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WhatIsMarriage.docxWhat Is Marriage?
Marriage is by nature a multifaceted institution. We deine marriage as the emo- tional and legal commitment of two people to share emotional and physical intimacy, vari- ous tasks, and economic resources.
The following nine characteristics of marriage were identiied by the late Carlfred Broderick (1992, 1993). A former president of the National Council on Family Rela- tions, Broderick found these characteristics to be common across income levels, educational levels, and ethnic and cultural groups in the United States:
• Marriage is a demographic event. Each marriage creates a social unit in society. • Marriage is the joining of two families and social networks. When individuals
marry, they marry not only each other but their partner’s family and friends. Their social network may comprise friends of both partners, but only those friends liked by both partners tend to remain friends of the couple.
• Marriage is a legal contract between the couple and the state. Each state speciies the rights and responsibilities of the partners.
• Marriage is an economic union. A married couple usually becomes a single inancial unit for most purposes. As a group, married couples are probably society’s most important inancial decision makers—buying, selling, bor- rowing, and sharing resources as one.
• Marriage is the most common living arrangement for adults. Few people choose to live alone. Marriage is also the most popular living arrangement for adults.
• Marriage is the context of most human sexual activity. Most married couples rate sexual activity positively, especially in the early years.
• Marriage is a reproductive unit. Most married couples become parents and see parenting as an important goal and a valued purpose in their lives.
• Marriage is a unit that socializes children (although children can also be raised by single parents, extended families, grandparents, and other caregivers).
• Marriage is an opportunity to develop an intimate, sharing relationship. Although many marriages fail, many others provi
Summary
• The family today is not in danger of extinction, but it is changing. The American family is more diverse today, in terms of family structure and ethnicity, than ever before.
• Somewhat under half the people marrying today will probably divorce at some time in their lives, often because they enter marriage with unrealistic expectations, marry the wrong person, marry for the wrong reasons, or have few skills to deal with the many challenges of marriage.
• Marriage is the emotional and legal commitment of two people to share emotional and physical intimacy, various tasks, and economic resources. A family is
two or more people who are committed to each other and who share intimacy, resources, decision-making responsibilities, and values.
• Some of the major trends in family structure, marriage, divorce, and remarriage are the following: There are both more families headed by single women and more stepfamilies today than there were in the 1950s and 1960s; families are smaller today; women are more likely to work outside the home after marriage; both men and women are marrying at a later age; cohabitation before marriage has increased dramatically; the divorce rate increased but has now stabilized at somewhat under 50%; and about 75% of those who divorce later remarry.
• Though not all families are strong, all families have strengths, and strengths develop over time. Strengths help families cope with stress and problems and help families better manage change.
• Marriage has many advantages for individuals, includ- ing a longer life, better health and healthier lifestyle, more money and wealth, a better sexual relationship, less domestic abuse for women, and more successful children.
• Human beings do not live and love in a vacuum. Besides being connected to special people in our lives, we are inextricably embedded in our social environ- ment. As individuals, couples, and families, we have little inluence on society, but society has a great deal of inluence on our personal attitudes and behaviors.
• There are many elements in our social environment that pose dificult challenges for couples and families. These include stress, change, and materialism; lack of time for oneself and signiicant others; the increasing use of child care outside the family; instability of couple and family relationships; violence; the use of alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs; the Internet’s effects on human relationships; changing gender roles and the balance of power in intergender relationships; urban migration and overcrowding; and inancial problems and the effects of the global economy on families.
• Community initiatives led by community members and family professionals have made some communities more supportive of youth development and building strong family relationships. These initiatives can be models for other communities.
• Surveys over the years indicate that the majority of Americans think their marriages and families are doing pretty well and that their lives are generally satisfying. Why Culture Matters
Families are families, right? Does it really matter that families have cultural histories? Yes, it does. For example, strong marriages look different in Navajo (Skogrand et al., 2008), Latino (Skogrand, Hatch, & Singh, 2008), and African American (Skogrand & Chaney, 2010) cultures. The indings of a study of Latino couples who had strong mar- riages indicated that in order to have strong marriages, couples needed to have children (Skogrand et al., 2008). The African American couples indicated that prayer, God, and church were highly important to have a strong marriage (Skogrand & Chaney, 2010). Everything that happens in families happens within a cultural context. Family members learn, and pass on to their children, the deinition of family, how intimacy is expressed, what it means to be male and female, and role expectations (Waldegrave, 2009).
Most often programs and policies focus on the values evident in mainstream society (Waldegrave, 2009). In the United States that is primarily white, middle-class individuals. White, middle-class individuals and families typically focus on individu- alism and self-determination, whereas, many members of diverse cultures think more collectively in that they value the group over oneself, and the group may be family or the community (Waldegrave, 2009). The result is that programs do not it the values and needs of diverse populations. An example is that in the ield of family inance, it is
Summary
• When viewing people from different ethnic groups, it is important to look beyond their physical qualities and get to know their personal and family strengths.
• In families we learn what it means to be a family, how intimacy is expressed, what it means to be male and female, and gender roles. Families, however, exist within a cultural context—therefore culture matters.
• Most of what we know about gay and lesbian couples and families has come from samples that are primarily European American and middle-class.
• Approximately one-fourth of gay and lesbian couples have children, and approximately 45% want to have children.
• Gay and lesbian couples experience society stigma as they develop and maintain intimate relationships. Individuals and couples develop a variety of ways to allow stigma and intimacy to coexist.
• Cultural identity evolves from shared beliefs, values, and attitudes.
• Ethnic identity refers to the geographic origin of a particular group.
• Race is based on the physical characteristics of a group of people and is a concept that is losing value. Summary
• Conceptual frameworks help describe different per- spectives on couple and family dynamics.
• Family science began more than 70 years ago and focuses on family relationships.
• Early work in the family science ield focuses on many of the same issues that receive attention today, such as poverty, housing, divorce, and marital happiness.
• The family systems theory focuses on the family as a system of interdependent parts.
• The international family strengths framework focuses on the positive characteristics of healthy families and couples.
• The family development framework examines how couples and families change across the life cycle.
• Emerging adulthood (18–25 years) has been identiied by researchers as a new stage of exploration and iden- tity development.
• The symbolic interaction framework examines the internal perceptions of family members and how they learn social rules and roles.
• The social construction framework emphasizes the importance of multiple perspectives on reality and their use in helping families meet their goals more effectively.
• The feminist framework, which focuses on the world as women perceive it, aims to empower women in all aspects of their lives.
• Family theorists have identiied three basic qualities that make couples and families stronger: cohesion,
lexibility, and communication. These three concepts are central to the family systems theory, the international family strengths framework, the family development framework, as well as other theories and frameworks.
• Cohesion focuses on the dynamic balance between the extremes of separateness and togetherness in both couple and family relationships. Balancing these two extremes entails maintaining both autonomy and intimacy but not remaining stuck at either extreme for long periods.
• Flexibility focuses on the dynamic balance between stability and change. The most functional couples and family systems have both characteristics, and they are able to move back and forth between them. Couples and families with problems over time tend to become stuck at one of the extremes, either too much stability (rigid) or too much change (chaotic).
• Communication is a facilitating dimension that can help create change in the levels of cohesion and lex- ibility when change is necessary.
• The Couple and Family Map is a tool for under- standing couple and family relationships. It is based on the family systems theory and is structured on the three dimensions of cohesion, lexibility, and communication.
• The Couple and Family Map describes three general types of family systems—balanced, midrange, and unbalanced—and can illustrate how systems change over time.
Chapter 3 | Understanding Marriage and Family Dynamics Summary
• Communication, the process of sharing messages, is an integral part of intimacy.
• In a national survey of couple communication strengths, happy couples agreed more often than unhappy couples that they were satisied with how they talked to each other as partners, had no trouble believing each other, felt their partners did not make comments that put them down, were not afraid to ask their partners for what they wanted, and felt free to express their true feelings to their partners.
• The top ive communication issues identiied by couples in a national survey were the following: They wished their partners would share their feelings; they had dificulty asking their partners for what they wanted; their partners did not understand how they felt; their partners often refused to discuss issues/ problems; and their partners made comments that put them down.
• Men and women tend to have different communication styles as a result of culturally established gender roles. Although communication styles can vary greatly from one individual to another, in general, men tend to be more competitive in their communication and women tend to be more focused on connecting emotionally with others.
• Basic principles of communication include the follow- ing: One cannot not communicate; the message sent is often not the message received; when communica- tion fails, both people are responsible for the failure; all messages convey both content information and relationship information; nonverbal communication carries about 65% of the meaning in an interper- sonal exchange; incongruent verbal and nonverbal communication can cause misunderstanding; and
metacommunication (talking about talking) is useful
for unbinding double binds. • To keep up with the relentless low of information,
ideas, and exchanges, we often ind ourselves in a state of continuous partial attention. As we attend to our e-mail, smartphone, computer, television, laptop, iPod, iPad, and so forth, we also are often trying to hold a genuine conversation with a friend. This form of multitasking, when it comes to developing and maintaining intimate relationships, simply does not work. In terms of loving relationships, continuous partial attention is disrespectful and self-defeating, for it is planting the seeds of the dissolution of our intimate bonds.
• Self-disclosure—individual revelations of personal information or feelings—is a key to the development of intimacy.
• Listening is the process of developing a full under- standing of another person’s story (situation, concern, point of view). Persuasive listeners and directive listen- ers try to control the conversation. Attentive listeners aim at fully understanding the other person’s point of view, an approach that encourages the development of genuine intimacy.
• Assertive communication assumes that expressing thoughts, feelings, and desires is the right of the indi- vidual. Passive communication is characterized by an unwillingness to say what one thinks, feels, or wants. Aggressive communication aims at hurting or putting down the other person.
• Assertiveness and self-conidence are key elements of a positive communication cycle. A negative communication cycle is characterized by avoidance and partner dominance.
• The more assertive, and less avoidant partners are, the more satisfying their relationship will be.
According to a national survey of married couples, happy couples are more able than unhappy couples to understand each other’s opinions and ideas when they discuss problems; can share feelings and ideas with their partner during disagreements; are able to resolve differences; have similar ideas about how to settle disagreements; and take disagreements seriously.
• According to the same national survey, the major conlict resolution problems that married couples experience are the following: one person ends up feeling responsible for the problem; they go out of their way to avoid conlict with their partner; they have different ideas about the best way to solve disagreements; some of their differ- ences never seem to get resolved; and they sometimes have serious disputes over unimportant issues.
• Conlict is inevitable in any intimate relationship. It can be thought of as a process that moves from decision making to problem solving to crisis resolution; making decisions when they are called for helps prevent crises.
• Most couples are afraid of negative emotions and have a dificult time learning how to deal with them. A common tendency is to suppress anger for fear of damaging the relationship. Because love and hate are so closely tied, however, the suppression of anger can lead to loss of affection in a relationship.
• Popular myths about anger include the belief that anger is caused by others, that the best way to deal with anger is to let it all out, that anger is a beneicial emotion, and that you’re a wimp if you don’t get angry.
• Intimacy and conlict are inextricably tied together. Anger keeps people from developing unhealthy dependencies on each other. Interdependence, a balance between depen- dency and independence, seems to work best.
• People manage stress and anger in a number of ways: Pursuers seek greater togetherness in a relationship; distancers want emotional space when stress is high; underfunctioners become less competent under stress; overfunctioners tend to take charge in tough times; and blamers believe everyone else is responsible for their problems. Summary
• According to a national survey, happily married cou- ples compared to unhappily married couples reported: they were more satisied with the affection they receive from their partners; they did not have as many con- cerns about their partner’s level of interest in sex; they were less likely to be concerned that their partner was interested in having an affair; they were less likely to feel the partner used sex unfairly; and they had a more satisfying and fulilling sexual relationship.
• The most commonly reported problems for married couples in terms of their sexual relationship were differing levels of interest in sex between husband and wife, dissatisfaction with the amount of affection received from one’s partner, sexual disinterest between partners, dificulty talking about sexual issues, and
an inability to keep the sexual relationship interesting
and enjoyable. • Attitudes toward sexuality, including sexual attractive-
ness and sexual behaviors, vary markedly from one culture to another. Summary
• According to a national survey, happily married cou- ples agree more often than unhappily married couples that both partners are equally willing to make adjust- ments in roles, that they are satisied with the division of housework, that it takes hard work to have an equal relationship, and that they make most decisions jointly and household tasks are divided on the basis of prefer- ences rather than tradition.
• The most commonly reported issues for married couples in their role relationship were the follow- ing: concern about unfair division of housework, housework based on traditional roles, husband not willing to adjust, wife too involved in house- work, and lack of working to maintain an equal relationship.
• Gender roles—the expectations every society has about people’s attitudes and behaviors based on whether they are male or female—are rooted in biol- ogy but heavily inluenced by culture.
• A Gallup poll indicated that males were more often perceived as aggressive, courageous, and ambitious. Females were described as emotional, affectionate, talkative, patient, and creative. There was considerable agreement across genders on these descriptions of men and women.
• Sociologist Talcott Parsons espoused a traditional view of gender roles. His theory of family roles assumed that men should be “instrumental” and women “expressive.” Parsons’s theory has been vigorously challenged and is no longer well received.
• Persistent gender-role patterns in marriage mean that women do much more of the housework in the
family than men do, which often leads to relation-
ship conlict. • In Latino/a, African American, and American Indian
cultures, as in White society, men have often been dominant in their families, but signs of change are also apparent in these cultures.
• New immigrants often have to adapt to new gen- der role dynamics as they enter the United States. Gender roles often become a hybrid of the new and the old.
• Historically prominent theories of gender-role devel- opment include the social learning theory, which is concerned with how individuals learn the behavior patterns considered appropriate for their sex; the cognitive development theory, which links the pro- gressive acquisition of gender typing to the general maturation of the child’s thinking processes; the family systems theory, which holds that the entire family must change when an individual member changes; and the feminist framework, which argues that women are exploited, devalued, and oppressed and afirms their equality with men.
• Family power is the ability of one family member to change the behavior of other family members. Power is an interactive process involving one family member who desires something from one or more other family members; these members may affect all other members in the system.
• The power balance in a marriage can be characterized in four basic ways: a husband-dominant pattern; a wife-dominant pattern; a syncratic pattern, in which authority is shared; and an autonomic pattern, in which each spouse has about equal authority but in different areas of life.
Summary
• Studies about economic issues and family are rela- tively new. These studies often draw on different disciplines and involve researchers from different disciplines.
• There are studies that show that happiness and money often go together. However, we do not know if one causes the other. It may be that things that go along with having money make the difference, such as health, less stress, or having more choices.
• The economic downturn that began in 2007 has had a dramatic affect on families. Many lost jobs and homes, and lost their hope for achieving the American dream. Some of the results of the downturn, however, resulted in families spending more time together and appreci- ating each other more.
• According to a national survey of married couples, happy couples—as compared to unhappy couples— agree on how to spend money, have no concerns about how the partner spends money, are satisied with decisions about savings, major debts are
not a problem, and inancial decisions are not
dificult. • Numerous recent studies indicate that marital hap-
piness and money are related. One national study showed that couples with great marriages had little or no debt and lived within their means.
• It has been suggested that inancial counselors and family life educators work together to help couples address both marriage issues and inancial issues.
• It is not only money in general that causes dificulties for couples but debt in particular that causes stress. Research shows that as debt goes down, maritalsatisfaction increases. It is suggested that debt affects both the amount of quality time a couple has and also how they spend that time.
• People manage their economic resources in different ways, depending on their worldviews, life experiences, and family structures.
• Although couples often think that things will get better after a divorce, divorce is inancially costly, and couples need to be aware of those potential costs as theycontemplatethisimportantlifedecision.
• White families in the United States make more money, on average, than Hispanic and African American famlies. Asian families have the highest median income. Males make more money than females, and there is a clear rela- tionship between educational level and income.
• Budgeting is the regular, systematic balancing of income and expenses. To budget successfully, individ- uals need to examine their personal values about sav- ing and spending and to monitor their plan monthly.
• Couples who pool their money are neither more nor less satisied with money management issues in the relationship than couples who have separate accounts.
• Monthly housing expenses should consume no more than 1 week’s take-home pay. Generally, buying a home is a better investment than renting.
• Credit spending, crisis spending, careless or impulsive spending, and compulsive spending are four reasons people go into excessive debt. Families who cannot reduce their debt over a period of 3 to 6 months should seek inancial and perhaps personal counseling. Summary
• Love and friendship are different. In addition, the dyna- mics of both have changed recently. Love and friendship can also look different depending on the culture.
• The love triangle, developed by Robert Sternberg, has three dimensions: decision and commitment, intimacy, and passion.
• Science shows that chemical changes occur in the brain when we fall in love and develop long-term relationships. This information may be useful in understanding why we respond as we do in courtship and marriage.
• Men and women are using the Internet to ind poten- tial partners more than ever before. In the end, only
3% of people who are married or are in committed
relationships found their partner using the Internet. • Jealousy is very connected with love and intimacy.
Although jealousy can be both functional and dysfunc- tional in a relationship, it is more often seen as prob- lematic. While both men and women get jealous, men are often upset when the partner has a sexual relation- ship with another person, and women are more often upset when the partner becomes emotionally involved with another person.
• Even though both men and women agree that self- disclosure is related to greater intimacy, it is mainly women who are good at self-disclosure. Men seek intimacy by doing activities with others; women use self-disclosure to create intimacy with others.
• Intimacy involves feeling close to and sharing one- self with another. Although marriage is an important source of intimacy, intimacy often declines after mar- riage and sometimes disappears completely. Intimacy takesagreatdealoftime,effort,andhardworkto develop and maintain.
• The ive keys to intimacy are communication, couple closeness, couple lexibility, personality compatibility, and conlict resolution. These keys are important for dating couples, cohabiting couples, premarital couples, and married couples.
• Attachment theory, based upon infancy development, applies to and can explain attachment in adult love relationships. What happens in childhood attachment affects how we interact in our adult relationships.
• Intimacy games can be either destructive or construc- tive. To minimize destructive games, it’s important to identify them, make their rules explicit, determine the hidden strategies, and make the disguised objectives clear and speciic.
• An increasing number of people in today’s society see singlehood as a viable alternative to marriage. This represents a major shift in behavior in the last decade. Summary
• Parent-arranged marriages remain common—and are effective—in many nonindustrialized cultures today, but in the United States, individual-choice courtship is the norm.
• Online dating has been the focus of study recently, indicating that all kinds of new rules apply to this type of partnering. For example, individuals need to make sure they are safe in meeting someone in person after connecting online, and they need to know they cannot always trust what the person says online.
• Research on dating reveals that older individuals experience the same emotions as young people. They may be more direct and move more quickly into a relationship, because they have less time left in their life to develop meaningful relationships.
• Many older adults choose to enter into a cohabiting relationship rather than marriage because of inancial and other considerations.
• Premarital programs are effective in helping individu- als make wise decisions in choosing a mate.
• Factors that inluence mate selection are physical attrac- tiveness, personality, age, life success, and the prin- ciples of exogamy and endogamy. The rise in ethnic diversity in the United States is changing the unwritten rules regarding mixed or intercultural marriages.
• Multiple theories are used today to explain and predict the various ways couples enter into relationships. In addition, there has been increased attention to how people choose a mate in different life stages.
• In dating relationships the incidence of reported vio- lence is 25% for women and 10% for men. Violent dates are likely to become violent mates.
• Cohabitation is more popular than ever as a way for many Americans to move from being single to becoming married. Though it remains a controversial issue for many people, from a statistical standpoint it has become the norm to cohabit before marriage. The majority of all marriages are preceded by cohabitation, with the rate being 68% for irst marriages and up to 80% to 85% for remarriages.
• Cohabitation is likely to spark spirited discussion in your family among the different generations, and it certainly generates controversy and study after study after study among researchers. Some investigators argue that their indings indicate that cohabitation is not a good way
