Family

• Marriage


  Legally recognized social contract between two people, traditionally based on a sexual relationship and implying a permanence of the union
• Courtship


  Traditional dating period before engagement and marriage
• Patrilocal residence system


  Customary for the wife to live with, or near her husband's blood relatives
• Matrilocal residence system


  Customary for the husband to live with, or near, his wife's blood relatives
• Family life cycle


  Helps to explain the different processes that occur in families over time
• Nuclear family


  Two-parent family structure including parents and children as the core of the group
• Single-parent households are on the rise
• Extended family


  May include grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins living in the same home
• Cohabiting family


  Describes those living together before or in lieu of marriage, which is a growing option for many couples
• Structural functionalist theorists


  • Hold the belief that families are an important social institution and that they play a key role in stabilizing society
• Social conflict theorists


  • Highlight the role of power in family life and contend that the family is often not a haven but rather an arena where power struggles can occur
• Symbolic interactionist theorists


  • Stress that family is not an objective, concrete reality, but a social construct that is subject to the ebb and flow of social norms and ever-changing meanings
• Domestic violence


  Significant social problem in families, often characterized as violence between household or family members, specifically spouses