Functions and Diversity of Family Structure in the UK

Functions and Diversity of Family Structure

There are various debates and views on the term ‘family’ in today’s

society.

Although we can say that a family consists of a unit of people that

are related, either legally through marriage or biologically.

In both premodern and modern societies families have been seen as the

most basic unit of a social organisation that carries out vital tasks,

such as socialising children.

Whereas a ‘household’ consists of a group of people who cohabit at the

same address. Therefore this is known as ‘a physical entity’. This

could contain various social arrangements some may be considered

within society as a ‘family’, whilst others may not. For example, a

male and female cohabiting but not married may not be seen in today’s

society as ‘a family unit’.

The classic family structure is the ‘nuclear family’, this particular

structure is known as traditional from a functionalist’s point of

view.

It consists of a family that is made up of a mother, children and a

farther who provides economically for both his wife and children.

This type of family structure is considered to be the most stable way

for people to live within society.

Therefore the ‘nuclear family’ is both universal and functional.

Murdock 1989 was a functionalist. His work shows that some form of a

family structure was the basis of all societies.

This leads to the idea that the family was universal, which means it

was found everywhere.

He argued that the family performed three main functions, and if they

were not apparent society would collapse. These were:

1. The family stabilises sexual behaviour and reproduc...

... middle of paper ...

...style of contemporary family structure is lifestyle

diversity. What is meant by this, is that people go through different

stages in their life which determine what type of family structure you

are likely to be part of. For example, we start life as children in a

household whether it be within a nuclear family or a single-parent

family, then we move on and become an adult ourselves.

It is clear that in today’s society the ‘cereal packet’ family is in

decline, as more lone-parent families are becoming apparent. The ‘new

right’ (conservatives) have failed to achieve the changes that they

wanted, divorce was actually made easier in 1984. Other policies such

as the freezing of child benefits undermined family life, and it is

clear that maintaining the traditional family was a secondary

consideration for the conservatives.