March of progress

• Stages of family change proposed by Young & Wilmott (1973)

  1. Stage one: The pre-industrial family

  2. Stage two: The early industrial family

  3. Stage three: The symmetrical family

  4. Stage four: The asymmetrical family
• Pre-industrial family


  • Family lives and works as a unit of production
  • People live with (or close to) extended family, and work together
• Early industrial family

  • Families move to towns and cities
  • Men spend their work and leisure time outside the home
  • Women perform a domestic role (often maintaining close kinship networks with other female relatives)
• Symmetrical family

  • Modern nuclear family has less gender segregation than the early industrial family
  • Men and women both go to work
  • Men and women both do housework
  • Men and women spend their leisure time together
• Asymmetrical family

  • Men once again spend their leisure time out of the home and without their partners
• Young & Wilmott saw social change occurring through stratified diffusion (lower-status strata copying the behavioural norms of those with higher status)
• Young & Wilmott later conceded that stage four (the asymmetrical family) did not occur