married family households are decreasing, cohabiting family, lone parent family and single parent family households are all increasing.
This post summaries some of the changing trends (and continuities) in family and household structure in the UK, using data from the Office for National Statistics which collects a range of data annually on families and households in the UK.
There were 19.4 million families in the UK in 2022.
The most common family type in the UK 2022 was the married couple family, making up 65% of all families (down from 67% in 2012).
Cohabiting couple families made up 19% of all families, up from 16% in 2012.
There were 2.9 million lone parent families in 2022, representing 15% of all families.
43% of families had no children living with them and 42% of families had at least one dependent child.
Only 15% of families had only non-dependent children living with them.
Households in the UK in 2022…
The breakdown of family and non-family households in the UK in 2022 was as follows…
There were 28.2 million households in the UK in 2022, an increase of 1.6 million since 2012.
18.8 million (57%) of households were one family households, either with or without children living in them. Approximately half of these had children living in, the other half were ’empty nest’ households.
(10% of households were lone parent family households (84% of which were lone-mother households. NB this 10% is included in the 57% in the first bullet point above!).
8.5 million households (30%) were single person households, up from 29% in 2012 and representing 13% of the population in 2022.
3% of households were occupied by unrelated adults living together
1% of households were multi family, which includes multigenerational.
The average household had 2.36 people living in it in 2022, similar to 2012.
Changes to families and households 2012-2022
I’ve used the 2022 statistics where I can to summarise trends, but in some cases below I’ve had to go back to the 2018 analysis because that’s the last time the ONS focussed on changes over time using the particular graphics I wanted. NB the trend between 2018 and 2022 probably hasn’t changed anyway, so no worries!
(With any luck I’ll have the visualisation skills to update this with the 2022 data soon enough anyway!)
Changes to Family Households
There has been a continued decrease in married couple families, from 67% of families in 2012 to 65.2% of families in 2022.
Opposite-sex cohabiting families have seen the most signficant growth, up from 15.4% to almost 19% of all families today.
The number of lone parent families has decreased slightly in the last ten years to 15% of all families in 2022.
Same-sex cohabiting and same-sex civil partner families have both increased and together make up 1.2% of all families in 2022, up from 0.8% of all families in 2012
This means same-sex families have had the fastest growth rate over the past decade but from a very small base.
Marriage and Cohabitation Trends
The chart below clearly shows the long term increase in cohabitating families between 1996 to 2018, and when combined with stats above, from 1996 to 2022.
In 1996 there were only 2 million cohabiting families, in 2022 there were 3.7 million.
The number of married families remained stable between 1996 and 2018, but have declined quite sharply in the last four years to 2022.
Family Size in the UK
The one child family is the most common type of family in the UK in 2022.
44% of families are one child, around 3.6 million families
41% are two children families, around 3.4 million families
15% are three children families, around 1.2 million families.
Family size appears to have remained pretty stable over the past 15 years (1)
Households Size in the UK
The average household size in the UK is 2.4, but the infographic below taken from the 2021 UK Census (2) shows how this breaks down more specifically. The dots are local authority areas, so the national average is in the middle of each cluster.
30% of households have one person in
35% have two people in
17% have three people in
14% have three people in
5% have five people in.
The above are estimates based on looking at what’s below!
Multi Family Households
There were approximately 280 000 multi family households in the UK in 2022, which is down from the peak of just over 300 000 in 2014, but a significant long term increase since 1996 when there were only 180 000 such households…
Increase in People Living Alone
There has been a slow and steady increase in the overall numbers of people living alone, but this varies a lot by age – generally the number of older people living alone has increased, the number of younger people living alone has decreased.
Signposting and related posts.
This is a key topic in the families and households module, usually taught in the first year of A-level sociology.
people increasingly choose to live alone because of increased wealth, urbanisation, improved communications and living longer
Why are increasing numbers of people all over the world living alone?
People increasingly choose to live alone because of:
Increasing wealth: people in wealthier countries are more likely to choose to live alone.
Improved communications: makes it easier for solo-livers to keep in contact with friends and family while living alone.
Mass urbanisation: higher density populations = easier to connect with other people.
Increased longevity: following a relationship ending or one partner dying, there is less desire to pair-up again!
According to a recent book by Eric Klinenberg (2013) Explaining the Rise of Solo Living (1), this is a global phenomenon and mainly reflects the increasing degree of individual choice that comes with increasing wealth.
Global trends in single person households
The percentage of one person households has increased in many countries since the 1960s and since the year 2000, although there is a lot of variation by country.
In America the number of single person households has doubled since. the1960s, with 28% of households having only one person in them in 2018.
The countries with the highest levels of people living on their own are in Northern Europe. In Germany, for example, more than 40% of households. are single person households. (2)
Single Person Households in the UK
In 2022, 30% of households in the UK were single person households, this is a very slight increase since 2012.
Living alone: younger men and older women
There has been a change in the proportion of men and women living alone by age over the last decade. In 2022 the relative percentages are as follows:
Age
Men
Women
16-24
2.6%
1.8%
25-44
23.6%
20.7%
45-64
34.6%
26.6%
65-74
19%
23.5%
75+
20.3%
37.5%
Percentages of single person households by age, 2022 U.K.
A Summary of Going Solo by Klinenberg
Klinenberg argues that the rise of solo living is an extremely important social trend which presents a fundamental challenge to the centrality of the family to modern society. In the USA, the average adult will now spend more of their life unmarried than married, and single person households are one of the most common types of household. We have entered a period in social history where, for the first time, single people make up a significant proportion of the population.
Eric Klinenberg spent seven years interviewing 300 single Americans who lived alone, and the general picture he got was that these people were exactly where they wanted to be – living on their own was not a transitory phase, it was a genuine life choice. On the whole, living alone is seen as a mark of social distinction, living as part of a couple is for losers.
While single by choice is very much on the up among younger people who have never settled down into a long term cohabiting relationships and have no intention of doing so, it is also the norm among older people who have come out of relationships.
Where older people living alone are concerned, and these are mostly women, they are not all chasing the dwindling population of men in their age group (given the higher life expectancy for women). Most of them are in fact wary of getting involved in relationships because doing so will probably mean becoming someone’s carer (again), and similarly they are skeptical about moving back in with their children (and possibly their grandchildren too) because of fear that they will become an unpaid domestic and child-sitting slave.
NB, as a counter to the above, not all singles are happy about it, however. One such group consists of mainly men on low wages who are unmarriageable and live in ‘single room occupancy facilities’ often suffering from various addictions and who practice ‘defensive individualism’ in order to cope with their bleak situation.
Why are more people living alone?
So how do we account for this increasing in single person households?
Klinenberg suggests four reasons…
The increased wealth generated by economic growth and the social security provided by the modern welfare state – the basic thesis is that the rise of single living is basically just a reflection of increasing wealth. When we can afford to live alone, more of us choose to do so. We especially see this where Scandinavia is concerned, and nearly half of the adult population live alone.
The communications revolution – For those who want to live alone, the internet allows us to stay connected. An important part of his thesis is that just because we are increasingly living alone, this doesn’t mean that we are becoming a ‘society of loners’.
Mass urbanization – Klinenberg suggests that Subcultures thrive in cities, which tend to attract nonconformists who are able to find others like themselves in the dense variety of urban life. In short, it’s easier to connect with other singles where people live closer together.
Increased longevity – because people are living longer than ever and because women often outlive their spouses by decades rather than years — aging alone has become an increasingly common experience.
Discussion questions
In the video below, Wayne discusses his motivations for ‘going solo’ with his friend Archie, and together they explore some of the reasons for the increase in single person households.
To what extent do you think Kleinberg’s findings apply to the increase in Solo Living in the UK?
What other ‘deeper’ Sociological reasons might explain the increase in Solo Living?
Do you agree that the rise of Solo Living challenges the centrality of the family in modern society?
Historical data (on single person households)
Most people who live alone are 65+ and increasing numbers of those aged 45-60 are living alone. However, the numbers of younger people living alone are declining (so Wayne in the video above is actually wrong when he says solo living is on the increase among younger people!)
Signposting and Related Posts
This material is mainly relevant to the families and households module, usually taught in the first year of A-level sociology.
This post defines social policy and then examines the 1969 Divorce Act, Maternity and Paternity Acts, the Civil Partnership Act and Child Benefit policies, looking at how these policies have impacted different aspects of family life such as marriage, divorce, family structure, as well as the differential impact on men, women and children within the family.
What is social policy?
Social policy refers to the plans and actions of state agencies such as health and social services, the welfare benefits system and schools and other bodies.
Policies are usually based on laws introduced by governments that provide the framework within which these agencies will operate. For example, laws lay down who is entitled to each specific welfare benefit.
Most social policies affect families in some way or other. Some are aimed directly at families, such as laws governing marriage and divorce, abortion or contraception, child protection, adoption and so on.
Policies are not necessarily aimed specifically at families but will have an effect in families. Such policies would include those on childcare, education, housing, and crime. Furthermore, many policies that impact upon families are those that make changes to the legislation on taxation and benefits, such as child tax credits.
Recently, the Department for Education and Skills has been given a new name and expanded role. The creation of the Department for Children, Schools and Families suggest that the current government believe that to make a better society for the children of today, family life and education should not be treated as two separate areas of life.
There are many social policies which have affected family life over the years, so the summary below is necessarily selective!
Social Policy and the Family: A Summary
Marriage and Divorce Policies
The most well-known act is probably the 1969 Divorce Act which made getting a divorce MUCH easier. Since then, the main policies have been focused on equalising marriage for same-sex couples and most recently raising the legal age of marriage from 16 to 18.
The 1969 Divorce Act
Before 1969, one partner had to prove that the other was ‘at fault’ to be granted a divorce, however, following the Divorce Reform Act of 1969, a marriage could be ended if it had irretrievably broken down, and neither partner no longer had to prove “fault”. However, if only one partner wanted a divorce, they still had to wait 5 years from the date of marriage to get one. In 1984 this was changed so that a divorce could be granted within one year of marriage.
The Civil partnerships Act 2004
The Civil Partnership Act 2004 gave same-sex couples the rights and responsibilities like those in a civil marriage. The Act was introduced by the New Labour government in power at the time. Civil partners are entitled to the same property rights, the same exemptions on inheritance tax, social security, and pension benefits as married couples. They also have the same ability to get parental responsibility for a partner’s children as well as reasonable maintenance, tenancy rights, insurance, and next-of-kin rights in hospital and with doctors. There is a process like divorce for dissolving a civil partnership.
There were 60 938 Same-Sex Civil Partnerships formed between 2004 and 2013, with annual numbers being around 6500 a year following an initial spike in the first couple years. From 2013 annual numbers of same-sex civil partnerships dropped to fewer than 1000 a year reflecting the fact that from 2013 same-sex couples were allowed to get married on the same basis as opposite-sex couples.
Since 2019 opposite-sex couples can also enter civil-partnerships and in 2021 6000 couples did so, but these numbers may be lower because of Covid-19 restrictions on social gatherings.
The Marriage (Same-Sex Couples) Act 2013
This act allows same-sex couples to enter a marriage in England and Wales on the same basis as opposite-sex couples, and to convert Civil Partnerships to Marriages. Statistics from the ONS suggest that same-sex couples prefer marriage over civil partnerships as there were approximately 6000 same-sex marriages in 2019, which reflects the drop off in the number of civil partnerships since marriage has been an option.
The Marriage and Civil Partnership Minimum Age Act 2022
In 2022 the minimum age of marriage in England and Wales was raised to 18. Previously it had been possible for 16 and 17 year olds to get married with parental consent. Since 2022 it is illegal to force children, including 16 and 17 year olds to marry and to do so could incur a jail sentence of up to seven years in prison. The act also covers more ‘informal’ non-legally binding ceremonies.
Maternity and Paternity Policies
In 2023 new mothers in the UK are entitled to 52 weeks statutory maternity leave, 39 weeks of which is paid, but at different rates.
The first 6 weeks of maternity leave are paid at 90% of your salary.
The next 33 weeks you are paid £172.48 per week or 90% of weekly average earnings (whichever is lower)
Any remaining leave is unpaid up to a maximum of 52 weeks.
Fathers are only entitled to up to two weeks of paternity leave, paid at the same rate as the final 33 weeks of maternity leave pay for mothers (£172.48 per week or 90% of weekly average earnings, whichever is lower.
Since 2015 parents can apply for up to 50 weeks of Shared Parental Leave, up to 37 weeks of which are paid. For this to work the woman must swap her maternity leave for shared leave, this isn’t extra leave for the father.
There is quite a long history of changes to maternity and paternity policy….
The Employment Protection Act of 1975
Social responsibility for women’s health during childbearing was first recognised through the 1911 National Insurance Act. It included a universal maternal health benefit and a one off maternity grant of 30 shillings for insured women (around £119 in today’s money)
However, many women were routinely sacked for becoming pregnant until the late 1970s and the UK only introduced its first maternity leave legislation through the Employment Protection Act 1975. However, for the first 18 years (until 1993!) only about half of working women were eligible for it because of long qualifying periods of employment. The act was amended in 1993 so that all pregnant women got a minimum of 14 weeks statutory maternity leave regardless of prior employment
Paternity polices
In 2003, male employees received paid statutory paternity leave for the first time, an entitlement that was extended in January 2010.
Since 2010 (following what is often called the ‘Paternity Act’) – This leave is divided into two 26-week periods. After the first 26 weeks, the father of the child (or the mother’s partner) has the right to take up to 26 weeks’ leave if their partner returns to work, in effect taking the place of the mother at home. It is unlawful to dismiss (or single out for redundancy) a pregnant employee for reasons connected with her pregnancy.
Shared Parental Leave
From 2015, parents will be given the right to share the care of their child in the first year after birth. Women in employment will retain their right to 52 weeks of maternity leave. Only mothers will be allowed to take leave in the first two weeks’ leave after birth. But after that parents can divide up the rest of the maternity leave.
Child Benefit Policies
Child benefit is payable for every child parents have, although if you’re a parent who earns more than £60 000 in 2023 you have to pay back all of it in the form of extra taxes.
Child Benefit has been around for almost 50 years!
The Child Benefit Acts (1975)
The Child Benefit Bill introduced for the first time a universal payment, paid for each child. The rate payable was £1/week for the first and £1.50 for each subsequent child. An additional 50p was payable to lone-parent families.
Child Benefits increased in line with inflation, until 1998, when the new Labour government increased the first child rate by more than 20% and abolished the Lone Parent rate. Rates increased again in line with inflation until 2010, since which time they have been frozen.
Effective from 7 January 2013, Child Benefit became means tested – those earning more than £50,000 per year would have part of their benefit withdrawn, and if earning over £60,000, would receive nothing at all.
Child Benefit in 2023
In 2023 everyone with children receives child benefit payments in the following amounts:
£24 a week for the first child
£15.90 a week for each subsequent child.
There is no limit to the number of children parents will receive child benefit for.
These payments are awarded for children up to the age 16 and up to age of 20 if they stay on in further or higher education.
They are payable to everyone whether working or in receipt of Universal Credit and the payments are in addition to the child payment part of universal credit.
However, for those earning £50 000 or more a year, they pay additional taxes: a ‘child tax credit charge’ which recoups some of the money received in child benefit, and for those earning £60K a year, they pay so much this cancels out the entire amount they will receive in child benefit.
Universal Credit Child Benefits
Universal Credit was introduced in 2013 to replace a wide range of other individual benefits including income support, housing benefit, working tax credit and child tax credit.
The total amount of universal credit for single people is just under £15 000 a year and for a single person or couple with children the cap is £22 000 a year (if they have two children living with them).
The general idea behind universal credit is to encourage people into work by making sure they are not earning less when working in part-time or low-paid jobs compared to claiming benefits. Prior to Universal Credit the benefits system had perverse incentives meaning you could earn less working 16 hours a week than on benefits because when you started working more than 16 hours per week JobSeeker’s Allowance would stop and you would lose your housing benefit. Under Universal Credit this doesn’t happen because if your earnings are below £15000 (if you’re a single person), they are ‘topped up’, thus encouraging more people into work (3)
In 2023, people with children who are eligible for Universal Credit receive £315 for their first child and then £270 for their second child, payable until those children turn 18 (assuming they stay in education) and then no further payments for any further children they have after the first two (unless they already had three or more children before 2017 and were already claiming the previous child tax credit and transferred onto Universal Credit).
The money paid by the government for children (the ‘child tax credit’ part of universal credit, if you like) is part of that overall cap. If someone’s overall Universal Credit amount is greater than £22 000 when they start receiving more money because of having two children, universal credit would automatically adjust downwards to the upper cap.
The Adoption Act 2005
In 2005, under New Labour, the law on adoption changed, giving unmarried couples, including gay couples, the right to adopt on the same basis as married couples.
Signposting and Related Posts
This topic is part of the families and households module, normally taught in the first year of A-level sociology.
The Radical Feminist viewpoint is that relationships are the primary means through which men control women and maintain their power over them in society.
Probably the most shocking evidence which supports this view is the continued prevalence of domestic violence. According to the Crime Survey of England and Wales (2022) 7.9% of women were victims of domestic abuse in the year ending March 2022. This compared to only 3.5% of men.
The radical Feminist explanation for Domestic Violence is that it is an inevitable feature of a patriarchal society. It is part of a wider system that helps maintain male power over women, the key division in society.
Just to demonstrate that this Radical Feminist views didn’t disappear in the 1980s. Here is a recent Radical Feminist view on domestic violence…
“Domestic violence against women by men is “caused” by the misuse of power and control within a context of male privilege. Male privilege operates on an individual and societal level to maintain a situation of male dominance, where men have power over women and children. Domestic violence by men against women can be seen as a consequence of the inequalities between men and women, rooted in patriarchal traditions that encourage men to believe they are entitled to power and control over their partners.”
Criticisms of the Radical Feminist view on Domestic Violence
1. Wilkinson criticises Feminists by arguing that it is not so much Patriarchy, but poverty that causes stress which leads to DV, so this is much less common in more equal, middle class households.
2. Men are also victims of Domestic Violence with some statistics suggesting that men are the victims in as many as 40% of cases of abuse.
3. There is a historical trends towards women having more freedom and control over their sexuality, especially compared to traditional tribal societies, a point elaborated on below.
Women have more sexual freedom today…
In many traditional tribal societies, there is little notion that women should gain any satisfaction out of sex. As one British witness to sexuality amongst the Himba of Namibia put it ‘when the husband wants sex, the woman just opens her legs, he gets on with it. When he’s finished, he just roles over and goes to sleep. There’s no sense of pleasure in it for the woman’.
Moreover, in some societies, especially in East Africa, women’s sexuality is tightly controlled. In extreme cases through Female Genital Mutilation, which removes much of the pleasure associated with sex, and sex remains very much about reproduction only.
The above example stands in stark contrast to modern notions of female sexuality. Since the heyday of Feminism and the sexual revolution in the 1960s, and helped by modern contraception, we now live in the age of what Anthony Giddens calls ‘plastic sexuality’. This is where sex is primarily about pleasure for both sexes rather than just being about reproduction.
Today, women increasingly demand sexual satisfaction as an ordinary part of their relationships, and cultural products such as the recent best-selling novel – ‘50 Shades of grey’ and programmes such as ‘The Joy of Teen Sex’ certainly suggest there is much more open and honest discussion about sex between partners in relationships.
Female sexuality is discussed more today. One 2016 TED talk on the topic by Sarah Barmark has over 40M views.
Further evidence that suggests modern relationships are equal and that women are more empowered lies in the proliferation of advice and discussion sites about relationships. Advice magazines such as seventeen.com suggest girls are more empowered in their relationships than they used to be. Such magazines even have quizzes so girls can assess whether their boyfriend’s up to scratch.
Blogs such as the good men project suggest that men are more prepared to discuss ‘what it means to be a man’ and ‘modern relationships’. This further suggests more equality between the sexes where intimate relations are concerned.
Domestic finances are more equal today
Pahl and Volger (1993) found that ‘pooling’ of household income is on the increase. Pooling is where both partners have equal access of income and joint responsibility for expenditure.
50% of couples pooled their income compared to only 19% of their parents, showing a movement away from ‘allowance systems’ in household expenditure’
Evidence against the view that there is equality in sexual relations
women are more likely to be harassed than men.
women experience less sexual satisfaction.
the mainstream media don’t advertise vibrators.
Decision making between men and women may not be equal.
Women are more likely to be sexually harassed than men
According to a 2020 UK government survey women are more likely to be victims of sexual harassment than men. 84% of women said they had experienced sexual harassment in their lifetime compared to 60% of men.
Women experience less sexual satisfaction than men….
Indiana University’s survey found that 91% of men had an org**m the last time they had sex, but only 64% of women did. These numbers roughly reflect the percentage of men and women who say they enjoyed sex “extremely” or “quite a bit”. 66% of women and 83% of men. Only 58% of women in their ’20s had an org**m during their latest sexual encounter.
30-40% percent of women report difficulty climaxing and 33% of women under 35 often feel sad, anxious, restless or irritable after sex, while 10% frequently feel sad after intercourse.”
The mainstream media refuses to advertise vibrators
According to one Feminist blog…“Vibrators still are such a big taboo. The media and films (ie. American Pie) glamourise women’s sexuality. However, they refuses to run ads for vibrators which are very useful tools for helping women understand their sexuality. Yet Viagra ads run on all of these platforms with no problem.
All of this serves to reinforce ‘heteronormativity’, or the idea that women need men to give them sexual satisfaction. The problem with this is that the evidence suggests that men are failing to provide satisfaction. Many women report a lack of satisfaction in the bedroom.”
Feminist criticisms that decision making is becoming more equal
While some decisions concerning money are made jointly, these tend to be less important ones – such as what clothes to buy. Men still tend to have the final say in more important decisions such as changing jobs or moving house.
The diversity of families and households in the UK has been slowly increasing since 2012. Types of families on the rise include cohabiting households, reconstituted families, single-parent families, and ‘kidult’ households where adults live with their parents. There’s been a slight decrease in traditional ‘cereal packet’ families. Multigenerational households, however, saw a minor decrease, making up only 1% of households in 2022. Single-person households and lone-parent families also increased marginally yet represent significant proportions of UK households.
Families and households in the UK have become more diverse since 2012, although the rate of change is relatively slow paced. The types of family and households which have increased since the 1950s include:
cohabiting rather than married households
reconstituted or step families
lone parent families
single person households
Kidult households, where adult children live with their parents.
The statistics below focus more on the trends in the last decade.
A slight decrease in ‘cereal packet’ families
The proportion of opposite-sex non-married cohabiting family households increased in the last decades, from 15.7% of all family households in the UK to 18.4% of all households in the UK.
There was a corresponding decrease in opposite-sex married family households: from 67% of all households to 65.2% of all households (2).
The proportion of ‘cereal packet families’ is slowly declining.
An important analysis point here is that the rate of decline is not particularly fast or significant.
Opposite-sex married and cohabitating families together make up 81% of all family households.
In other words around 80% of households with children are still heterosexual two parent households!
Trends in Reconstituted Families
In 2011 there were 544,000 step families with dependent children in England and Wales.
This means that 11% of couple families with dependent children were step families.
The Number of step families has increased since the 1950s.
However, the number of step families has declined recently dropping from 631,000 in 2001 to just 544,000 in 2011.
If there is only one biological parent in the step-family, that parent is the mother rather than the father in 90% of cases.
NB it is more difficult to get up to date stats on step-families! However according to this Guardian article from 2021 an estimated 1 in 3 families are blended families. NB this is probably including families with non dependent children.
Trends in Lone Parent Households
There were 2.9 million lone-parent families in the UK in 2022, which is 15% of all families.
This is down slightly from 2012 when there were 3.0 million lone-parent families, representing 17% of all families
84% of lone-parent families were lone-mother families in 2022.
See source (2) below.
Separated Families
A separated family is defined as ‘one parent with care of a child 16 or under, or child aged under 20 if they are in full time Further Education, and with a non-resident parent’.
In 2020 there were an estimated 2.3 million separated families in Britain, with an estimated 3.6 million children.
89% of parents with care in 2020 were female and under the age 50, and 86% of the non-resident parents male and 80% were under 50.
Methodological note: Lone parent and separated families are not quite. the same thing!
Trends in Single Person Households
29.6% of all households in the UK were single person households in 2022.
This is equivalent to 8.3 million people or 13% of people who live in households.
This is up slightly from 2012 when 29% of all households were single person households.
According to Euromonitor International, the number of people living alone globally is skyrocketing, rising from about 153 million in 1996 to 277 million in 2011 – an increase of around 80% in 15 years.
Trends in ‘Kidult’ Households
The number of adults living with their parents rose by over 14% between 2011 and 2021 to 4.9 million adults.
Young adult males are more likely to live with their parents than young adult females.
In 2022 31% of males aged 20-34 lived with their parents compared to only 22% of females aged 20 to 34. (Source).
Overall, around 1/3 of adult men and 1/5th of adult women in the UK now live with their parents.
Trends in Multigenerational Households
Only 1% of households were multigenerational in the UK in 2022.
This is down slightly from 2012 when the figure was 1.1%.
For more posts on this topic area more generally please see my page on families and households, one of the options within the first year of A-level sociology (AAQA).
A summary of liberal, marxist and radical feminist views on the traditional nuclear family
Almost all feminists agree that gender is socially constructed. This means that gender roles are learnt rather than determined by biology, and the family is the primary institution which socialises individuals into these gender roles.
The proof for gender being constructed (rather than biologically determined) is found in the sometimes radically different behaviour we see between women from different societies: i.e. different societies construct being a “women” in different ways (and the same can be said for differences between men in different societies as well).
Overview of Feminist Perspectives on the Family
This post summarises Feminist perspectives on the family covering:
An overview of Feminism in general
Liberal Feminism
Marxist Feminism
Radical Feminism
All sections include what different Feminists think about the role of the family in causing gender equality, their ideas about solutions to inequalities and criticisms.
The content below is primarily designed to help students revise for the AQA A level sociology paper 2, families and households option.
Feminism and the Family
Feminists have been central in criticising gender roles associated with the traditional nuclear family, especially since the 1950s. They have argued the nuclear family has traditionally performed two key functions which oppressed women:
socialising girls to accept subservient roles within the family, whilst socialising boys to believe they were superior – this happens through children witnessing then recreating the parental relationship.
socialising women into accepting the “housewife” role as normal, which limited women to the domestic sphere and made them financially dependent on men.
Essentially, feminists viewed the function of the family as a breeding ground where patriarchal values were learned by individuals, which in turn created a patriarchal society.
For the purposes of teaching A-level sociology Feminism is usually to be split (simplified) into three distinct branches: Liberal Feminists, Marxist Feminists and Radical Feminists. They differ significantly over the extent to which they believe that the family is still patriarchal and in what the underlying causes of the existence of patriarchy might be. Remember – all the theories below are discussing the “nuclear” family.
Marxist feminists argue the main cause of women’s oppression in the family is not men, but capitalism. They argue that women’s oppression performs several functions for Capitalism.
Women reproduce the labour force – women do most of the childcare within the nuclear family, part of which involves socialising them to accept the authority of their parents, which gets them used to the idea of being obedient to hierarchical authority more generally, which is what their future capitalist employers need. They are thus socialising the next generation of workers, and they do this for free because their domestic labour is unpaid.
Women absorb anger – Think back to Parson’s warm bath theory in which women help men destress after a hard day at work and thus help keep industrial capitalism going. The Marxist-Feminist interpretation of this is that women are just absorbing the anger of the proletariat, preventing this anger from being directed towards the Bourgeois, and thus preventing revolution and the downfall of capitalism.
Women are a ‘reserve army of cheap labour’ – the fact that women’s ‘normal’ role in the nuclear family restrictions them from working, but they are nonetheless there in the background, in reserve. This prevents men from striking to demand higher wages because the Bourgeois could potentially take on female employees at lower wages if male employees start to play up.
Key thinker – Fran Ansley (1972)
Ansley argues women absorb the anger that would otherwise be directed at capitalism. Ansley argues women’s male partners are inevitably frustrated by the exploitation they experience at work and women are the victims of this, including domestic violence.
Laurie Penny argues that neoliberal capitalism has encouraged women to seek self-empowerment and freedom through consumerism (by buying high heals and overt expressions of sexuality, for example).
The problem is that only a relatively few women earn enough to be able to ‘consume their way’ to liberation and so this isn’t a solution for the majority of women.
In reality many women work very long hours in unpaid domestic roles or low paid unskilled jobs, and it is mainly the exploitation of women which sustains both patriarchy and capitalism.
Feminists should be campaigning for better working conditions for women, and if women realised their power and just stopped working they could bring capitalism down, but this kind of activism is not very sexy or exciting and women remain ‘distracted’ with consuming their way to liberation.
Solutions to Gender Inequalities within the family
For Marxist Feminists, the solutions to gender inequality are economic: we need to tackle capitalism to tackle patriarchy.
Two specific solutions include campaigning for better pay and conditions in jobs where mainly women work, such as cleaning and caring jobs.
Another solution is paying women for housework and childcare, thus putting an economic value on what is still largely women’s domestic work.
Evaluations of Marxist Feminism
One criticisms is that women’s oppression was clearly in evidence before capitalism – if anything, women are probably more oppressed in pre-capitalist, tribal societies compared to within capitalist societies.
If you look at the United Nation’s Gender Equality Index (2) there appears to be a correlation between capitalist development and women’s liberation – suggesting that capitalism has the opposite effect from that suggested by Marxist Feminists. This correlation isn’t perfect, but you can clearly see wealthy European countries such as Finland at the top and poorer sub-saharan African countries near the bottom.
The idea that women act as a reserve army of labour is less and less relevant every year: the employment rate for men in the UK in December 2022 was 79% for men and 72% of women, only a 7% gap.
However if we look at part time employment rates there is still more potential for women to do more work as women are more likely to employed than men: 38% of women worked part-time, compared to only 18% of men (1)
Radical feminists argue that all relationships between men and women are based on patriarchy, essentially men are the cause of women’s exploitation and oppression. For radical feminists, the nuclear family is where this system of oppression starts, it is the foundation on which patriarchy is based and thus should be abolished.
Against Liberal Feminism, they argue that paid work has not been ‘liberating’. Women’s lives within the family have not simply become better because they now have improved job opportunities and pay which is more equal to men’s.
Instead women have acquired the ‘dual burden’ of paid work and unpaid housework and the family remains patriarchal: men benefit from women’s paid earnings and their domestic labour. Some Radical Feminists go further arguing that women suffer from the ‘triple shift’ where they have to do paid work, domestic work and ‘emotion work’ – being expected to take on the emotional burden of caring for children.
Radical Feminists also argue that, for many women, there is a ‘dark side of family life’ – According to the Crime Survey for England and Wales domestic violence accounts for a sixth of all violent crime and nearly 1 in 5 adults will experience domestic violence at some point in their lives, with women being more than twice as likely to experience it than men.
Kate Millett: On the sociology of Patriarchy
Key thiker –Kate Millet (see below) was one of the leading American Second Wave Feminists in the 1960s and 70s and is one of the best known radical feminists.
“Patriarchy’s chief institution is the family. It is both a mirror of and a connection with the larger society; a patriarchal unit within a patriarchal whole. Mediating between the individual and the social structure, the family effects control and conformity where political and other authorities are insufficient. As the fundamental instrument and the foundation unit of patriarchal society the family and its roles are prototypical. Serving as an agent of the larger society, the family not only encourages its own members to adjust and conform, but acts as a unit in the government of the patriarchal state which rules its citizens through its family heads.
Traditionally, patriarchy granted the father nearly total ownership over wife or wives and children, including the powers of physical abuse and often even those of murder and sale. Classically, as head of the family the father is both begetter and owner in a system in which kinship is property. Yet in strict patriarchy, kinship is acknowledged only through association with the male line.
In contemporary patriarchies the male’s priority has recently been modified through the granting of divorce protection, citizenship, and property to women. Their chattel status continues in their loss of name, their obligation to adopt the husband’s domicile, and the general legal assumption that marriage involves an exchange of the female’s domestic service and (sexual) consortium in return for financial support.
The chief contribution of the family in patriarchy is the socialisation of the young (largely through the example and admonition of their parents) into patriarchal ideology’s prescribed attitudes toward the categories of role, temperament, and status. Although slight differences of definition depend here upon the parents’ grasp of cultural values, the general effect of uniformity is achieved, to be further reinforced through peers, schools, media, and other learning sources, formal and informal. While we may niggle over the balance of authority between the personalities of various households, one must remember that the entire culture supports masculine authority in all areas of life and – outside of the home – permits the female none at all.
Although there is no biological reason why the two central functions of the family (socialisation and reproduction) need be inseparable from or even take place within it, revolutionary or utopian efforts to remove these functions from the family have been so frustrated, so beset by difficulties, that most experiments so far have involved a gradual return to tradition. This is strong evidence of how basic a form patriarchy is within all societies, and of how pervasive its effects upon family members.”
Solutions to gender inequality
Radical Feminists advocate for the abolition of the traditional, patriarchal nuclear family and the establishment of alternative family structures and sexual relations.
The various alternatives suggested by Radical Feminists include separatism – women only communes, and matrifocal households. Some extreme radical feminists also practise political lesbianism and political celibacy as they view heterosexual female relationships with men as “sleeping with the enemy.”
Radical feminists also argue for more support for female victims of domestic violence to help women out of abusive relationships.
Evaluations of Radical Feminism
There is still evidence of the dual burden and triple shift on women. Women do twice as much childcare than men and spend 64% more time doing domestic chores.
The ME TOO campaign and the Harvey Weinstein scandal both show that harassment and sexual abuse of women remain common.
Ignores the progress that women have made in many areas e.g. work, controlling fertility, divorce.
Too unrealistic – due to heterosexual attraction separatism is unlikely.
Ignores domestic/emotional abuse suffered by men who often don’t report it.
Liberal Feminists do not emphasise the role of the family in perpetuating gender inequality in society as much as Marxist or Radical Feminists.
According to liberal Feminists gender inequalities are primarily caused by inequalities in the public sphere rather than inequalities in the home. Prior to 1972 the main problem was the lack of equal pay in work between men and women, and today two problems include:
stereotypical subject domains in education steering women into lower paid jobs such as health and social care.
unequal maternity and paternity pay encouraging the woman to take more time of work than the man following the birth of a new child.
lack of free child care preventing women from returning to work earlier.
Solutions to Inequality
Liberal Feminists tend to focus on achieving greater equality of opportunity in the public sphere: focussing on achieving equal access to education, equal pay, ending gender differences in subject and career choice won primarily through legal changes.
In Liberal Feminist theory if women have an equal chance as men to pursue careers outside of the family, they are free to choose NOT to be housewives and mothers.
We have made enormous progress towards equality in the public sphere in recent decades, and all that remains is ‘tweaking’ in certain areas, such as improving equality in higher managerial positions: there are still very few women employed at the senior executive levels.
Two social policies liberal feminists would support include the 2015 shared parental leave act in which the mother and father can share the mother’s maternity leave between them and the forthcoming 2024 act which proivdes free childcare for children down to 9 months of age.
Key Thinker: Jenny Somerville
A key thinker who can be characterised as a liberal feminist is Jennifer Somerville (2000) who provides a less radical critique of the family than Marxist or Radical Feminists and suggests proposals to improve family life for women that involve modest policy reforms rather than revolutionary change.
Somerville argues that many young women do not feel entirely sympathetic towards feminism yet still feel some sense of grievance.
To Somerville, many feminists have failed to acknowledge progress for women such as the greater freedom to go into paid work, and the greater degree of choice over whether they marry or cohabit, when and whether to have children, and whether to take part in a heterosexual or same-sex relationship or to simply live on their own.
The increased choice for women and the rise of the dual-earner household (both partners in work) has helped create greater equality within relationships. Somerville argues that ‘some modern men are voluntarily committed to sharing in those routine necessities of family survival, or they can be persuaded, cajoled, guilt-tripped or bullied’. Despite this, however, ‘women are angry, resentful and above all disappointed in men.’ Many men do not take on their full share of responsibilities and often these men can be ‘shown the door’.
Somerville raises the possibility that women might do without male partners, especially as so many prove inadequate, and instead get their sense of fulfilment from their children. Unlike Germain Greer, however, Somerville does not believe that living in a household without an adult male is the answer – the high figures for remarriage suggest that heterosexual attraction and the need for intimacy and companionship mean that heterosexual families will not disappear.
However, it remains the case that the inability of men to ‘pull their weight’ in relationships means that high rates of relationship breakdowns will continue to be the norm which will lead to more complex familial relationships as women end one relationship and attempt to rebuild the next with a new (typically male) partner.
What Feminists thus need to do is to focus on policies which will encourage greater equality within relationships and to help women cope with the practicalities of daily life. One set of policies which Somerville thinks particularly important are those aimed at helping working parents. The working hours and culture associated with many jobs are incompatible with family life. Many jobs are based on the idea of a male breadwinner who relies on a non-working wife to take care of the children.
Somerville argues that in order to achieve true equality within relationships we need increased flexibility in paid employment.
Evaluation of the Liberal Feminist Perspective on the Family
Sommerville recognises that significant progress has been made in both public and private life for women.
It is more appealing to a wider range of women than radical ideas.
It is more practical – the system is more likely to accept small policy changes, while it would resist revolutionary change.
Difference Feminists argue that Liberal Feminism is an ethnocentric view – it reflects the experiences of mainly white, middle class women.
Her work is based on a secondary analysis of previous works and is thus not backed up by empirical evidence.
Radical Feminists such as Delphy, Leonard and Greer (see further below) argue that she fails to deal with the Patriarchal structures and culture in contemporary family life.
Despite policy changes which have made work more equal, slight gender inequalities remain in the UK!
A Level Sociology Families and Households Revision Bundle
(1) This division goes back to Alison Jaggar’s (1983) Feminist Politics and Human Nature where she defined four theories related to feminism: liberal feminism, Marxism, radical feminism, and socialist feminism
Engels believed the nuclear family emerged with capitalism and private property, contemporary Marxists argue the family performs ideological functions.
Marxists argue that the nuclear family performs ideological functions for Capitalism – the family acts as a unit of consumption and teaches passive acceptance of hierarchy. It is also the institution through which the wealthy pass down their private property to their children, thus reproducing class inequality.
The Marxist Perspective on the Family an Overview:
We start with an overview of the Marxist perspective in general
Engel’s theory of the emergence of the nuclear family
The family as an ideological apparatus
The family as a unit of consumption
Criticisms of the Marxist view of the family.
This post has been written primarily for students studying the families and household option as part of A-level sociology.
Marxism is a ‘structural conflict’ perspective. They see society as structured along class lines with institutions generally working in the interests of the small elite class who have economic power (the ‘Bourgeoisie’) and the much larger working class (the ‘Proletariat’). The Bourgeoise gain their wealth from exploiting the proletariat. There is thus a conflict of interests between the Bourgeoise and the Proletariat.
However, this conflict of interests rarely boils over into revolution because institutions such as the family perform the function of ‘ideological control’, or convincing the masses that the present unequal system is inevitable, natural and good.
Something else Marxists suggest about the family (like the Functional Fit theory) is that the family type generally changes with society – more specifically, the nuclear family emerges not because of the needs of industrialisation, but because of the needs of the capitalist system.
Engels – The Emergence of the Nuclear Family
According to Engels, the monogamous nuclear family only emerged with Capitalism. Before Capitalism, traditional, tribal societies were classless and they practised a form of ‘primitive communism’ in which there was no private property. In such societies, property was collectively owned, and the family structure reflected this – there were no families as such, but tribal groups existed in a kind of ‘promiscuous horde’ in which there were no restrictions on sexual relationships.
Hunter-gatherer societies – promiscuous hordes?
However, with the emergence of Capitalism in the 18th Century, society and the family changed. Capitalism is based on a system of private ownership – The bourgeois use their own personal wealth to personally invest in businesses in order to make a profit, they don’t invest for the benefit of everyone else.
Eventually the Bourgeois started to look for ways to pass on their wealth to the next generation, rather than having it shared out amongst the masses, and this is where the monogamous nuclear family comes from. It is the best way of guaranteeing that you are passing on your property to your son, because in a monogamous relationship you have a clear idea of who your own children are.
Ultimately what this arrangement does is to reproduce inequality – The children of the rich grow up into wealth, while the children of the poor remain poor. Thus the nuclear family benefits the Bourgeois more than the proletariat.
Criticisms of Engels
Gender inequality clearly preceded Capitalism….. The vast majority of tribes in Africa and Asia are patriarchal, with women being barred from owning property, having no political power, and having to do most of the child care and hard physical labour.
Wealthy Capitalist economies such as the UK and USA have seen the fastest improvements in gender equality over the last 100 years. Capitalism, increasing wealth and gender equality within a nation seem to be correlated.
The family as an Ideological Apparatus
The modern nuclear family functions to promote values that ensure the reproduction and maintenance of capitalism. The family is described as an ideological apparatus – this means it socialises people to think in a way that justifies inequality and encourages people to accept the capitalist system as fair, natural and unchangeable.
One way in which this happens is that there is a hierarchy in most families which teaches children to accept there will always be someone in “authority” who they must obey, which then mirrors the hierarchy of boss-worker in paid employment in later life.
The modern nuclear family – a hierarchical structure which supports capitalism?
The Family as a Unit of Consumption
Capitalists/business owners want to keep workers’ wages down so they can make a profit, but to do so they must also be able to sell the workers goods i.e. they must create demand for their products. The family builds demand for goods in a number of ways
1) Families must keep up with the material goods/services acquired by their neighbours and peers e.g. family holidays, cars – this is known “Keeping up with the Joneses”. There are significant amounts of advertising and TV programmes influencing parents in this way.
2) The media and companies target children in their advertising who then persuade their parents through pester power to buy more expensive items. This is particularly bad in the UK where there few legal restrictions on adverts aimed at children; in Sweden advertising aimed at children under 12 is illegal.
Are nuclear families just a ‘unit of consumption’ which keeps capitalism going?
Overall Criticisms of Marxism
It’s too deterministic – it assumes people passively accept socialisation and family life, and that the future is pre-determined. There are plenty of families who reject the consumerist lifestyle and many families bring their children up to be independent thinkers.
The Marxist perspective ignores family diversity in capitalist society, the nuclear family is no longer the main type of family. In fact, family breakdown may be better for Capitalism – as divorce is expensive and more money has to be spent on maintaining family relationships and later on forming new families.
Feminists argue that the Marxist focus on social class inequalities downplays the role of patriarchy, which is the real source of female oppression. Feminists would point out that sex inequalities exist within all families, irrespective of social class background.
Marxism ignores the benefits of nuclear family e.g. both parents support the children. The New Right point out that this is the most functional type of environment in which to raise children, and the nuclear family is found in most societies around the world, suggesting it is something people choose.
A Level Sociology Families and Households Revision Bundle
50 pages of revision notes covering all of the sub-topics within families and households
mind maps in pdf and png format – 9 in total, covering perspectives on the family
short answer exam practice questions and exemplar answers – 3 examples of the 10 mark, ‘outline and explain’ question.
9 essays/ essay plans spanning all the topics within the families and households topic.
Signposting and Related Posts
The Marxist perspective on the family is normally taught after the Functionalist perspective on the Family, and is normally the second of five perspectives on the family within the families and households module in A-level sociology.
Functionalists focus on the positive functions of the nuclear family, such as secondary socialisation and the stabilisation of adult personalities.
Functionalists see the family as one of the essential building blocks for stable societies. They tend to to see the nuclear family as the ideal family for industrial societies and argue that it performs positive functions such as as socialising children and providing emotional security for parents.
There are two main Functionalist theorists of the family: George Peter Murdock and Talcott Parsons.
Murdock argued that the nuclear family was universal and that it performed four essential functions: stabilising the sex drive, reproduction, socialisation of the young and economic production. (Obviously this has been widely criticised!)
Parsons developed the Functional Fit Theory: In pre-industrial society families used to be extended, but with industrialisation families became nuclear because they fitted industrial society better.
The Functionalist Perspective on the Family: Overview
This post covers:
The Functionalist view of society
George Peter Murdock’s theory of the universal nuclear family
Talcott Parsons’ Functional Fit Theory
The possible positive functions of the family today
Evaluations and criticisms of the Functionalist view of the family from other perspectives.
The Functionalist View of Society
Functionalists regard society as a system made up of different parts which depend on each other. Different institutions perform specific functions within a society to keep society going, in the same way as the different organs of a human body perform different functions in order to maintain the whole.
Functionalists see the family as a particularly important institution because it as the ‘basic building block’ of society which performs the crucial functions of socialising the young and meeting the emotional needs of its members. Stable families underpin social order and economic stability.
Before you go any further you might like to read this more in depth post ‘Introduction to Functionalism‘ post which covers the key ideas of Functionalism.
George Peter Murdock – Four essential functions of the nuclear family
George Murdock was an American Anthropologist who looked at 200 different societies and argued that the nuclear family was a universal feature of all human societies. In other words, the nuclear family is in all societies!
Is the nuclear family universal?
Murdock suggested there were ‘four essential functions’ of the nuclear family:
1. Stable satisfaction of the sex drive – within monogamous relationships, which prevents sexual jealousy. 2. The biological reproduction of the next generation – without which society cannot continue. 3. Socialisation of the young – teaching basic norms and values 4. Meeting its members economic needs – producing food and shelter for example.
Criticisms of Murdock
Feminist Sociologists argue that arguing that the family is essential is ideological because traditional family structures typically disadvantage women.
It is feasible that other institutions could perform the functions above.
Anthropological research has shown that there are some cultures which don’t appear to have ‘families’ – the Nayar for example.
Talcott Parsons – Functional Fit Theory
Parsons has a historical perspective on the evolution of the nuclear family. His functional fit theory is that as society changes, the type of family that ‘fits’ that society, and the functions it performs change. Over the last 200 years, society has moved from pre-industrial to industrial – and the main family type has changed from the extended family to the nuclear family. The nuclear family fits the more complex industrial society better, but it performs a reduced number of functions.
The extended family consisted of parents, children, grandparents and aunts and uncles living under one roof, or in a collection of houses very close to eachother. Such a large family unit ‘fitted’ pre-industrial society as the family was entirely responsible for the education of children, producing food and caring for the sick – basically it did everything for all its members.
In contrast to pre-industrial society, in industrial society (from the 1800s in the UK) the isolated “nuclear family” consisting of only parents and children becomees the norm. This type of family ‘fits’ industrial societies because it required a mobile workforce. The extended family was too difficult to move when families needed to move to find work to meet the requirements of a rapidly changing and growing economy. Furthermore, there was also less need for the extended family as more and more functions, such as health and education, gradually came to be carried out by the state.
I really like this brief explanation of Parson’s Functional Fit Theory:
Two irreducible functions of the family
According to Parsons, although the nuclear family performs reduced functions, it is still the only institution that can perform two core functions in society – Primary Socialisation and the Stabilisation of Adult Personalities.
Primary Socialisation
The nuclear family is still responsible for teaching children the norms and values of society known as Primary Socialisation.
An important part of socialisation according to Functionalists is ‘gender role socialisation. If primary socialisation is done correctly then boys learn to adopt the ‘instrumental role’ (also known as the ‘breadwinner role) – they go on to go out to work and earns money. Girls learn to adopt the ‘expressive role’ – doing all the ‘caring work’, housework and bringing up the children.
Toys can form an important part of gender socialisation
The stabilisation of adult personalities
The stabilisation of adult personalities refers to the emotional security which is achieved within a marital relationship between two adults. According to Parsons working life in Industrial society is stressful and the family is a place where the working man can return and be ‘de-stressed’ by his wife, which reduces conflict in society. This is also known as the ‘warm bath theory’.
Criticisms of Functional Fit Theory
It’s too ‘neat’ – social change doesn’t happen in such an orderly manner:
Laslett found that church records show only 10% of households contained extended kin before the industrial revolution. This suggests the family was already nuclear before industrialisation.
Young and Wilmott found that Extended Kin networks were still strong in East London as late as the 1970s.
The Positive Functions of the Family: A summary
Functionalists identify a number of positive functions of the nuclear family, below is a summary of some of these and a few more.
The reproduction of the next generation – Functionalists see the nuclear family as the ‘fundamental unit of society’ responsible for carrying that society on by biological reproduction
Related to the above point one of the main functions is primary socialisation – teaching children the basic norms and values of society.
This kind of overlaps with the above, but even during secondary socialisation, the family is expected to help educated children alongside the school.
The family provides psychological security and security, especially for men one might say (as with the ‘warm bath theory’.)
A further positive function is elderly care, with many families still taking on this responsibility.
Murdock argued that monogamous relationships provide for a stable satisfaction of the sex drive – most people today still see committed sexual relationships as best.
Criticisms of the Functionalist perspective on the family
It is really important to be able to criticise the perspectives. Evaluation is worth around half of the marks in the exam!
Downplaying Conflict
Both Murdock and Parsons paint a very rosy picture of family life, presenting it as a harmonious and integrated institution. However, they downplay conflict in the family, particularly the ‘darker side’ of family life, such as violence against women and child abuse.
Being out of Date
Parson’s view of the instrumental and expressive roles of men and women is very old-fashioned. It may have held some truth in the 1950s but today, with the majority of women in paid work, and the blurring of gender roles, it seems that both partners are more likely to take on both expressive and instrumental roles
Ignoring the exploitation of women
Functionalists tend to ignore the way women suffer from the sexual division of labour in the family. Even today, women still end up being the primary child carers in 90% of families, and suffer the burden of extra work that this responsibility carries compared to their male partners. Gender roles are socially constructed and usually involve the oppression of women. There are no biological reasons for the functionalist’s view of separation of roles into male breadwinner & female homemaker. These roles lead to the disadvantages being experienced by women.
Functionalism is too deterministic
This means it ignores the fact that children actively create their own personalities. An individual’s personality isn’t pre-determined at birth or something they have no control in. Functionalism incorrectly assumes an almost robotic adoption of society’s values via our parents; clearly there are many examples where this isn’t the case.
A Level Sociology Families and Households Revision Bundle
