhood, divorce, or death of a spouse. The second most common family form is the blended family, which is a family created by remarriage and includes at least one child from a prior relationship. All of the cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and step relatives are considered extended family (one’s relatives beyond the nuclear and blended family level).

The U.S. Census Bureau conducts annual surveys of the U.S. population and publishes them as the Current Population Surveys. Table 1 represents U.S. family types. Married families comprised over half (52%) of the family types in 2008. Single never-marrieds are the second largest type and include opposite-sex and same-sex cohabiters. (Opposite Sex Unmarried Couples by Labor Force Status of Both Partners: 2008, 2008) Figure 1 shows the trend (1950-2008) in family types, clearly illustrating that married families have always been the most common form.

Figure 1. United States Trends in Family Types (in Millions), 1950-2008 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2008) 

Figure 2: Almost half of Asians live in extended families, one-in-ten Europeans live alone (Kramer, 2020)

FAMILY FUNCTIONS

What are the functions of families? In studying the family, Functional Theorists have identified some common and nearly universal family functions. That means almost all families in all countries around the world have at least some of these functions in common.

Economic Support

By far, economic support is the most common function of today’s families. While in some countries, economic support might look like food availability in a pantry, the ability to do laundry at one's house, or access to spending money, in another country economic support would look like capturing a wild animal, cooking it on an open fire, and sharing it with others. Economic support looks different across cultural contexts. Some families cooperate in business-like relationships. In Quebec, Montreal there is an established pattern of Italian immigrants who help family and friends emigrate from Italy to Canada. They subsidize each other’s travel costs, help each other find employment once in Canada, and even privately fund some mortgages for one another. Each participant is expected to support others in the same manner.

Emotional Support

Emotional relationships are also very common. It is important to note that there is a tremendous amount of cultural diversity in how intimacy is experienced in various families around the world. Intimacy is the social, emotional, spiritual, intellectual, and physical trust that is mutually shared between family members. Family members share confidences, advice, trust, secrets, and ongoing mutual concern. Many family scientists believe that intimacy in family relationships functions as a strong buffer to the ongoing stresses experienced by family members outside of the home.

Socialization

Children are born with the potential to communicate, work cooperatively, and socialize with others. They will realize this potential if older family members or friends take the time to protect and nurture them into their cultural and societal roles. Today, the family is the core of primary socialization. But many other societal institutions contribute to the process, including but are not limited to; schools, religion, workplace, and media. The family is where individuals learn the rules of their unique society.

From the first moments of life, children begin a process of socialization wherein parents, family, and friends transmit the culture of the mainstream society and the family to the newborn. They assist in the child’s development of his or her own social construction of reality, which is what people define as real because of their background assumptions and life experiences with others. An average child’s social construction of reality includes knowledge that he or she belongs, can depend on others to meet his needs, and has privileges and obligations that accompany membership in his family and community. In a typical set of modern social circumstances, children grow up through predictable life stages: infancy, preschool, school years, young adulthood, adulthood, middle adulthood, and finally later-life adulthood. Most will leave home as young adults, find a spouse or life partner in their mid-to-late 20s and work at a job for pay. This is the expectation of the average U.S. child. But how about those who don’t fit into these predictable patterns? Might their reality be shaped differently? Is their reality any less “real” than the populations we discussed earlier? Our social constructions of reality may overlap or have vast similarities, but no two people will have identical social realities because no two people will have identical life experiences.

Also, when discussing the average U.S. child, it’s safe to say that the most important socialization takes place early in life and at identifiable levels. Primary socialization typically begins at birth and moves forward until the beginning of the school years. Primary socialization includes all the ways the newborn is molded into a social being capable of interacting in and meeting the expectations of society. Most primary socialization is facilitated by family, friends, day care, and to a certain degree various forms of media. 

Around age four to five preschool and kindergarten are presented as expectations for children. Once they begin their schooling, they begin a different level of socialization. Secondary socialization occurs in later childhood and adolescence when children go to school and come under the influence of non-family members. This level runs concurrently with primary socialization. While parents unconditionally accept their children, children will learn through school and employment that to obtain approval from teachers and school employees, a tremendous amount of conformity and performance are required.

As students, children have to learn to belong and cooperate in large groups. They learn a new culture that extends beyond their narrow family culture and that has complexities and challenges that require effort on their part. This creates stressors for the children. 

Friends, classmates, and peers become increasingly important in the lives of children in their secondary educational stage of socialization. Most zero to five year olds yearn for affection and approval from their parents and family members. By the time of pre-teen years, the desire for family diminishes and the yearning now becomes for friends and peers. Parents often lament the loss of influence over their children once the teen years arrive. Studies show that parents preserve at least some of their influence over their children by influencing their children’s peers. Parents who host parties, excursions, and get-togethers find that their relationship with their children’s friends keeps them better connected to their children. They learn that they can persuade their children at times through their peers.

The third level of socialization includes college, work, marriage and significant relationships, and a variety of adult roles and adventures. Adult socialization occurs as we assume adult roles such as wife/husband/employee/etc. We adapt to new roles which meet our needs and wants throughout the adult life course. Freshmen in college, new recruits in the military, volunteers for Peace Corps, employees, missionaries, travelers, and others find themselves following the same game plan that led to their success during their primary and secondary socialization years. This success helps them to find out what’s expected and strive to reach those expectations during their adult socializations.

Sexuality and Reproductive Control

The family has traditionally asserted control of sexuality and reproduction. A few centuries ago the father and mother even selected the spouses for many of their children (they still do in many countries). In many Western cultures, parents want their adult children to select their own spouses. Older family members tend to encourage pregnancy and childbirth only in marriage or a long-term relationship. Unwed mothers are mothers who are not legally married at the time of the child’s birth. Being unwed brings up concerns of economic, emotional, social, and other forms of support for the mother and child that may or may not be present from the father. When an unwed mother delivers the baby, it is often the older female family members who end up providing the functions of support for that child rather than the birth father. Table 3 shows unwed mother births in the U.S. in 2000 and 2006. Most of the over four million live births in 2006 were to married mothers. But about 1/10 of teen mothers and over 1/3 of all mothers were unwed (U.S. Census Bureau, n.d.). From 2000 to 2006 teen births declined slightly while unwed births to older (non-teen) women increased. This trend of increasing unwed birth rates suggests that more and more families have less control by sanctioning childbirth within marriage.

Table 3. Percentage of All Births to Unwed Teens and Mothers of All Ages Years 2000 and 2006. (U.S. Census Bureau, n.d., p. 3)

Out-of-wedlock childbirths have become more common worldwide since the 1960s, but with wide variations among and within countries. Increasing economic independence and education combined with modern birth control methods have given women more control over family planning. In about 25 countries, including China, India and much of Africa, the proportion of such births is typically around 1 percent, explains Joseph Chamie, a demographer and a former director of the United Nations Population Division. In another 25 countries, mostly in Latin America, more than 60 percent of births are out-of-wedlock, a big jump from just 50 years ago. The rates of such births often coincide with public responses which range from severe punishments and stigmatization of children to celebrations and government assistance. In most countries, marriage still provides extra economic protection for parents and children, and governments struggle on how to respond to the trends. “Marriage has become less necessary for women’s financial survival, social interaction and personal wellbeing, and government policies have been slow to keep pace,” Chamie notes. “Like it or not, out-of-wedlock births are in transition worldwide and create challenges for many societies.” – YaleGlobal (Chamie, 2017)

Table 4: Percentage of Births after Wedlock Source: (Chamie, 2017)

Status

Ascribed status is present at birth and is said to be unchangeable (race, sex, or class). Achieved status is attained through one’s choices and efforts (college student, movie star, teacher, or athlete). Master Status is a status which stands out above other statuses and which distracts others from seeing who one really is. 

People are born into a network of racial, cultural-ethnic, religious and economic statuses. This shaped to some degree the way one grows up and is socialized. In modern societies achieved status is more important than ascribed status for most members of that society. Although, the degree of achievement one attains often depends heavily on the level of support families provide. While a status is the social position within a group, role is how one enacts that status. For example, a student (status) needs to attend class, study for exams, write papers, do homework, etc. Each status has many roles associated with it and each person has many statuses. An individual is probably a child, maybe a sibling, perhaps a spouse or parent, and likely an employee as well as a student. People have many roles to fulfill in your varied statuses.

Another consideration about groups and one’s roles in them is the fact that one single role can place a rather heavy burden on a person. Role strain is the burden one feels due to the varied roles within any given status and role conflict is when the roles in one status come into conflict with the roles in another status. For example, a student’s role of studying for a midterm (status of student), one’s role of getting to work on time (status of employee), and one’s role of socializing (status of single person) conflict because one had planned to study for that midterm on Saturday afternoon, but then their boss calls and asks them to come in to work, and just as they getting their friend stops by to ask them to go to the beach.

GROUPS

The first and most important unit of measure in sociology is the group, which is a set of two or more people who share a common identity, interact regularly, have shared expectations, and function in their mutually agreed upon roles. Most people use the word “group” differently from the sociological use. They say group even if the cluster of people they are referring to don’t even know each other (like six people standing at the same bus stop). Sociologists use aggregate to denote a number of people in the same place at the same time. So, people in the same movie theater, people at the same bus stop, and even people at a university football game are considered aggregates rather than groups. Sociologists also discuss categories. A category is a number of people who share common characteristics. Brown-eyed people, people who wear hats, and people’s political party are categories-they don’t necessarily share the same space, nor do they have shared expectations. In this text, we mostly discuss trends and patterns in family groups and in large categories of family types.

Family groups are crucial to society and are what most of you will form in your own adult lives. Groups come in varying sizes. Dyads are groups with two people and triads are groups with three people. The number of people in a group plays an important structural role in the nature of the group’s functioning. Dyads are the simplest groups because two people have only one relationship between them. Triads have four relationships (1-persons A and B, 2-persons A and C, 3-persons B and C, 4-persons A, B, and C). A group of four has ten relationships. Each additional person adds multiple new relationships.Each person in the group interacts with each other and affects each others’ interactions with the different individuals of that group.. 

As sociologists further study the nature of the group’s relationships, they realize that there are two broad types of groups: primary groups, which tend to be small, informal, and intimate (e.g., families, friends), and secondary groups, which tend to be larger, more formal, and much less personal (e.g., a study group, an individual and his coworker.) 

SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION

The average person lives too narrow a life to get a clear and concise understanding of today’s complex social world. Our daily lives are spent among friends and family, at work and at play, in the outdoors or on social media. There is no way one person can grasp the big picture from their relatively isolated lives. There are thousands of communities, millions of interpersonal interactions, billions of Internet information sources, and countless trends that transpire without many even knowing they exist. How to make sense of it all?

Psychology gave the understanding of self-esteem, economics gave the understanding of supply and demand, and physics gave the Einstein theory of E=MC2. The sociological imagination by Mills, gives a framework for understanding the social world that far surpasses any common sense notion derived from limited social experiences. C. Wright Mills (1916-1962), a contemporary sociologist, suggested that the study of the family at the following two core societal levels helps gain valuable insight. He stated, “neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both.” (C. W. Mills, 1959) 

Mills identified personal troubles and public issues as key principles for wrapping our minds around many of the hidden social processes that transpire in an almost invisible manner in today’s societies. Personal troubles are private problems experienced within the character of the individual and the range of their immediate relation to others. Mills identified the fact that people function in their personal lives as actors who make choices about their friends, family, groups, work, school, and other issues within their control. People have a degree of influence in the outcome of matters within their personal level. A college student who parties four nights a week, who rarely attends class, and who never does his homework has a personal trouble that interferes with his odds of success in college. But, when 50% of all college students in a country like the U.S. never graduate, we call it a public issue.

Public issues lie beyond one’s personal control and the range of one’s inner life. These pertain to society’s organization and processes. To better understand larger social issues, let us define social facts. Social facts are social processes rooted in society rather than in the individual. 

Émile Durkheim (1858-1917, France) studied the science of social facts in an effort to identify social correlations and ultimately social laws designed to make sense of how modern societies worked given that they became increasingly diverse and complex. (Durkheim, 1982)

The national cost of a gallon of gas, the War in the Middle East, the repressed economy, the trend of having too few females in the 18-24 year old singles market, and the ever-increasing demand for plastic surgery are just a few of the social facts at play today. Social facts are typically outside of the control of average people. They occur in the complexities of modern society and impact people at large, and rarely are significantly impacted back. This is because, as Mills taught, people live much of their lives on the personal level and much of society happens at the larger social level. Without a knowledge of the larger social and personal levels of social experience, people live in what Mills called a false social consciousness, which is an ignorance of social facts and the larger social picture.

A larger social issue is illustrated in the fact that nationwide, students come to college as freshmen ill-prepared to understand the rigors of college life. They haven’t often been challenged enough in high school to make the necessary adjustments required to succeed as college students.

Nationwide, the average teenager text messages, surfs the Net, plays video or online games, hangs out at the mall, watches TV and movies, spends hours each day with friends, and works at least part-time. Where and when would he or she get experience focusing attention on college studies and the rigors of self-discipline required to transition into college?

In a survey conducted each year by the U.S. Census Bureau, findings suggest that in 2006 the U.S. had about an 84% high school graduation rate. (Table R1501, n.d.) They also found that only 27% had a Bachelor’s degree. (Table R1502, n.d.) Given the numbers of freshman students enrolling in college, the percentage with a Bachelor’s degree should be closer to 50%.

The majority of college first year students drop out, because nationwide we have a deficit in the preparation and readiness of Freshmen attending college and a real disconnect in their ability to connect to college in such a way that they feel they belong to it. In fact college dropouts are an example of both a larger social issue and a personal trouble. Thousands of studies and millions of dollars have been spent on how to increase a freshman student’s odds of success in college (graduating with a 4-year degree). There are millions of dollars in grant money awarded each year to help retain college students.

The real power of the sociological imagination is found in how you and I learn to distinguish between the personal and social levels in our own lives. Once we do that we can make personal choices that serve us the best given the larger social forces that we face. There are larger social trends that will be identified in this course. Some of them can teach you lessons to use in your own choices. Others simply provide a broad understanding of the context of the family in our complicated society.

In this textbook you will find larger social evidence of many current United States family trends. Some changes were initiated in the Industrial Revolution where husbands were called upon to leave the home and venture into the factory as breadwinners. Women became homemakers and many eventually ended up in the labor force as well. The trend of having fewer children and having fewer of them die in or immediately after birth is directly related to medical technology and the value of having smaller families in our current service-based economy. The trend of lowering our standards of what exactly a “clean house” means is an adjustment that arguably needed to be made; post-World War II marketing campaigns had convinced women that a spotless house equaled a good woman. Today, good women have varying levels of a clean house.

Of concern to many are the continuing high rates of divorce. By studying divorced people we can learn how to prevent divorce and enhance the quality and satisfaction of marriage. Simply studying something does not imply that you agree with it or support it for yourself or others. Learning about something makes us better able to understand and defend our own views and values.

The Industrial Revolution changed societies and their families in an unprecedented way, such that Sociology as a discipline emerged as an answer to many of the new-found societal challenges. Societies had changed in unprecedented ways and had formed a new collective of social complexities that the world had never witnessed before. The Industrial Revolution transformed society at every level. Look at Table 4 to see pre- and post-Industrial Revolution social patterns and how different they were.

Table 5: Population estimates (1950–2005) and projections (2005–2050), by region. (Bongaarts, 2009)

Table 6: Trends in the total fertility rate by region. (Bongaarts, 2009)

Prior to the Industrial Revolution, families lived on smaller farms and every able member of the family did work to support and sustain the family economy. Towns were small and very similar (homogamous) and families were large (more children=more workers). There was a lower standard of living and because of poor sanitation, people died earlier. After the Industrial Revolution, farm work was replaced by factory work. Men left their homes and became breadwinners earning money to buy many of the goods that used to be made by hand at home (or bartered for by trading one’s own homemade goods with another’s). Women became the supervisors of homework. Much was still done by families to develop their own home goods while many women and children also went to the factories to work. Cities became larger and more diverse (heterogamous). Families became smaller (less farm work required fewer children). Eventually, standards of living increased and death rates declined.

Table 7: Pre-Industrial and Post-Industrial Revolution Social Patterns. © 2005 Ron J. Hammond, Ph.D.

It is important to note the value of women’s work before and after the Industrial Revolution. Hard work was the norm and still is today for most women. Homemaking included much unpaid work which is not as valued as paid work. These pre and post-industrial changes impacted all of Western civilization because the Industrial Revolution hit all of these countries about the same way, Western Europe, United States, Canada, and later Japan and Australia. The Industrial Revolution brought some rather severe social conditions which included deplorable city living conditions, crowding, crime, extensive poverty, inadequate water and sewage, early death, frequent accidents, extreme pressures on families, and high illness rates. Today, sociology continues to rise to the call of finding solutions and answers to complex social problems, especially in the family.

FAMILY RESEARCH

The American Sociological Association is the largest professional sociology organization in the world. A section of ASA members focuses its studies specifically on the family. Here is an excerpt from their mission statement: “Many of society’s most pressing problems — teenage childbearing, juvenile delinquency, substance abuse, domestic violence, child and elder abuse, divorce — are related to or rooted in the family”. The Section on Family was founded to provide a home for sociologists who are interested in exploring these issues in greater depth. (American Psychological Association, n.d.)

Many family sociologists also belong to the National Council on Family Relations. (Home | National Council on Family Relations (ncfr.org) Their mission statement reads as follows: “The National Council on Family Relations (NCFR) provides an educational forum for family researchers, educators, and practitioners to share in the development and dissemination of knowledge about families and family relationships, establishes professional standards, and works to promote family well-being (National Council on Family Relations, n.d.).” Research is important because if the results of a study are made public individuals can use the information to make better choices.

For example, studies have shown that the leading factor of divorce is not sex problems, failure to communicate, money mismanagement, or even in-law troubles. What is the leading cause of divorce? It is marrying too young. Specifically, if you marry at 17, 18, or 19 you are far more likely to divorce than if you wait to marry in your 20s. This was discovered and confirmed over decades of studying who divorced and which factors contributed more to divorce than others.

FAMILY CULTURE

Another key point in studying the family is to understand that all families share some cultural traits in common, but all also have their own family culture uniqueness. Culture is the shared values, norms, symbols, language, objects, and way of life that is passed on from one generation to the next.

Culture is what one learns from their parents, family, friends, peers, and schools. It is shared, not biologically determined. Most families in a society have similar family cultural traits. But, when a couple marries they learn that the success of their marriage is often based on how well they merge their unique family cultures into a new version of a culture that is their own.

Even though family cultures tend to be universal and desirable, we often judge other cultures as being good, bad, with our own culture typically being judged good. Ethnocentrism is the tendency to judge others based on our own experiences. In this perspective, our culture is right, while cultures which differ from our own are wrong. Another more valuable and helpful perspective about differing cultures is the perspective called cultural relativism, the tendency to look for the cultural context in which differences in cultures occur. If you’ve eaten a meal with your friend’s family you have probably noticed a difference in subtle things like the food that is served and how it is prepared. You may have noticed that their family communicates in different ways from your own. You might also have noticed that their values of fun and relaxation also vary from your own. To dismiss your friend’s family as being wrong because they aren’t exactly like yours is being ethnocentric. Cultural relativists like all the ice-cream flavors, if you will. They respect and appreciate cultural differences even if only from the spectators’ point of view.

OPPORTUNITY

In the U.S. and throughout the world there are rich and poor families. One’s social class has a great deal to do with who one was born to or adopted by. Where one ends up in their economic standing has a great deal to do with how one acts, given one’s own set of life chances. As identified by Max Weber, life chances are access to basic opportunities and resources in the marketplace. Some are paying for college on their own and taking the bus to school while others have a new car, the latest cell phone, and don’t have to worry how much their books cost because their parents are footing the bill. Life chances can also be applied to the quality of one’s own marriage and family. If one came from a highly shaming family culture, then one is more likely to develop an addiction. If one came from a family where the parents divorced, then one is more likely to divorce. If one was born to a single mother one is more likely to become a single mother or father. These are known correlates but not causes. In other words, one may be slightly disadvantaged because of the difficult family circumstances one was born in, but one is by no means doomed to repeat the patterns of their family of origin (the family into which one was born in) their family of procreation (the family one creates by marriage, childbirth, adoption).

Understanding life chances simply raises one’s awareness by demonstrating trends from the larger social picture that might well apply to someone on their personal level.

DEMOGRAPHY

Finally, the U.S. family today has an important underpinning that influences the family in the larger social and personal levels. Demography is the scientific study of population growth and change. 

Everything in society influences demography and demography conversely influences everything in society. 

Indeed, during the two decades following World War II, marriage and childbearing in most Western nations tended to: (1) occur early in adulthood; (2) follow a predictable sequence; and (3) be tightly coupled. That is, young couples first married, and then quickly began having children. (Timberlake & Heuveline, 2005)

After World War II, the United States began to recover from the long-term negative effects of the war. Families had been separated, relatives had died or were injured, and women who had gone to the factories then returned home at war’s end. The year 1946 reflected the impact of that upheaval in its very atypical demographic statistics. Starting in 1946, people married younger, had more children per woman, divorced and remarried, and kept having one child after another. From 1946 to 1956 the birth rate rose and peaked, then began to decline again. By 1964, the national high birth rate was finally back to the level it was at before 1946. All those children born from 1946-1964 were called the Baby Boom Generation (there are about 78 million of them alive today). Why was there such a change in family-related rates? The millions of deaths caused by the war, the long-term separation of family members from one another, and the deep shifts toward conservative values all contributed. The Baby Boom had landed and after the Baby Boom Generation was in place, it conversely affected personal and larger social levels of society in every conceivable way.

The Baby Boomers are most likely your parents or grandparents. Their societal influence on the family changed the U.S. forever. The earliest cohort of Baby Boomers (1946-51) has the world record for highest divorce rates. Collectively, Baby Boomers are still divorcing more than their parents ever divorced. They had their own children and many of these belong to Generations X or Y (X born 1965-1984 and Y born 1985-present). The demographic processes of the U.S. include these Baby Boomers, their legacy, and their offspring. To understand the U.S. family, one must understand the Baby Boomers and underlying demographic forces.

The core of demographic studies has three component concerns: births, deaths, and migration. All of demography can be reduced to this very simple formula:

(Births-Deaths) +/- ((In-Migration)-(Out Migration)) = Population Change.

This part of the formula, (Births-Deaths) is called natural increase, which is all births minus all deaths in a given population over a given time period. The other part of the formula, ((In-Migration)-(Out Migration)) is called net migration, which is all in-migration minus all out-migration in a given population over a given time period. The Industrial Revolution set into motion a surge of births and a lowering of deaths which changed U.S. society and families forever.

MAKING SENSE OF ABSTRACT THEORIES

(Hammond & Cheney, 2018a)

Theories are sets of interrelated concepts and ideas that have been scientifically tested and combined to magnify, enlarge, clarify, and expand our understanding of people, their behaviors, and their families. Without theories, science would be a futile exercise in statistics. In the diagram below, you can see the process by which a theory leads social scientists to perform a certain type of study with certain types of questions that can test the assumptions of the theory. Once the study is administered, the findings and generalizations can be considered to see if they support the theory. If they do, similar studies will be performed to repeat and fine-tune the process. If the findings and generalizations do not support the theory, the sociologist rethinks and revisits the assumptions they made.

The Wheel of Science (Wallace Wheel)

Figure 8: The Wheel of Science (created by Tim Tanner for FAML400)

Theories can be used to study society–millions of people in a state, country, or even at the world level. When theories are used at this level, they are referred to as macro theories, theories which best fit the study of massive numbers of people (typically Conflict and Functional theories). When theories are used to study small groups or individuals, say a couple, family, or team, they are referred to as being micro theories, theories which best fit the study of small groups and their members (typically Symbolic Interactionism). In many cases, any of the three main theories can be applied at either the macro or micro levels.

STRUCTURAL FUNCTIONALISM THEORY

The Functionalist Theory claims that society is in a state of balance and kept that way through the function of society’s component parts. Society can be studied the same way the human body can be studied: by analyzing what specific systems are working or not working, diagnosing problems, and devising solutions to restore balance. Socialization, religious involvement, friendship, health care, economic recovery, peace, justice and injustice, population growth or decline, community, romantic relationships, marriage and divorce, and normal and abnormal family experiences are just a few of the evidences of functional processes in our society.

Functionalists agree that things break down in society and that unfair treatment of others is common. These breakdowns are called dysfunctions, which are breakdowns or disruptions in society and its parts that threaten social stability.

Functionalists realize that just like the body, societies get “sick” or dysfunction. By studying society’s parts and processes, Functionalists can better understand how society remains stable or adjusts to destabilizing forces when unwanted change is threatened. According to this theory most societies find that healthy balance and maintain it; if they don’t then they collapse as many have in the history of the world. Equilibrium is the state of balance maintained by social processes that help society adjust and compensate for forces that might tilt it onto a path of destruction. Look at the Habitat for Humanity picture in Figure 2. Functional Theorists would say that component parts of society respond to dysfunctions in ways that help to resolve problems. In this house the foundation was dug, poured, and dried within a week. From the foundation to this point was three working days. This house is now finished and lived in, thanks mostly to the Habitat non-profit process and the work of many volunteers. Lots of homeless people are a dysfunction for society; think about what would happen if half of society was homeless for example. So another part of society, the normative organization of Habitat for Humanity, steps in and makes adjustments; they buy lots, get donations and volunteers and build homes helping to bring society back into equilibrium.

SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM THEORY

Symbolic Interactionism claims that society is composed of ever-present interactions among individuals who share symbols and their meanings. This is a very useful theory for understanding other people, improving communication, and in understanding cross-cultural relations. Values, communication, witch-hunting, crisis management, fear from crime, fads, love, evil and sin, what’s hot and what’s not, alien abduction beliefs, “who I am,” litigation, mate selection, arbitration, dating joys and woes, and both personal and national meanings and definitions can all be better understood using Symbolic Interactionism.

Once you realize that individuals are, by their social natures, very symbolic with one another, then you begin to understand how to persuade your friends and family, how to understand others’ points of view, and how to resolve misunderstandings. This theory is interested in meanings. Think about these three words, LOVE, LUST, and LARD. Each letter is a symbol. When combined in a specific order, each word can be defined. Because we memorize words and their meanings we know that there is a striking difference between LOVE and LUST. We also know that LARD has nothing to do with either of the other two terms. Contrast these word pairs hate versus hope, help versus hurt, advise versus abuse, and connect versus corrupt. These words, like many others carry immense meaning and when juxtaposed sound like the beginning of philosophical ideas.

Figure 9. Photo of a Habitat for Humanity Home. © 2009 Ron J. Hammond, Ph.D.

Symbolic Interactionism makes it possible for someone to be a college student. It makes it so they understand their professors’ expectations and know how to accomplish them. Daily interactions are filled with symbols and an ongoing process of interactions with other people based on the meanings of these symbols. For example the question of “How are you?” is a greeting, not a question in the U.S. culture. A Symbolic Interactionist would be interested in how it changed from a question to a greeting.

Symbolic Interactionism helps people to know what the expectations of their roles are and if they perceive themselves as doing a good job or not in meeting those expectations. The Thomas Theorem is often called the “definition of the situation.” It says that if people perceive or define something as being real, then it becomes real in its consequences. An example of this is a woman who was diagnosed as HIV positive. She made her funeral plans, made sure her children would be cared for then prepared to die. Two years later she was retested. It turned out her first test results were a false positive, yet she acted as though she had AIDS and was certainly going to die soon from it. She changed how she saw her remaining days. In a hypothetical case, a famous athlete defines himself as invincible and too famous to be held legally accountable for his criminal behavior. He is subsequently found guilty for a crime. A hypothetical politician believes that his/her constituents will tolerate anything and so he/she engages in morally undesirable behavior. The point is that when one defines their situation as being real, they act as though it is real (regardless of the objective facts in the matter).

One of the major realizations that comes with Symbolic Interactionism is that one begins to understand the other people in their life and come to know that they are neither right nor wrong, just from a different point of view. They define social symbols with varying meanings. To understand the other person’s symbols and meanings is to approach a common ground. Listen to this statement by Rosa Parks (1913-2005), “All I was doing was trying to get home from work.” In 1955, when she refused to give up her seat on the bus to a White person, it proved to be a spark for the Civil Rights Movement that involved the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr. and many other notable leaders. It was Rosa Parks’ simple and honest statement that made her act of defiance so meaningful. The lion’s share of the nation was collectively tired and sick of the mistreatment of Blacks. Many Whites joined the protests while others quietly sympathized. After all that was written in the history books about it, a simple yet symbolic gesture by Rosa Parks started the healing process for the United States. Table 1 provides a quick reference for comparing the three major sociological perspectives.

THEORIES DEVELOPED FOR UNDERSTANDING THE FAMILY

Over the years, researchers have found the necessity to develop theories of behavior that are specific to family settings. These theories have been developed by people with a variety of areas of emphasis, from family therapists to gerontologists to child development specialists. In this chapter we will briefly discuss five such theories: Family Systems, Family Developmental, Social Exchange, Ecological, and Feminist.

FAMILY SYSTEMS THEORY

When understanding the family, the Family Systems Theory has proven to be very powerful. Family Systems Theory claims that the family is understood best by conceptualizing it as a complex, dynamic, and changing collection of parts, subsystems and family members. Much like a mechanic would interface with the computer system of a broken down car to diagnose which systems are broken (transmission, electric, fuel, etc.) to repair it, a therapist or researcher would interact with family members to diagnose how and where the systems of the family are in need of repair or intervention. Family Systems Theory comes under the Functional Theory umbrella and shares the functional approach of considering the dysfunctions and functions of complex groups and organizations. To fully understand what is meant by systems and subsystems look at Figure 3 which depicts Juan and Maria’s extended family system.

Figure 10. Juan and Maria’s Extended Family System.

Juan and Maria are a middle-aged couple. Juan is a professor who lives with his parents, his wife’s widowed mother, his two children Anna and José, Anna’s husband Alma and the 3-month old triplets Anna just delivered. Notice that Maria’s father has passed away, so he has an X over his place in this diagram. Because Juan is financially established, he can support the large extended family. This represents a 4-generation complex family system. There are three couples living within this home, Juan and Maria, Grandpa and Grandma, and Alma and Anna. But there are various levels of strain felt by each couple.

Today multi-generational family systems are becoming more common, but are typically three generations where the married adult child and his or her spouse and children move back home. Juan and Maria raised their two children Anna and José with tremendous support from grandparents. Maria’s mother was a college graduate and has been a big help to José who is a sophomore in college and a basketball team member. Juan’s mother and father are the oldest family members and are becoming more dependent. Juan’s mother requires some daily care from Maria. In fact, Maria has the most individual strain of any family member in this family system. Juan and Maria have each felt a strain on their marriage because of the strains that come from each subsystem and family member who depends upon them. They both have in-laws in the house, they both contribute to the care needs of the elderly family members, and they both try to support their son’s basketball games and tournaments. But perhaps most stressful is that there are three brand new babies in the house (see Figure 4).

Those new babies have strained the entire family system, but extreme strain lands on Maria because Alma is a second year medical student and spends long hours in class and training. Anna is extremely overwhelmed by bottle-feedings, diapers, and other hands-on baby care demands. So, Maria is supporting both her daughter and three grandsons, but it’s overwhelming.

Maria is the Matriarch of this family system. She simultaneously belongs to the following subsystems, Daughter-Mother; Daughter-in-law-Father & Mother-in-law; Spousal; Mother-Son; Mother-Daughter; Mother-in-law-Son-in-law; and Grandmother-grandchildren. A large number of subsystems in one’s life does not automatically imply strain or stress. By looking at the family as a complex system with interlocking and interdependent subsystems, solutions can be found among the members of the system and subsystems.

This brings up the topic of boundaries. Boundaries are distinct emotional, psychological, or physical separateness between individuals, roles, and subsystems in the family. Boundaries are crucial to healthy family functioning. When a family experiences a crisis, often these boundaries are rearranged. Family members might be taking on different roles and new alliances and subsystems might emerge. The family system will do all it can to maintain its balance by allowing roles to adapt. This is called flexibility.

FAMILY DEVELOPMENTAL THEORY

Family Developmental Theory dates back to the 1930s and has been influenced by sociologists, demographers, and family and consumer scientists, as well as others. It is used to explain patterns of change, the dynamic nature of families, and how change occurs within the family life cycle. Family Developmental Theory was originally focused on stages of the family life cycle. According to Evelyn Duvall the stages are as follows: 

• Stage 1: Married Couples without Children. 

• Stage 2: Childbearing Families which starts at the birth of the first child and continues until the oldest child is 2½ years old. 

• Stage 3: Families with Preschool Children where the oldest child is 2½ -6 years old. 

• Stage 4: Families with Schoolchildren where the oldest child is 6-13 years old. 

• Stage 5: Families with Teenagers where the oldest child is 13-20 years old. 

• Stage 6: Families as Launching Centers. This starts when the first child leaves home and continues until the last child leaves home. 

• Stage 7: Middle-Age Parents which continues until retirement. 

• Stage 8: Aging Families which continues until the death of one spouse. (California State University, n.d.-a)

Figure 11: Extended Family System Strain on Maria.

Theorists found over time that many families did not fit this model. For example many children who had launched had returned to the family home, often with children of their own. Further, various family types that do not include a mother and a father do not fit this model. Newer models of this theory focused more on the roles and relationships within the family. The theory still focuses on developmental tasks which are the growth responsibilities that arise at certain stages in the life of the family. To be successful, family members need to adapt to changing needs and demands and to attend to tasks that are necessary to ensure family survival.

The major assumptions of this theory include the importance of individual development but stress that the development of the group of interacting individuals is most important. Developmental processes are inevitable and important in understanding families. Growth from one stage to another is going to happen. Families and individuals change over a period of time–they progress through a series of similar developmental stages and face similar transition points and developmental tasks.

To understand the family we must consider the challenges they face in each stage, how well they resolve them, and how well they transition to the next stage. The success or difficulty of achieving the developmental tasks in each stage leads to readiness for the next stage. The major criticism of this theory is its lack of ability to account for different family forms, and gender, ethnic, and cultural differences. It isn’t culturally relevant or sensitive to other lifestyle choices (e.g., childless families) (California State University, n.d.-a).

SOCIAL EXCHANGE THEORY

Social exchange theorists focusing on marital quality and stability have posited that individuals weigh the costs and benefits of mate selection and of remaining in a marriage. We look to this theory to explain why an individual might remain in a dissatisfied marriage. Barriers to change and attractiveness of alternatives are the main elements of social exchange theory when used to guide the investigation of divorce. (Albrecht et al., 1983; Heaton & Albrecht, 1991)

There are several terms which are central to social exchange theory that must be defined prior to a discussion of the theory. Outcomes are those rewards or costs which are received or incurred by actors from each other in an exchange relationship. Outcomes can be positive (rewards) or negative (costs) and social exchange theory makes no assumption about whether an individual will view a particular outcome as positive or negative (e.g., some individuals view divorce as positive while others view it as a negative outcome). 

The theory only assumes that behavior is consistent with what individuals value in their lives. Rewards may be physical, social, or psychological. Costs can be viewed as negative or as forgone rewards. Resources are possessions or behavioral capabilities (human capital) which have value to others and to oneself (e.g., a husband’s job and income have value to his wife). When one resource outweighs another resource then it may become a barrier (e.g., the wife’s income may be a resource that enables her to leave the marriage, but her husband’s income may be so great that it may be a barrier to leaving since she won’t be able to enjoy the life to which she has become accustomed without his income) (Klein & White, 1996; Molm & Cook, 1995). Barriers are the costs of making a choice (Klein & White, 1996). Several studies find when barriers are many and alternatives are few individuals may remain in dissatisfied marriages (Thibaut & Kelly, 1959; White & Booth, 1991).

Alternatives are the variety of possible exchange relations available to individuals. An individual’s alternatives are those opportunities which produce outcomes which have value to the individual. These outcomes may be exchange relationships with other individuals. In the study of divorce, alternatives are to remain married or to divorce. There are costs and rewards associated with alternatives (e.g., the psychological cost of staying in a poor quality marriage, the cost of paying bills on one income associated with divorce) and social exchange theory implies that individuals attempt to weigh rewards and costs when making decisions about alternatives (Klein & White, 1996; Molm & Cook, 1995; Nye, 1982).

Individuals are dependent on each other in an exchange relationship and the outcomes which are valued by the individuals are contingent on the exchanges made with the other. Exchanges can be one-sided (asymmetrical) or reciprocal (Lewis & Spanier, 1979; Molm & Cook, 1995). An individual may give to another without receiving anything in return or may receive without giving. Individuals tend to influence each other by considering their partner’s previous choices when making their own choices. Not only is a memory of past costs and rewards used in determining present exchanges, a forecast of future costs and rewards is considered also (Lewis & Spanier, 1979). When an exchange relationship is imbalanced, the individual who is less dependent will have the most power, or the power advantage (Molm & Cook, 1995). For instance, a woman who has no college education and lacks a stable job that provides her with a good income is more dependent on her husband, who earns the household income, than he is on her.

Exchange relations take place over time. They are not single transactions. For social exchange relationships to form and be ongoing, the value of the exchange to each of the individuals in the relationship must be greater than the perceived value of the potential alternatives. For example, as long as the value of the marital relationship is perceived to be greater than the perceived value of divorce, the individuals will remain in the marital relationship. However, in some cases individuals will remain in antagonistic relationships because the alternatives are perceived as even less desirable than the marital relationship (e.g., women in unsatisfying relationships with no education, no personal income, and many children to support) or because there is threat of punishment from the spouse (e.g., women in abusive relationships whose spouses threaten harm to them or their children if they leave). Social exchange theory acknowledges individuals do not always act rationally, but assumes those departures from rational behavior will follow predictable patterns (Klein & White, 1996; Molm & Cook, 1995). This theory assumes that humans act rationally when deciding on an exchange; however, this is not always true (California State University, n.d.-d).

ECOLOGICAL THEORY

The major assumptions of Ecological Theory are that humans are interdependent with the environment; the whole system and its parts are interdependent and operate in relation to each other; a change in any part of the system affects the system as a whole and also the other parts of the system; all humans are interdependent with the resources of the world; the family is the foremost setting in which development occurs; the family interacts with more than one environment; interactions are regulated by the laws of nature and human-derived rules. Figure 5 shows the model with its systems. It is depicted as concentric circles with the person of interest in the center. Each larger circle is a system that is less directly connected to the individual in the center although it does have some influence over the person. 

The microsystem is the immediate social settings in which an individual is involved in. There is focus on face-to-face interactions. Family, school, work, church, and peer groups are typically within the microsystem. The mesosystem links two microsystems together, direct or indirectly. For example, a 10-year old child is at the center of the model so his family is one of his microsystems and his classroom at school is another microsystem; the interaction between these two is one of his mesosystems. An example of this interaction is a parent-teacher conference (California State University, n.d.-c).

Figure 12: Parts of the Human Ecological Theory Model (Ecological Model, n.d.).

The exosystem are settings in which the person does not actively participate but in which significant decisions are made affecting other individuals who do interact directly with the person. Examples of a child’s exosystem would be neighborhood/community structures or parents' work environment. The macrosystem is the “blueprints” for defining and organizing the institutional life of the society, including overarching patterns of culture, politics, economy, etc. The chronosystem encompasses change or consistency over time in the characteristics of the person and the environment in which the person lives (e.g., changes in family structure, SES, place of residence and community, society, cultural, and historical changes) (California State University, n.d.-c).

An example of how we might view a child of divorce with the Ecological Theory would be that his family configuration has changed (microsystem); one parent doesn’t come to parent-teacher conferences anymore (mesosystem); his mom has to get a full time job and work more hours and be away from him for more hours per day (exosystem); society’s views of divorce may make it easy or difficult for him to deal with the divorce (macrosystem); and his SES may have declined, his family structure has changed, his place of residence may have changed. An Ecological Theorist would start his research by investigating these areas of the child’s life. 

FEMINIST FAMILY THEORY 

(Arinder, 2020)

By Jo Ann Arinder 

Feminist theory falls under the umbrella of critical theory, which in general has the purpose of destabilizing systems of power and oppression. The purpose of using a feminist lens is to enable the discovery of how people interact within systems and possibly offer solutions to confront and eradicate oppressive systems and structures. Feminist theory considers the lived experience of any person/people, not just women, with an emphasis on oppression. As Hooks (hooks, 2000) states, “Simply put, feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation and oppression. 

Burton (Burton, 2014) notes that, “Origin of the Family and commentaries on it were central texts to the feminist movement in its early years because of the felt need to understand the origins and subsequent development of the subordination of the female sex” (p. 2). Work in feminist theory, including research regarding gender equality, is ongoing.

Gender equality continues to be an issue today, and research into gender equality in education is still moving feminist theory forward. For example, Pincock’s (Pincock, 2018) study discusses the impact of repressive norms on the education of girls in Tanzania. The author states that, “…considerations of what empowerment looks like in relation to one’s sexuality are particularly important in relation to schooling for teenage girls as a route to expanding their agency” (p. 909). This consideration can be extended to any oppressed group within an educational setting and is not an area of inquiry relegated to the oppression of only female students. For example, non-binary students face oppression within educational systems and even male students can face barriers, and students are often still led towards what are considered “gender appropriate” studies. This creates a system of oppression that requires active work to disrupt.

Figure 1 presents a model of feminist theory that begins with the belief that systems exist that oppress and work against individuals. The model then shows that oppression is based on intersecting identities that can create discrimination and exclusion. The model indicates the idea that, through knowledge and action, oppressive systems can be disrupted to support change and understanding.

Figure 13: Model of Feminist Theory

Concepts

The core concepts in feminist theory are sex, gender, race, discrimination, equality, difference, and choice. There are systems and structures in place that work against individuals based on these qualities and against equality and equity. Research in critical paradigms requires the belief that, through the exploration of these existing conditions in the current social order, truths can be revealed. More important, however, this exploration can simultaneously build awareness of oppressive systems and create spaces for diverse voices to speak for themselves (Egbert & Sanden, 2019).

Constructs 

Feminism is concerned with the constructs of intersectionality, dimensions of social life, social inequality, and social transformation. Through feminist research, lasting contributions have been made to understanding the complexities and changes in the gendered division of labor. Men and women should be politically, economically, and socially equal and this theory does not subscribe to differences or similarities between men, nor does it refer to excluding men or only furthering women’s causes. Feminist theory works to support change and understanding through acknowledging and disrupting power and oppression.

Feminist theory proposes that when power and oppression are acknowledged and disrupted, understanding, advocacy, and change can occur.

Feminist research is interested in disrupting systems of oppression or barriers created from these systems with a goal of creating change. All research can include feminist theory when the research adds to efforts to work against and advocate to eliminate the power and oppression that exists within systems or structures that, in particular, oppress women. 

The strengths of feminist theories are that they can be applied to a broad range of issues and they provide valuable critique of other theories and perspectives that lack a focus on gender and power. These theories are limited in that research and practice are often emotionally charged and there can be an overemphasis on gender and power (California State University, n.d.-b).

1B. Studying Relationships and Families

Learning Outcomes

At the end of this chapter you will be able to do the following.

• Explain the steps in the research process.

• Define and identify dependent and independent variables.

• Explain sampling.

• Calculate the mean, median, and mode of data.

• Identify levels of measurement of variables.

• Analyze ethical concerns in research.

One of the most remarkable traits that August Comte mandated for Sociology was a core of scientific rigor. He proposed the concept of positivism which is scientifically-based sociological research that uses scientific tools such as survey, sampling, objective measurement, and cultural and historical analysis to study and understand society. Although the current definition of positivism expands far beyond Comte’s original vision, sociological scientific methodology is used by government and industry researchers and across higher education and the private sector. Comte was originally interested in why societies remain the same (social statics) and why societies change (social dynamics). Most sociological research today falls within these broad categories. Sociologists strive for objectivity which is the ability to study and observe without distortion or bias, especially personal bias. Bias-free research is an ideal that, if not present, will open the door to extreme misinterpretation of research findings.

Sociology is both different from and similar to other scientific principles. It differs from chemistry, biology, and physics in that sociology does not manipulate the physical environment using established natural science theories and principles. It’s similar to chemistry, biology, and physics in that statistical principles guide the discovery and confirmation of data findings. Yet sociology has no universally social laws that resemble gravity or the speed of light. This is because chemistry, biology, and physics have the luxury of studying phenomena which are acted upon by laws of nature. Sociologists study people, groups, communities, and societies which are comprised of agents (people who use their agency to make choices based on their varied motivations).

THE RESEARCH PROCESS

(J. G. Mills, 2021)

Problem Recognition and Definition

Researchers start with a question such as “What do I want to know?”; “What is important for society to know?”; or “Why does this occur?” 

After a researcher decides on what question she wants to answer she must state her goals and objectives. Does she want to determine if religious service attendance causes couples to have happier marriages? Or does she want to describe the characteristics of happy marriages? The first one is a causal study (what causes what) and the second is a descriptive study. The next step is to conduct a literature review to establish what is already known about the topic. Why reinvent the wheel? If someone has already done research on the characteristics of happy marriages, why do you need to do that? But maybe the person before you only studied certain characteristics and you have thought of more that might be important. Much research in sociology builds on existing research. The research question is usually stated as a hypothesis. A hypothesis is the researcher’s educated belief about what she will find, such as “Those marriages that possess the most characteristics of happy marriages will be the happiest.”

Creating the Research Design

There are many different types of studies that can be conducted. The most common type in sociology is survey research. But there are also interviews, observation, action research, polls, and experiments, as well as others. One determinant of the research design is whether the researcher wants to describe some social phenomenon or determine if one phenomenon causes another phenomenon. Descriptive studies answer the questions of who, what, where, and when. Causal studies are undertaken to determine how one variable affects another, how and why. Back to our marital happiness study, do we want to describe the characteristics of a happy marriage? Or do we want to determine if the presence of many of the characteristics causes a happier marriage? In other words, how does the presence of characteristics influence happiness?

Sampling

Sometimes the entire population –the group you are interested in researching– can be studied. Often it is too large to study everyone. Think of a survey of all the students at College of the Canyons; that’s over 20,000 people. Do we really need to survey all of them? Can we realistically survey all of them? If we choose our sample –subset of the population– carefully it will reflect the characteristics of the population and the way the sample answers the questions will be representative of everyone in the population.

Sampling methods are classified as either probability or nonprobability. In probability samples, each member of the population has a known chance of being selected. Probability methods include random sampling, systematic sampling, and stratified sampling. In nonprobability sampling, members are selected from the population in some nonrandom manner. These include convenience sampling, judgment sampling, quota sampling, and snowball sampling. You will learn about all of these sampling methods in your research methods class. We will discuss only random and convenience sampling here.

In random sampling each member of the population has an equal chance of being selected. You need a list of everyone in your population to obtain a random sample. The easiest way to draw a random sample is to assign a number to each person in the population and then use a table of random numbers (you’ll learn about this in your research methods class) to select the subset (sample). Convenience sampling is used when you don’t have a list of everyone in your population so you choose participants because they are convenient to you.

Data Collection and Analysis

The next step is to collect your data by administering your survey, interviewing your subjects, or making observations. If you collect quantitative data –data that is, or can be converted to, numbers– you can enter it into a computer program, typically SPSS (you’ll use this in your statistics class). If you collect qualitative data –data that can’t be converted to numbers; data that is about the quality of something– you look for themes in the results.

Reporting the Results

The reason we do research is to expand the knowledge base and in order to do that we need to report our results. This is typically done via journals and conferences. Journal articles typically contain several sections: abstract, statement of the problem, methods used, results, discussion of the results, and references.

The analysis is the process through which large and complicated collections of scientific data are organized so that comparisons can be made and conclusions drawn. The study must show validity —the study must actually test what you intended to test. If you want to say one event is the cause of another, you will need to rule out other possibilities or explanations to show that your research is valid. For example if you want to prove that marijuana use leads to heroin use, you have to prove that there are no other contributing factors such as peer pressure or emotional or mental dysfunctions. The study must also demonstrate reliability —the ability to repeat findings of a research study. To demonstrate reliability we must demonstrate that the research process can be replicated with similar results.

SOCIOLOGISTS PERFORM SURVEY RESEARCH

Since by far the most common form of research in sociology is survey research, we are going to discuss how and when it is most useful. Sociologists study people who choose, decide, succeed, fail, harm others, harm themselves, and behave in rational and irrational ways. If you took an ounce of gasoline and placed a burning match upon it, the gas would have to burn. The gas has no choice just as the flame has no choice. But, if someone placed a burning match on your arm, or the arm of your classmate, you or they might respond in any number of ways. Most would find the experience to be painful. Some might enjoy it, others might retaliate with violence, and yet others might feel an emotional bond to the one who burned them. Sociologists must focus on the subjective definitions and perceptions that people place on their choices and motivations. In general surveys are research instruments designed to obtain information from individuals who belong to a larger group, organization, or society. The information gathered is used to describe, explain, and at times predict attitudes, behaviors, aspirations, and intended behaviors. Surveys are easily used to collect information about political views, social and religious opinions, demographic information, past or expected future behavior, and even marital happiness and characteristics such as communication style, level of commitment, and fidelity.

Polls are typically surveys which collect opinions, such as who one might vote for in an election, how one feels about the outcome of a controversial issue, or how one evaluates a public official or organization. Surveys can be administered once (cross-sectional). Or they can be administered at two or more times (longitudinal).

If you administer your survey and get a good response rate –the percentage of people who complete your survey–you can generalize your results to the entire population. Generalizability means that the results from the sample can be assumed to apply to the population as though the population itself had been studied.

Also important is the quality of the survey itself as a scientific instrument. Valid survey questions are questions that are accurate and measure what they claim they’ll measure. For example let’s say we wanted to know how students feel about a Lacrosse team at College of the Canyons. Which statement should we ask them about their agreement to? 1. “Every campus needs a Lacrosse team” or 2. “College of the Canyons would benefit from a Lacrosse team.” The first asks about all campuses, not specifically this one. It’s seeking an opinion about campuses and Lacrosse teams in general. The second asks specifically about this campus and is a valid measure of what we want to know. Reliable questions are questions that are relatively free from bias errors which might taint the findings. In other words, reliable survey questions are consistent and if I ask a similar group of people the same question I will get similar results.

Survey

There are 2 types of survey questions: Open-ended questions are questions designed to get respondents to answer in their own words (e.g., “What might be the benefits of having a Lacrosse team?”) Closed-ended questions are questions designed to get respondents to choose from a list of responses you provide to them (e.g., “Are you married?” Yes or No.) Likert scale questions are statements which respondents are asked to agree or disagree with. They are the most common types of questions used in surveys (e.g., “How much do you agree that the president is doing a good job of running the country?” Strongly Disagree, Disagree, Neither Agree nor Disagree, Agree, Strongly Agree). Demographic questions are questions which provide the basic categorical information about respondents such as age, sex, race, educational level, marital status, etc.

Levels of Measurement

Nominal level data is data with no standard numerical values. This is often referred to as categorical data (e.g., What is your favorite type of pet? __Reptile __Canine __Feline __Bird __Other). There is no numerical value associated with reptiles that makes it more or less valuable than a canine or other type of pet. Other examples include sex, favorite color, or town you grew up in.

Ordinal level data is categories with an order to them. One category is more of something than another category. For example height measured as short, medium, and tall is ordinal because medium is more height than short and tall is more height than both short and medium.

Interval level data is categories with an order, but we add standard numerical values with regular intervals. If we measure height in feet and inches we have interval data. A height of 5 feet, 3 inches is 8 inches away from 5 feet, 11 inches. Each of those 8 inches has the same value, the intervals are identical. Five feet, 3 inches is one of the categories, but in this case the categories are numbers. The Fahrenheit temperature scale is an example of an interval scale. The difference between 68 degrees and 72 degrees is the exact same four degrees as the difference between 101 degrees and 105 degrees.

Ratio level data adds a real zero starting point for the numerical values. We can create ratios with ratio level data. With ratio data we can say that someone who has two children has twice as many children as someone having only one child, and someone having four children has twice the children of someone who has just two children, and the person with four children has four times the number of children as the person with only one child. Ratio data is used to compare to other data. For example, the sex ratio is the number of males per 100 females in a society. In 2006, the sex ratio for Alaska, Rhode Island, and the U.S. was Alaska 107; Rhode Island 93.6, and U.S. 97.1 (U. S. Census Bureau, 2009). We can say that Alaska had more males than females (107 males per 100 females) while Rhode Island had more females than males (93.6 males per 100 females). The U.S. overall has more females than males (97.1 males per 100 females).

Number of males and females, opinions about a Lacrosse team, marital happiness, height, and sex are variables. Variables vary by respondent (one is male, the next is female, the next is female, etc.). Sex is the variable and male or female are the attributes, or the possible choices. Everyone in your class is human, so humanness is not a variable—it doesn’t vary. But almost everything else you can observe is a variable.

Two types of variables are dependent and independent variables. Dependent variables change in response to the influence of independent variables; they depend upon the independent variables. Independent variables are variables that when manipulated will stimulate a change upon the dependent variables. If I know the independent variable can I predict what the dependent variable will be? If I know that you possess many of the characteristics of happy marriages can I predict your level of happiness? Yes. That doesn’t mean that everyone with many of the characteristics will be the happiest, but more often than not, they will be. So possession of characteristics is the independent variable and happiness is the dependent variable. How happy you are depends on how many of the characteristics you possess.

Is this a causal relationship or merely an association or correlation? A causal relationship is when one variable actually causes the other to occur, such as eating lots of Krispy Kreme donuts causes you to gain weight. That’s pretty clear, but in sociology most relationships are not that clear. Do I know for certain that possession of many of the characteristics that are found in happy marriages causes a marriage to be happy? No. What if there is something else that is causing both happiness and possession of characteristics? Maybe it’s religion or optimistic personality or something else. If this is true then this is an association or correlation. They go hand in hand, but one does not cause the other.

Quantitative Analysis

When basic statistics are performed on data, we call them measures of central tendency (mean, median, and mode). Consider this list of numbers which represents the number of movies that nine students have seen in the last two weeks: 0, 1, 1, 1, 3, 4, 4, 5, 8.

The mean is the arithmetic score of all the numbers divided by the total number of students (i.e., 27÷9=3). The median is the exact midpoint value in the ordered list of scores (e.g., 0, 1, 1, & 1 fall below and 4, 4, 5, & 8 fall above the number 3 thus 3 is the median). The mode is the number which occurs most often (e.g., 1 occurs the most, so the mode is 1). The extreme values or outliers are the especially low or high numbers in the series (e.g., 8). Notice that if you removed the 9th student’s score and averaged only the remaining scores the mean would be 2.375. Extreme values can increase or decrease the mean. You will cover these basic and more interesting statistics in your statistics class.

ETHICS OF RESEARCH

Ethics are standards of what is right and wrong. They are a general agreement shared by researchers as to what is proper and improper in scientific research. Our culture and sociology have ethical standards that may be different from other disciplines or other cultures. Standards may arise from religious, political, or pragmatic sources. Standards differ over time, for example long ago we didn’t have formal considerations about how to treat people who participate in scientific studies.

There are four major ethical issues that protect research subjects: 1.) Voluntary participation means that subjects must participate voluntarily, they must understand the risks of participating, and they must be able to withdraw from the study at any time. 2.) Researchers can do no harm to participants. This includes anything from killing someone to causing them undue stress. 3.) Every study must be confidential which means that the researcher can never divulge the participants’ identities. Some studies are anonymous which means the researcher does not know the participants’ identities. 4.) Deception cannot be used to get people to participate in research they would not want to participate in.

To be sure subjects know what they are getting into when they agree to participate in a study they sign an informed consent form which tells them the general purpose of the study, explains their right to withdraw, explains the confidentiality of the study, tells whether it is anonymous, explains the potential risks, and describes how to contact the researcher.

You can probably think of times when it would be necessary to deceive a subject or when you might need to cause just a little stress to investigate something. Of course there are exceptions, but we’ll leave that to your research methods class.

FAMILY RESEARCH

One of the largest social surveys taken in the United States has been the General Social Surveys collected almost every year since 1972. It has provided 27 national samples with over 50,000 survey takers and thousands of variables as of 2008 (U. S. Census Bureau, 2009). These large volumes of data and variables allow researchers to study the family at a scale that most could never attain if left to fund and collect the data for themselves.

In Great Britain the Family Resource Survey began in 1992 and has provided much needed insight into the needs and functioning of these families (General Social Survey, n.d.). In China, a U.S. team of researchers performed a survey research study called the National Health and Nutrition Survey (National Centre for Social Research, n.d.). Numerous family and health data were collected for study. In Iraq, a medical family survey was conducted by the World Health Organization and Iraqi officials wherein over 9,000 households were surveyed (China Health and Nutrition Survey, n.d.). The focus here was on the ravages that the ongoing war had taken on families and social networks.

Clinical observation studies typically take place in counseling, medical, residential treatment settings, or community centers. Perhaps two of the most prominent clinical researchers of the family have been Judith Wallerstein and John Gottman. Dr. Wallerstein studied children of divorce over the course of 25 years and has made a thorough study of the impacts that divorce has had on these children and their adult marriages and life experiences (Iraq Family Health Survey, n.d.).

Dr. Gottman studied couples in depth by videotaping them in clinically controlled apartments “love labs” where he observed their daily interaction patterns and carefully analyzed the footage of their interaction patterns. His research led to the “Four Horsemen of Divorce” and the classification of four aspects of deeply troubled marriages: Defensiveness, Stonewalling, Criticism, and Contempt (Wallerstein et al., 2000; Wallerstein & Blakeslee, 1995, 1996; Wallerstein & Kelly, 1996).

Participant observations are much less common than surveys and clinical studies. They basically are studies where the researcher lives in, belongs to, or participates in the very social familial experience that is being studied.

The National Survey of Families and Households was collected in the early 1990s where 13,000+ families were interviewed in depth for survey information. This massive data set now exists in electronic form and can be analyzed by anyone seeking to look at specific research questions that pertain to many different aspects of the family experience in the U.S. at that time. When a researcher analyzes existing data it is called secondary analysis. This would apply to a research examining any of the above mentioned surveys, the U.S. Census, or even the Population Reference Bureau’s world data (J. M. Gottman, 2002; J. M. Gottman et al., 2007; J. M. Gottman & Silver, 1995; J. Gottman & Silver, 2007).

Finally, family members can be interviewed through in-depth qualitative interviews designed to capture the nuances of their experiences. This is what Dr. Judith Wallerstein did when she wrote the book, The Good Marriage (1995). She carefully interviewed 50 happily married couples that were considered by those around them to have a really good marriage. Her work was published in an era of family research that was flooded with studies about divorce and family dysfunction. The Good Marriage began a turn of events that made it more acceptable to study the positive functioning and side of family experiences in the U.S

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