Sociology of Families (SOCI 371) Lecture Notes PDF

SOCIOLOGY OF FAMILIES (SOCI 371) DR. GBENGA ADEJARE  INTERGENERATIONAL TIES Changes, Challenges, and Opportunities Across Ages And Generations Background Is nuclear family still ideal? Is it threatened, or a threat? https://youtu.be/6dtYa6mzPow Introduction cont’d Two key demographic tr...

SOCIOLOGY OF FAMILIES (SOCI 371) DR. GBENGA ADEJARE  INTERGENERATIONAL TIES Changes, Challenges, and Opportunities Across Ages And Generations Background Is nuclear family still ideal? Is it threatened, or a threat? https://youtu.be/6dtYa6mzPow Introduction cont’d Two key demographic trends re-shaping family life: Decrease in fertility rate Increase in life expectancy Adult children and their older parents today spend more years together over the life course than at any other time in history Family life often associated with key transitions that reflect a progression into old age Introduction cont’d Life course transitions involve home-leaving, marriage, parenthood, grandparenthood, caregiving, the death of older relatives, widowhood, etc. As they age, individuals and families become more varied and diverse Sometimes, transitions are delayed, truncated, or altered by societal factors, individual choice, and cultural expectations Some argue that family ties have lost much of their meaning, that bonds and rituals are less salient than they were for previous generations, and that families abandon their older members Demography: What Aging Families Look Like The profile of aging families today is historically different: - Smaller size, fewer marriages, less fecundity, more childless couples, older first-time parents, and higher life expectancy Difficult to assign distinct structural markers, such as age, to entrance and exit from life-course stages. 65 years as a number signaling entry to “old age” is becoming problematic Chronological vs functional aging  Aging as a social construct Just as there are no clear definitions of childhood, there are no clear definitions of old. The social definition of old age varies from society to society Old people may be expected to be active or inactive, relatively dependent or independent. They may be given high or low social statuses. Jane Pilcher gave us a number of reasons why this is so. 7  Aging as a social construct cont’d Jane Pilcher gave us a number of reasons why this is so: The type of social organization. E.g. Nomadic setting tend not to value elderly as they are seen as burden The importance of the skills and knowledge of the elderly to the society The control the elderly have over economic resources also affects their social position 8 Demography: Family at Mid-life What Families Look Like in Mid Life: Co-residence, home-leaving, and home returning Intergenerational co-residence common The transition to parenthood delayed into the thirties for many Canadians Phenomenon of “sandwich” generation Demography: Later Life What Families Look Like in Later Life: Living longer in old age Images of physical and mental decline associated with later life are changing: “Seventy is the new fifty” The co-longevity of different generations Decrease in the proportion of one’s adult life spent raising children Co-longevity has resulted in an increase in the number of years spent in the empty nest phase of life which may be contradicted by the phenomenon of “boomerang children” Demography: Later Life Cont’d. Co-longevity impacts other family relationships, like sibling ties and marital relations Despite the prevalence of divorce, couples that remain married long enough to celebrate a seventieth wedding anniversary are increasingly common A key message so far is that families change and evolve. Demography: Mid-life and Later-life The parameters of mid- and later-life in the family literature not defined by age marker alone but by various transitions Demographic changes highlight the evolving nature of mid-life Later years of mid-life referred to as “empty nest” stage—with adult children gone Past few decades have witnessed the phenomenon of “cluttered nest” Transitions throughout Family Life For much of the twentieth century, transitions have given a particular structure or staging to family life These stages involve: Adult children leaving home, marriage-related transitions, grandparenthood; episodes of illness for aging parents; death of parents; widowhood; and old age and the onset of frailty Transitions throughout Family Life cont’d Focus on changing sets of mid-life transitions: Children leaving and returning, childlessness, grandparenthood, divorce, widowhood, and remarriage These are characterize as new or non-transitions, and transitions delayed, redefined, and reframed. Transitions throughout Family Life cont’d A Transition Delayed: Leaving Home Children’s financial needs are a key factor influencing home- leaving Mid-life parents providing financial support to their co- resident children Delayed home-leaving among young adults attributed to the long-term trend towards the postponement of marriage Transitions throughout Family Life cont’d A Transition Delayed: Leaving Home, cont’d Family structure affects home-leaving behaviour Decreased likelihood that adult children will live at home if parents are divorced or a parent is widowed Children are not always satisfied with co-residence although it may serve their needs Transitions throughout Family Life cont’d A New Transition: Returning Home The increasing cases of “boomerang kids” Consequences of a “cluttered” nest for home-returning children and parents Economic needs and/or marital status transition may be the reasons for return Positive and negative effects of returning home on family relationships Continued and return co-residence not considered normative by Canadian society Intergenerational ambivalence may be experienced as a consequence  Transitions throughout Family Life cont’d Transitions Redefined: Grandparenthood The rise of grandparenting role seen as “redefined”– longevity accounts for more grandparents seeing the adolescents and young adult grandchildren Grandparenthood best understood as mediated in a three-generation context Grandparenthood experienced differently when there are two generations of grandparents in a family at the same time Dynamics in Aging Families Caring and support between the generations: Intra-generational and intergenerational care Aging in place: remaining living at home even with complex physical and cognitive challenges Understanding Family Dynamics: Ambivalence Contradictions in family relationships Diversity in Family Forms and Perspectives Ethnicity: 31 per cent of people aged 65 years and older were born outside Canada compared with 22 per cent of the population as a whole The intersection of ethnicity and immigrant status has implications for several of the transitions considered here, such as continuing co-residence in mid- and later life families The importance of cultural exigencies is also evident for post- immigrant racialized families For later-life transitions, ethnicity influences the nature of relationships in families  Diversity in Family Forms and Perspectives, cont’d Gender: A striking characteristic of Canada’s older adult population is the large and increasing imbalance in the proportions of men and women By age 85, women outnumber men by more than two to one Men are now more engaged as caregivers over the life course Over the past decade, there has been more research on older men’s experiences of transitions such as widowerhood and on masculinities more generally  Diversity in Family Forms and Perspectives cont’d Sexual Orientation: - LGBTQ families are becoming increasingly diverse - The caregiving relationships of LGBTQ-identified people have been recognized as important topics in the literature on social support in families - While our understandings of widowhood following long-term same-sex unions and marriages is still limited, long-partnered but unmarried opposite- sex and same-sex partners often experience what has been termed “disenfranchised grief ” Aging Families and Social Policy cont’d Social policy impact expectations and experiences of families in mid- and later life: Three issues: o mid-life parent–young adult co-residence o social support in mid-life child–older parent relationships o the diversity of aging families Population aging and the question of who provides needed care Aging Families and Social Policy cont’d There is an overall trend to shift responsibility for care in old age from governments onto individuals and families The issue of “care gap” Increases in dual-earner households, from 36 per cent of couples with children in 1976 to 69 per cent in 2015, drive this care gap The intersection of work and family role including caregiving Aging Families and Social Policy cont’d Policy to support workplaces that encourage balancing work responsibilities with caregiving Recognition of the diversity in aging Canadian families in the policy domain has been limited for the most part to issues of class, gender, and family structure Media rhetoric about the intergenerational acrimony does not represent the experience of many families  Aging Families and Social Policy cont’d Much media rhetoric casts conflict between generations, especially pitting “greedy geezers” against millennials Research and policy must inform one another in the family domain Conclusion Changing demographic patterns of families emphasized two key demographic trends re-shaping family life: fewer children and longer lives In aging families, the nature of life transitions is changing: leaving home delayed, and home-returning after leaving Bonds of connection across generations continue to show family dynamics Most care to elderly provided by family members Families are diverse, with greater heterogeneity in structures and practices in the later stages than in earlier ones