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Chapter 1
Introduction to Family Studies INSTRUCTOR'S INTRODUCTION The two distinctive features of this chapter reside, first, in the broader range of theoretical perspectives presented compared to other textbooks. All the theoretical perspectives presented in this chapter are highlighted at some point in the text. Second, as explained in the Preface of the textbook, the themes provide the threads that link various topics together, often leading to matters of social policies affecting family life. The themes present the text's “voice,” “flavour,” or perspective. This perspective comes from my own fieldwork as well as from readings that have particularly influenced me throughout the years. These themes are useful instruments of integrative analysis, social critique, and social policy building. ADDITIONAL CLASS MATERIAL ON METHODS The following class material is meant to accompany Table 1.2 on Methods in Family Research. Instructors may wish to return to this topic in a later lecture to avoid beginning the course with methods. Although qualitative material is discussed, the emphasis is on quantitative methods. The reason is that Canadian instructors in family studies, including myself, tend to have a greater expertise in qualitative methods. The additional material is intended to complement instructors’ expertise whenever appropriate. Another suggestion: You may reserve these notes and the related pages from Chapter 1 and use them to accompany the Family Research inserts that appear in each chapter. Or these inserts may be put together along with Table 1.2 to create a Module or special lecture on research methods in family studies at a convenient point in your program.
Surveys Surveys probably constitute the largest source of research information in the sociology of families. The results of many longitudinal surveys of large samples, including several generations within a family, are becoming available. For Canada, one can think of Statistics Canada's General Social Surveys and the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth which began in the early 1990s. In the U.S., one can think here of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, and the National Survey of Families and Households--which are older than the Canadian survey of children and youth and include several generations within a same family. Family research utilizing surveys has recourse to a multiplicity of "instruments" (i.e., questionnaires in this case), but a few prominent "scales" or questionnaires that have been extensively tested are used repeatedly throughout family studies. One can think here of the Marital Adjustment Test for Marital Satisfaction developed by Locke and Wallace in 1959, the Conflict Tactics Scale to measure the
Changing Families: Relationships in Context, Third Canadian Edition
behaviours of people during a situation of conflict which was developed by Straus in 1979, and the Psychological Maltreatment of Women Inventory developed by Tolman in 1989, which is a self-report questionnaire for men. Online questionnaires are now the least expensive survey method followed by phone interviews. Face-to-face interviews are the most expensive forms of surveys. The latter, however, particularly when combined with a self-administered questionnaire, including some open-ended questions for qualitative data and interviewers' observations, provide a far richer and textured set of data or information than mail or phone surveys and, so far, even online surveys. In order to generalize to the rest of the population, surveys have to use a random sample. A random sample gives an equal chance to all the members in a category of people of being selected. When a targeted sample includes a small minority of the population, for instance lesbian couples who give birth, researchers often turn to other sampling techniques that are not random. They may ask colleagues for names of persons who would be willing to be interviewed and, in turn, these persons may provide additional referrals. This is at times called the "snowball sampling technique." Other researchers place advertisements on campuses for student volunteers or advertisements in newspapers or magazines. The people who respond to these ads are then interviewed. While the latter methods may be useful to explore a topic, they do not necessarily yield generalizable data or information. Why? Because respondents are self-selected. For instance, fathers who respond to an ad seeking subjects for a study of father-daughter incest may be those fathers who feel truly guilty for their actions, who have maintained a good relationship with their daughter, or who may not have engaged in sexual intercourse with them. In contrast, fathers in denial may not respond and neither might fathers who are unrepentant. Thus, the study will not reach the entire spectrum of types of father-daughter incest and consequences. Surveys have several limitations. First, they can focus on only a limited number of topics and can ask only a limited number of questions. Therefore, this presents a problem for secondary analyses. That is, researchers who later have recourse to these large data banks for their own topics may have very limited material at their disposal, such as only one question (indicator) for, say, marital happiness. This is often too little. Second, multiple-choice questions do not offer respondents the chance to express the magnitude of their experience or feelings. The latter are better obtained through openended questions that yield in-depth qualitative data. Third, surveys often ask questions that respondents have never thought about before or questions that do not address respondents' current preoccupations, joys, and problems. In contrast, in-depth interviews or questionnaires can avoid this pitfall as they are in great part driven by respondents. The students' autobiographies in the textbook are an example of an in-depth questionnaire that allows respondents to choose which of their own life experience and preoccupations they will use as the basis of their responses. Thus, qualitative surveys yield richer data but they are time consuming and expensive to analyze. They also require great analytical skills and extensive theoretical linkages.
Observations Observers may simply record what they see or they can do audio and now videotapes that are analyzed later by independent coders. Coders are persons hired to give a name to the behaviour they observe on the video by segments of a few seconds at a time. A code number is generally assigned to
Changing Families: Relationships in Context, Third Canadian Edition
each type of behaviour so that statistics can be derived. For instance, a child who smiles at his mother while she speaks to him may be coded as "warm response" and receive a score of 5 on a 5-point scale. Such codings often take place with the help of a computer already equipped with keys corresponding to the observed categories: The coders then simply press the key corresponding to "warm versus cold behaviours" and then press the number or code 5 in the above example.
Indirect observations, combined with a form of instant (or “live”) surveys, are also used. For instance, families can be given a pager or their members can be “beeped” on their cell phones at random times during a day. At that point, all family members are asked to check multiple-choice questions (the same for all members) in order to gain a more holistic picture and also to compare the perspective of each family member with that of the others. For example, parents’ answers can be compared to each other, to their children’s, or siblings to each other. Questions generally ask where they are at the time of beeping, what they are doing, with whom, and what their mood or feelings are, etc. Observation studies can be designed to include a great deal of qualitative information in addition to the statistical one. Observation of families in their natural settings is a very difficult enterprise to undertake for many reasons. Families may be reluctant to participate, they may alter their daily activities to look better in the observer's eyes, or they may not have enough space at home to accommodate the observer. Naturalistic observations in public places are also possible, such as when parents and children are playing together in a park or are talking in a restaurant. Experiments At times, fieldwork can include a level of experimentation, particularly when it takes place in a laboratory setting. One can think here of the research whereby various instruments are attached to the respondents' skin to measure heart rate, pulse, perspiration levels (as in a lie-detector test), and even draw samples of blood to examine chemical changes in response to happiness or stress, for example. Couples interact around assigned tasks and the researchers can follow chemical and organic changes that take place when a stressor is introduced, when a couple disagrees, or when a couple is affectionate. Real experiments generally include at least two groups: The experimental group that is given a specific stimulus such as the possibility to watch a violent or an erotic video; also needed is a control group similar to the other one which does not receive the stimulus or the treatment in medical research. The two groups are measured on various dimensions derived from the researcher's theory both before and after the stimulus. For instance, along these lines, it has been found that parents who were asked to interact with a child who had been trained by researchers to behave in an oppositional-conflictual manner tended to drink more alcoholic beverages after the session than similar parents who had interacted with the same child who had played a very cooperative and prosocial role with them. These children who are trained by researchers on how to behave are called "child confederates." Naturalistic experiments are those that involve, for instance, the study of family functioning before a mother is diagnosed with breast cancer and after the diagnosis or even the surgery. Such families can be observed or interviewed. Their level of warmth toward each other, of help to the mother, and so
Changing Families: Relationships in Context, Third Canadian Edition
on, is measured before and after a natural situation (or stimulus) occurs. Naturalistic experiments are not frequent because researchers rarely have the opportunity of knowing in advance of positive or negative changes that occur in a family. But longitudinal surveys often do catch changes, such as a divorce, and are able to compare a family's behaviour years before and even after, and also compare such a family with one in which divorce does not occur, or before and after a natural disaster. Experiments can be combined with indirect observations mentioned above.
Evaluative Research Evaluative studies may involve a quasi-experimental design whereby researchers test parents, children, or families before a treatment or a social intervention is initiated and re-test them after. Generally, a control group is involved. The goal of evaluative research is to appraise the success or failure of an intervention or of several interventions which are being compared to see which is the most effective. For instance, researchers recently compared two programs designed to lower levels of wife abuse. They used pre- and post-measures as is generally the case in a welldesigned evaluative study. Welfare initiatives are often evaluated but one has to be very careful and closely examine the procedures involved in the evaluation, particularly when a government agency evaluates its own programmes (self-evaluation). For instance, after WorkFare for people on social assistance was introduced in Ontario, the government reported a sharp decline in the welfare caseload of assisted families. This was touted as proof of success for this initiative. Yet, independent researchers found that only one third of the former welfare recipients had actually exited poverty. The rest were still as poor as before. At the same time, food banks were noticing an increase in the utilization of their resources by families. Obviously, what was needed was a methodology whereby WorkFare families (generally mother-headed) were followed up carefully to see how many were still employed, whether they were still poor or if they were worse off than when they were socially assisted. Reliance on just one statistics, such as a drop in the welfare rolls, can be very misleading when evaluating the success of a programme. (Evaluative research is mentioned in the textbook in Chapter 14 as it is very important with respect to outcomes of social policies.) Content and Secondary Analysis and Historical Research Secondary analysis refers to the very widespread practice whereby researchers utilize the data contained in the various surveys discussed earlier and analyze some segments of it. These analyses are secondary because they come after the original design of the surveys has occurred. The researchers who design a survey and analyze its data engage in a primary analysis: They had designed the survey to answer certain specific research questions. Researchers who engage in secondary analyses fall into two categories. Those who are knowledgeable in a field and are testing specific hypotheses derived from their theoretical perspective or are searching for an answer to a research question that has not yet been analyzed. These researchers know that a given survey contains relevant information. Then there are those who are simply in search of "publishable material" and take the data in the survey and analyze it until they find what are called "statistically significant differences" or, yet, correlations. The latter researchers are not guided by knowledge or theory and may try to find a theoretical perspective that explains what they have found after the fact, so to speak.
Changing Families: Relationships in Context, Third Canadian Edition
Content analyses of, for instance, television programmes, websites, YouTube, social media, and magazine articles can be very useful to pinpoint trends that can influence children's behaviours (i.e., violence) or family relations (i.e., portrayal of parents or of the maternal or paternal role). Historical family research utilizes, in addition to public statistics, the content analysis of personal documents such as diaries, family genealogies and marking events, marriage and baptism records in churches of past centuries, advice books written for parents, advertising in old magazines and newspapers, old newspapers' accounts that pertain to family life, biographies, ledgers and bookkeeping records of farms, estates, and plantations, ship manifests and captains' logbooks, to name only the main sources for content analysis. Novels can also be content analyzed for portrayal of family. Paintings of family groups can also be examined, a method that Philippe Aries has used to demonstrate that children in earlier European centuries were part of the adult world at a relatively young age. Poetry, oral tradition, and written songs can also be sources of insight into family lifestyles and preoccupations of a given period. HELP WITH ANALYTICAL QUESTIONS (located at the end of chapter in the textbook) Question 1. Possibilities: Some instructors, for ideological reasons, see families as a "traditional" concept. Others like to emphasize that the element of choice and intimate relations seem to fulfill this perspective. However, not all family members are involved in intimate relations; some may actually be strangers but still recognize that they belong to the same family (as illustrated in a quote in the Student’s Guide and in a question also in the Guide). The emphasis on intimate relations will not cover such family members. As well, one can have intimate relations outside the family and with individuals who pass through one's life for only a brief period of time, and who never penetrate one's familial circle. Thus, families and intimate relations are two separate concepts that overlap in some instances but cover different realities in other instances. The concept of intimate relations misses the notion of institution, the intergenerational aspect of families, and the reality of extended families. As well, it is not a concept that is well adapted to the situation of many new Canadians.
Question 3. Linkages of themes to theories: ● Social inequalities can be linked to political economy theories, structural functionalism, rational theory (capital), and feminist theories. They can also be linked to behaviour genetics in the sense that social inequalities limit individuals’ development of some of their abilities, particularly at the intellectual and personal control levels. ● Gender inequalities and roles originate from feminist theories and are also linked to political economy theories and to social constructions of reality. They can be linked to the developmental aspects of a family (as, for instance, one sees the continuation of the nurturing role of women throughout the stages of family development) as well as to social exchange theory and even interactional theories. ● Family diversity can be linked to structural functionalism or as a critique of its original conception; to political economy theories; to feminism; to social constructionism. ● Family responsibilities can be linked to political economy theories, social structural functionalism, feminism, social constructionism (the constructs of the roles of mothers, fathers, and children, for instance). They can also be linked to rational theories (families provide capital) and to developmental theories (responsibilities are continued, added, and transferred as families grow, shrink, and parents age).
Changing Families: Relationships in Context, Third Canadian Edition
● Effective community is itself derived from rational theory but can also be linked to interactional theories as well as behaviour genetics. ● Cultural context is related to social construction; feminism can also present a critique of our current cultural context. ● The interactional theme is linked to symbolic interactionism, interactive-transactional theories, developmental and behaviour genetics perspectives (in the latter case, there is an interaction between nature and nurture, between the shared and nonshared environments, and between genes and these environments which form nurture). It can also be linked to political economy theories as an explanation of the context of inequalities and its effects on family relations. SUGGESTED VIDEOS www.youtube.com probably still offers Jean Kilbournes’ Killing Us Softly—Advertising’s Image of Women. This video comes in several segments. It is related both to feminism and social constructionist perspectives and can also be used to illustrate what is meant by content analysis (of the media, in this case). Sut Jhalby’s The Codes of Gender also offers an analysis of advertising that includes elements of symbolic interactionism, particular Goffman, as well as feminism and social constructionism. The Oprah Show had an interesting hour on Sister Wives, an ideal polygamous American family, around October 13-14, 2010. SUGGESTED LIGHT READINGS The two historical novels by Bernice Morgan, situated in Newfoundland, provide a very good example of family as an institution lasting throughout a century: Random Passage (1992) and Waiting for Time (1994), St. John’s, NF: Breakwater. These two books provide a realistic depiction of the situation and are equally suggested for Chapter 3. A miniseries also resulted. SHORT ESSAY QUESTIONS 1. Discuss polygamy from a feminist perspective or even social exchange theory. 2. How are social constructionism and feminism related in the study of families? 3. Present a case study of an age-gapped family (or an age-condensed family) focusing on the consequences of this situation both for parents and children within a developmental perspective.
4. Use anthropological material to illustrate some of the different social constructions of motherhood that exist throughout the world. 5. Link the concept of the shared environment in behaviour genetics to symbolic interactionism as well as interactional-transactional perspectives.