changing family patterns

• changing patterns of divorce - increasing divorce rates due to a change in social norms and seculirisation
• explans for divorce increase - changes in the law - (no fault divorce, divorce reform act) declining stigma, secularisation, rising expectations
• meaniing of a high divorce rate - new right - undermines marraige, less people see the value in marraige, creates underclass
• meaning of high divorce - functionalism - not a threat to marraige - just higher expectations - people are still remarrying
• meaning of high divorce - feminism - women are breaking free from male oppression
• marraige - less people are getting married and people are more likely to marry later
• reasons for changing patterns in marraige - secularisation, declining stigma, changes in position of women
• other changes in marraige patterns - more remarraiges - increased later in life marraiges - decline in traditional weddings
• cohabitation - unmarried couples living together
• cohabitation trends - decline in stigma - more common for young - increased opportunities for women, seculirisation
• chester - cohabiting was a step before marraige
• coast - 75% of cohabiting couples expect to marry each other
• same sex relationships - increased social acceptance - policy treats couples - chosen families valued more
• one person households - rise in number of people living alone
• reason for one person households increasing - increased divorce marrying later, living apart together
• childbearing - women are having fewer children and later - more women are remaining childless
• lone parents families - increasing in lone parents - women are twice as likely to head lone parent families
• reasons for lone parent patterns - increase in divorce and seperation - stigma reduced - single by choice
• lone parents and welfare state - growth of lone parent families means an overly generous state
• stepfamilies - increasing as divorce rates rise
• ethnicity - black african women are more likely to be in lone parent households
• ethnicity - asian families are more likely to live in extended family structures
• charles - three generation families are much more likely in bangladeshi communities
• chamberlain - family are geographically dispersed they still support one another
• beanpole family - extended vertically
• limitations with marraige stats - delay in publishing
• limitations in divorce stats - only show legal break ups not just seperation - no stats for cohabiting couples
• decreasing marrage explan - economic factors - gender roles
• lib fem and marraige - couples get married later
• new right marraige - decline or morals
• postmodernism and marraige - more choice
• increase in divorce reasons - social policy - economic factors - declining religion