Factors Affecting the Development of Family Structures

Introduction

The entire world is seen to be keen towards developing the highly motivating and robust family connection through acting on different learnings regarding communication, dealing with sociological and psychological perspectives. Numerous sociological and psychological concepts and theories provide comprehensive ideas to market within a society and a group of people. However, a family system is an essential aspect of social and psychological interaction, which needs to incorporate some valuable theories, concepts and perspectives to lead towards a healthy and productive family structure ( Harkonen et al., 2017). This essay is going to target and explore various psychological and sociological ideas and will show how these concepts can be applied to a family. For this, a case study is selected about a family based on two parents and two children. The respective family scenario will be used to incorporate different factors involved in the development of family structure and to explain the contemporary ideas of a family using sociological perspectives. This essay will also discuss the stages of action affecting the individual needs within a family structure. Keeping the given scenario in consideration, the concepts of neuroscience and life experiences affecting the well-being and resilience of individuals will also be included.

Main Body

Factors affecting the development of family structures

Some major psychological and sociological concepts and factors play a huge role in developing common family structures and understandings. One of those factors is the divorce. According to the given scenario, both Kenny Stone and his wife, Maggie Stone, who is now married, were divorced before. The divorce can probably harm a healthy family system, and the evidence is also present in the case too. The daughter of Maggie named, Harriet is a 12 years old girl who does not find a spark in her life anymore. This could be due to a broken family, and she has not seen her birth father around so that her personality could shape perfectly ( Bastaits et al., 2016). Another factor shaping the roles and developing the family structures is the poverty status which, according to the scenario, is faced by Kenny. Maggie, who took hold to look after the home and children, resulted in the increased pressure of work on Kenny, which eventually made him get frustrated with life. Therefore, the increased financial pressure also proves to affect the healthy development of family structures and roles ( Hadfield et al., 2016). The third most important factor is women’s rights or feminism. If the women of a household are not given the proper rights to survive, a healthy family cannot take over ( Allen, 2016). As per the scenario, Kenny kept on checking the location of Maggie on her phone to make sure she was at home and taking care of the children and the house. There, he forgot to give her the right to live with a free will because he believed her to stay home. Here the request of a woman is being violated, and definitely, the development of a healthy family structure and roles are affected negatively.

Similarities and differences among family ideas using sociological perspectives

The society depicts the contemporary ideas of the family typically while using the sociological perspectives. These ideas may vary due to some significant differences and can have some similarities too. The first similarity is among families with a sociological perspective: men are supposed to be the breadwinner for a family that is depicting the functionalism ( Steffenmeier et al., 2017). As per the given case study, Kenny was working to make a living for his family but felt a massive burden on himself which is usually experienced by most of the men in the family system. Another similarity among the contemporary ideas of the family is that the majority of women are perceived to stay at home taking responsibility for children and home ( Shockley et al., 2017). The scenario also depicted this condition where Kenny asked Maggie to stay at home and look after the children. Above are the similarities among common family ideas, while some significant differences in the societal perspectives are also observed. One difference is that people now prefer not to live in a nuclear family. This means that the concept of the extended family system is increasing day by day due to some reason ( Turner, 2017). However, this does not link to the given scenario because Kenny and Maggie lived in a nuclear family with their two children. Still, there was probably a need for other family members to connect with them after having arguments and violence. The second difference between family perspectives and ideas is that women now work and prefer to support their husband and parents by earning a living. Feminism is a sociological perspective in this scenario according to which men and women are equal, and both can make for a living ( Tomlinson, 2017). This sociological perspective can be applied to the given case when Maggie is seen working women, but later on, she had to leave her job as a retail assistant to spend more time taking care of children and home. This is a common difference found in the sociological family ideas where some women prefer to work and earn money while some want to stay at home and look after their children.

Evaluation of sociological concepts

The functionalism and feminist perspectives of the family systems have explained a lot of concepts which cover the family roles that are needed to be taken care of. The first sociological concept related to the part of the family is violence and abuse. A lot of reports and evidence are present which prove that marital abuse and violence are on the top list today worldwide ( Arruzza, 2016). Linking this concept to the given scenario demonstrates that Kenny, who was the breadwinner of the family, was not satisfied with what his wife did and had many financial burdens. Due to his habit of drinking and going back home late every other night led to the argument and eventually towards the acts of violence towards Maggie. Another family role related to the sociological concept is mental health. This concept is quite important because of this link to other images of social life. According to the given case, Harriet, who is the daughter of Kenny, is going through anxiety which is a significant mental health issue. Due to this problem, she cannot fulfil her emotional needs linked to her relationship as she is close to her father, who is less available to her. The concept of divorce and separation also plays an essential role in shaping family roles. Both the parent, in this case, Maggie and Kenny, are divorced parents and yet are unable to provide complete support being a couple to their children and failed to perform their role are perfect parents.

Stages of development affecting individual needs

Plenty of theories and models have been proposed discussing the stages and steps towards human nature and personality development. The ability to deal with family members and conquering the field of communication is the ultimate goal which requires a person to go through some significant developmental stages. According to Piaget’s theory explaining human development stages, the last stage is ‘formal operation’. This stage is the previous one, fitting individuals older than eleven years. This stage impacts a lot of individual needs by enhancing the theoretical thinking of a person ( Hanfsting et al., 2019). This means that an individual gets able to plan things based on reasoning and logic, and this eventually fulfils his psychological and sociological needs. Maslow’s 5 stage hierarchy of needs is another world-famous theory proposed by Abraham Maslow ( Hopper, 2019). According to this theory, the 4^th stage of development is ‘self-esteem’. The esteem need of an individual involves the desire to feel good and accomplished about oneself ( Lonn et al., 2017). Self-confidence and a good feeling about oneself is the primary goal. According to the given case, the self-esteem needs of Maggie and Harriet needs to be fulfilled. Another developmental stage of Maslow’s theory is ‘self-actualization’, which comes just above the self-esteem. This means that only an individual with good self-esteem can reach this stage, and this is, however, one of the human needs. Self-actualization refers to being fulfilled and accomplished or having a feeling of living up to the highest potential ( Jonas, 2016). In the given case, the son of Maggie, Jason, seems to have better self-esteem because he is good at studying and wants to achieve more in life. Simultaneously, Kenny, Maggie and Harriet need to accomplish these development stages to fulfil their individual needs.

Evaluation of the concept of neuroscience

In addition to evaluating the normal development of the human body and the activity of the nervous system, neuroscience plays an essential role in studying the disorders and diseases related to the nervous system and how it shapes attitudes and behaviours. To understand the concept of neuroscience, the selected area of human development is emotional. According to the case study, the actions and beliefs of all persons are deeply linked to the emotional attitudes and perspectives. However, neurotransmitters can connect the specific areas of the brain, referring to behaviours, and moods whose malfunctions can lead to mood swings aggression and anxiety ( Zhao et al., 2019). As per the given case, all the family members have gone through a hard time while dealing with each other and outsiders too. Thus neurotransmitters play an important role in formulating their attitudes and behaviours, due to which Kenny violated his wife’s rights, and Harriet did not find attractive in life. Another concept related to neuroscience is “nature vs nurture”, which has a high impact on the emotional area of human development. Nature is what a person gets when he/ she comes into the world influenced by genetic inheritance and other biological factors ( Kong et al., 2018). At the same time, nurture is perceived as the influence of external factors after conception. The life experiences of Kenny, Maggie and their children, the products of exposure and learning, all come under nurturing behaviour of their development.

Life experiences affecting wellbeing and resilience

Most provided evidence proves that life experiences related to human development and family interactions often have a profound impact on wellbeing and resilience. First of all, mental health issues can adversely affect how a person lives and interact with others. As per the given case, Harriet and Maggie are found to suffer from mental health issues because Harriet is unable to feel good about herself, and the same is with Maggie. This life experience of both lets them invade their psychological, emotional, social and spiritual needs ( Brigham et al., 2018). They are found to get failed in making life choices. In terms of resilience, mental health issues stopped them from seeing the positive sides of their lives and made them hopeless. Violence can also lead to an enormous and sensitive life experience, affecting the wellbeing and resilience of an individual (Satici, 2016). The argument which took place between Maggie and her husband always ended up at violence which had quite a negative impact on the personalities of every individual present in their family. However, this life experience affected the well-being spiritually and how Maggie felt about herself. Her ability to control and fight back was not enough, and she ended up breaking herself down emotionally. The third life experience may happen in the form of poverty. The poverty was experienced by Kenny and Maggi when the entire financial burden was over Kenny, which negatively affected wellbeing in the form of inability to fulfil the sense of security and provision of better life facilities to the children.

Conclusion

Based on the above discussion related to psychological and sociological concepts of human development, it can be evaluated that all these concepts and perspectives are positively linked to the typical family roles and experiences. The case was given to fit all the asked points about how they fit into the scenario. From the above discussion, it is concluded that life experiences, psychological and social concepts play a huge role in shaping the personalities and behaviours of individuals. Moreover, the expected differences and similarities found in family ideas also gave a picture of family structure and roles.

References

1. Allen, K.R., 2016. Feminist theory in family studies: History, reflection, and critique. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 8(2), pp.207-224.
2. Arruzza, C., 2016. Functionalist, determinist, reductionist: Social reproduction feminism and its critics. Science & Society, 80(1), pp.9-30.
3. Bastaits, K. and Mortelmans, D., 2016. Parenting as mediator between post-divorce family structure and children’s well-being. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 25(7), pp.2178-2188.
4. Brigham, T., Barden, C., Dopp, A.L., Hengerer, A., Kaplan, J., Malone, B., Martin, C., McHugh, M. and Nora, L.M., 2018. A journey to construct an all-encompassing conceptual model of factors affecting clinician well-being and resilience. NAM Perspectives.
5. Hadfield, K., Amos, M., Ungar, M., Gosselin, J. and Ganong, L., 2018. Do changes to family structure affect child and family outcomes? A systematic review of the instability hypothesis. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 10(1), pp.87-110.
6. Hanfstingl, B., Benke, G. and Zhang, Y., 2019. Comparing variation theory with Piaget’s theory of cognitive development: more similarities than differences? Educational Action Research, 27(4), pp.511-526.
7. Härkönen, J., Bernardi, F. and Boertien, D., 2017. Family dynamics and child outcomes: An overview of research and open questions. European Journal of Population, 33(2), pp.163-184.
8. Hopper, E., 2019. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs explained. Viitattu, 12, p.2019.
9. Jonas, J., 2016. Making practical use of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs theory to motivate employees: a case of Masvingo Polytechnic. Journal of Management & Administration, 2016(2), pp.105-117.
10. Kong, A., Thorleifsson, G., Frigge, M.L., Vilhjalmsson, B.J., Young, A.I., Thorgeirsson, T.E., Benonisdottir, S., Oddsson, A., Halldorsson, B.V., Masson, G. and Gudbjartsson, D.F., 2018. The nature of nurture: Effects of parental genotypes. Science, 359(6374), pp.424-428.
11. Lonn, M.R. and Dantzler, J.Z., 2017. A practical approach to counselling refugees: Applying Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Journal of Counselor Practice, 8(2), pp.61-82.
12. Satici, S.A., 2016. Psychological vulnerability, resilience, and subjective well-being: The mediating role of hope. Personality and Individual Differences, 102, pp.68-73.
13. Shockley, K.M., Shen, W., DeNunzio, M.M., Arvan, M.L. and Knudsen, E.A., 2017. Disentangling the relationship between gender and work–family conflict: An integration of theoretical perspectives using meta-analytic methods. Journal of Applied Psychology, 102(12), p.1601.
14. Steffensmeier, D., Painter-Davis, N. and Ulmer, J., 2017. Intersectionality of race, ethnicity, gender, and age on criminal punishment. Sociological Perspectives, 60(4), pp.810-833.
15. Tomlinson, S., 2017. A sociology of special and inclusive education: Exploring the manufacture of inability. Taylor & Francis.
16. Turner, R. ed., 2017. Social psychology: Sociological perspectives. Routledge.

Zhao, X.E., He, Y., Zhu, S., Xu, Y., You, J., Bai, Y. and Liu, H., 2019. Stable isotope labelling derivatization and magnetic dispersive solid phase extraction coupled with UHPLC-MS/MS for the measurement of brain neurotransmitters in post-stroke depression rats administrated with gastrodin. Analytica Chimica Acta, 1051, pp.73-81.