This document outlines all the notes needed to get an A* in the 2023/24 Sociology A Level exams. Content was taken from an examination marker and turned into a decidable document, ensuring it contains key concepts/theories and their thorough analysis. It is best to practice exam questions alongside...
Boomerang – an adult child who returns home after living away for a period.
Beanpole – a long family line that consists of few aunts, uncles and grandparents.
Chosen families – a group of individuals you consider as family, with no blood or law relation
to each other.
Extended family – a multigenerational household
Fictive kin – a group of individuals you consider as family, with no blood or law relation to
each other.
Living apart together – a family that lives separately.
Lone parent family – a single parent household. Matrifocal = mother headed. Patrifocal =
father headed.
Negotiated family – a family that doesn’t conform to traditional norms, they enter the
relationship on an equal basis with values that vary according to expectations and wishes of
each member.
Neo-conventional family – a nuclear family with both heterosexual parents working.
Nuclear family – a two generational household with a heterosexual couple with dependent
children and a male breadwinner.
Modified extended family – multigenerational family members that live closely to each other.
Patriarchal family – a male headed two generational household.
Personal life communities – a group o. individuals you consider each other as family, with no
blood or law relationship to each other.
Reconstituted family – couples that bring a child (or children) to a new relationship from their
previous family.
Same sex family – a homosexual couple with dependent children.
Singleton household – a person that lives alone in a household.
Symmetrical family – a family where both spouses go to work for wages and share domestic
labor equally.
Zombie family – an unstable family used for support and to protect from risks.
, Lesson One: Functionalist Theories Of The Nuclear Family:
Murdock:
Murdock analysed a biased sample of 244 societies and found that the nuclear family was
universal because it was a functional prerequisite. All humans face the same issues
surrounding fourmain functions - economic, educational, reproductive and sexual needs.
These are structural imperatives which every society must solve; using deductive logic he
concluded that the nuclear family maintained society.
Evaluations:
Rapoports - since the 1970’s, the nuclear family in the UK has diminished by ⅓. Lone
parents have increased three-fold. Due to British diversity, we will never have a dominant
family type.
Barrett and Mclntosh argue that Murdock’s claim can be criticised as being functionally
deterministic. By choosing an exclusive (narrow) definition of family based on procreation,
Murdock ‘un-Defines' other family structures as being dysfunctional for society.
Walby - it’s essentially ideological because traditional family structures disadvantage women.
This prevents him from acknowledging that children develop their own personalities so may
choose to be a part of a different family type when they’re older.
Oakley - malestream in assuming that the family is functional for all. Ignores the ‘dark side’
such as abuse.
Giddens - the implications of historical cultural differences indicate it’s only possible to talk
about human relationships as universal. All throughout the world relationships can be found,
these just may not be of the nuclear type.
Chester - challenges generalizability of historical and cultural differences in relationship
structures. Living in a nuclear family is a phase that most go through during their life cycle.
It’s still significant in contemporary British society.
Murdock’s theory is based on an ‘ideology of familism’ - the idea of a perfect nuclear family
which is biassed because it’s not based on reality or necessity. The process of
dis-embedding and de-traditionalism has created individualism which has created more
family diversity. His views are basic and irreducible which prevents him from examining other
family types.
Parsons:
Pre-industrialisation we lived in extended families as we relied on each other for support.
Post-industrialisation children had to become geographically mobile, motivated by social
mobility, which caused the size of families to shrink, as explained by his functional fit theory.
The welfare state led to less reliance on relatives, causing the evolution of the nuclear family.
The nuclear family performs primary socialisation of children and stabilisation of adult
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