Friday April 29th, 2022
FH Assessment 3 - Power and Control in the Family
1. ‘Triple shift’ is where women must perform housework, paid work, and emotion work. This includes
childcare.
2. ‘Symmetrical family’ means the roles of husbands and wives are now much more similar. For example, a
symmetrical family is where men help women with housework and childcare, and women are given more
opportunities to go to work.
3. The ‘dark side’ of the family refers to the aspects of the family life that people don’t see because they are
negative. For example, domestic abuse is where one person controls another in methods such as physical,
emotional, psychological, and financial.
Another example would be child neglect, a child may have to suffer not being fed enough substantial food or
a lack of new materialistic things such as clothes, because their parents would rather pay for alcohol or
cigarettes etc.
A third example is restrictions/controls e.g., one may control their partner’s finances/income.
4. One explanation of domestic violence occurrence in families is the radical feminist view. This view
emphasises how patriarchal ideas can cause domestic violence against women. Millet and Firestone argue
that societies are formed from patriarchy thus, the key division of society is between males and females. In
this view, men are seen as oppressors of women, which often leads to women having to deal with domestic
abuse. In Dobash and Dobash’s research, they found that 1 in 8 women get beaten by their partner, whilst
the overall statistic (not found from their research) is 1 in 4 women, which suggests their research has an
appropriate generalisation from their sample. Although the radical feminist view can explain why females
suffer domestic abuse and are likely to be victims of it, it fails to identify that men can also suffer from
domestic violence within the household. For example, this view dismisses lesbian relationships, female
abuse against men, and child abuse. Furthermore, this view generalises males as being the aggressors
however, not all men are aggressive, as evaluated by Elliot. The materalist view also criticises the radical
feminist explanation because they argue that domestic violence stems from financial instability/problems,
rather than patriarchy.
The materalistic view explains economic factors, which if there are limits on them, can be a cause of
domestic violence. Wilkinson and Pickett view financial stress as a trigger for domestic abuse on family
members. This is because not all families have the same income thus, those on a low income and potentially
overcrowding, would be more likely to feel stressed and pressured than those who have a higher income
and larger houses (they may be fortunate enough to be able to get far away from their partner or children
whilst within their house). Overall, they found that people have an equal chance of suffering domestic
violence, but those who have more pressure, stress, and lower incomes, have a greater risk of domestic
abuse in their household. This view successfully evaluates the ways in which social inequality can be the
cause of domestic abuse. Furthermore, it can be supported as women are 3.5 times more likely to suffer
from domestic violence in lower income households than those living in a higher income household.
However, they do not identify why women are more likely to be victims or acknowledge why men can be
victims. Instead, this view is solely focused on the social inequalities, which is a much broader view than the
radical feminist view.
5. As stated in item A, gender roles and relationships have become more equal because of “changing attitudes
to gender roles and increased participation by women in the labour market.” This means that society has
changed with times, presenting more equal gender roles, and the opportunity for women to join the labour
market. As found in the British social attitudes survey, only 13% of men and 12% of women agreed that it
was the males' job to earn money, and the woman’s job to do household work and childcare. This is a major
shift from a previous year, where nearly 50% of men and women agreed with the statement. This indicates
that there has been a change in women’s position because as more women are going into work, the less
