Theoretical and Methodological Perspectives in family studies

Theoretical and Methodological Perspectives in
family studies

1. Introduction.
Literally, family is determined in Webster's Dictionary as parents and their children regarded as a group. It is a group where people are united into one identity. Families are often placed on the top of social hierarchies with its great power that unites all its members. That determines something more than the unity of each member. There are a lot of components in the notion of a family. That is why the author speaks about such notion as ‘families’.
Concerning the new century, it is regarded that one of the oldest social forms - the families - will be of major significance in composing individual and group life in respect of some vital spheres beginning from education, economic status and health. Today, every society becomes more various and stratified. There are some reasons of that families go on to be of great significance for providing their members with support and knowledge. They are: groups contain clear identities; economic restructuring and globalization remodel the old structures into the new ones; and state support for social prosperity continues to drop.

2. Changes in family structure.
In the article the author tells about families as the places of socialization where a child learns about the main rule of behavior in the society. And the things that a child learns greatly depend on the type of a family he/she lives in. The author points out such major types of families as nuclear families (with both parents), extended families (where other relatives such as aunts, uncles, grandparents and so on live together), and types of marriage (includes legal marriage, cohabitation, living apart together, monogamy, serial monogamy, serial polygamy, polygyny, polyandry).
It should be noted that the families tendency of present day is the deinstitutionalization of marriage. Besides, the steady disintegration of the mother-father child raising nucleus is observed. This tendency of family fragmentation is first of all seen in the high divorce level among people who have already become parents and the growing predominance of parents who live in civil marriage. There is no other domestic trend that is more fearful to the welfare of children and to the long-term national safety.
According to politicians from the political point of view, the main threat to the future prosperity of the state is the increasing quantity of children being brought up in families with one parent. This fact is particularly right in those families where the mother was never married. The families with two-parents is now proved as an anti-poverty program, and also the only guaranteed way to children's emotional welfare and success. More than that, the increase in the number of one-parent families is broadly considered to be the reason of the nation's most earnest problems involving crime, violence, failing schools, drugs.
The topic of the family is a complex one and there is a necessity to conduct the study from the points of view of several disciplines. The family as the topic in sociology is examined from the macrosociology perspective in general, and from the microsociology one investigating the major questions and topics in smaller contexts, such as family relationships, their impact on human development and so on.

3. Theoretical and Methodological Perspectives in family studies. It is expected that families are to assist people with current changes in family patterns. Today, there exist many forms contemporary families take. It is stated that many aspects of families – composition, meaning and responsibilities – have recently changed greatly (Anderson, Sabatelli, 2003, p.167). The program in family at Michigan State is elaborated to examine traditional and contemporary family forms from a variety of theoretical and methodological perspectives. The Family program presumes the study of traditional and diverse families in various structural contexts using various types of methodological approaches. It is necessary to mention that the author touches upon such question as structural functionalism that analyzes the organization of a society, its structure and the family as an important unit that fulfils main functions in the society. The family is compared with the organic as it is a system with many subsystems that function together. Social exchange theory and rational theories are other means of explaining the relations and ties in families. An individual creates his/her own environment at the interpersonal level and, simultaneously he/she is changed by this very environment. Such point of view is examined from the interactional-transactional perspective. Gender stratification is another interesting subtheme in the article where the author explains the gender roles of males and females in the society. Additionally it is stated the feminism in family studies where the motherhood is regarded to be a social construct and not a natural product.

4. Conclusion. The given paper presents a short analysis of theoretical and methodological perspectives in family studies. The article review describes such major themes as: social inequalities, family diversity, family functions in the society, effective community and gender roles.
References. Baran, Stanley J. Introduction to Mass Communication: Media Literacy & Culture. Mountain View, California: Mayfield Publishing Company, 2001. Maxine Baca Zinn, D. Stanley Eitzen (2005) “Diversity in Families”, Publisher: Allyn & Bacon, 592 pp.
Jaipaul L. Roopnarine, Uwe P. Gielen (2005) “Families in Global Perspective”, Publisher: Allyn & Bacon, 400 pp.
Stephen A. Anderson, Ronald M. Sabatelli (2003) “Family Interaction: A Multigenerational Developmental Perspective”, Publisher: Allyn & Bacon, 370 pp.