. 2-1 Copyright 2010 McGraw-Hill Australia Pty Ltd PPTs to accompany Claiborne & Drewery, Human...

. 2-1Copyright 2010 McGraw-Hill Australia Pty Ltd PPTs to accompany Claiborne & Drewery, Human Development

Chapter 2

Development in families

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The family: a complex, constructed ecology

• The family is nested within a complex set of political, social, historical and cultural settings

• The family is an important repository of resources for learning– A family has its own stories, meanings, preoccupations

• Relationships within the family are multi-dimensional

• Family relationships change over time• Families are broader than the nuclear “ideal”

2-2Copyright 2010 McGraw-Hill Australia Pty Ltd PPTs to accompany Claiborne & Drewery, Human Development

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The influential ecology of the family

• The family sets in place patterns of relationship and learning that will influence how we go on, sometimes through our entire lives

• Culture lives through family• Meanings are presented and developed within and

through family life• Familiar or habitual ways of behaving, including

emoting, relating and interacting, are usually established first in the family


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Dominating ideas about family

• There are many powerful beliefs about what is right in family life

• These ideas vary from culture to culture, and moment to moment in history

• If people think that their ideas reflect the ‘natural’ order, they will try very hard to maintain that order

• Developmental psychologists advise on what is ‘normal’ in family life


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Family as committed relationship

• Genetic relationship– Your biological parents will always be your biological

relatives

• A place of nurture– What counts as nurture is a focus of study in human

development

• Sharing economic livelihood– Different cultures have different approaches to shared

livelihood

• Families are held together by emotional ties– In some cultures (but not all), love is the foundation of the

family, and holds it together

Copyright 2010 McGraw-Hill Australia Pty Ltd PPTs to accompany Claiborne & Drewery, Human Development 2-5

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Whanaungatanga: maintaining common history and identity

• Ancestral connections to land (tūrangawaewae)• Iwi connections: whakapapa (genealogy)• Common language (A.Durie, 1997)

• Manaaki : the capacity for care and respect of every member

• Tohatohatia: the capacity to share, generosity• Whakamana: empowering its members• Whakatakoto tikanga: envisioning the future

(M.Durie, 1997)


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Levels of relationship in Māoridom

• Iwi: a people, tribe or nation; persons with shared ancestry and history

• Hapū: an extended family grouping• Whānau: group of people who relate closely to

one another• Whāngai: to adopt a child from within the broader

whānau; a person adopted into the whānau


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Iwi roles and responsibilities

• Kaumātua: responsible elder• Kuia: elder woman• Mātua: adult, father (signal of respect)• Pakeke: adult, worker• Rangatahi: youth, younger person• Tuakana: elder brother (of a male), elder sister (of

female)• Teina: younger brother (of a male), younger sister

(of a female)• Tamaiti: child• Tamariki: children


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Demography of Māori whānau

• Before 1960, average 6+ births per wahine• Fewer marriages per head of population• By 1990, down to about 2, similar to Pākehā

women• 2000s 2.6+ births per wahine• Median age of giving birth 26 years• Median age for Pākehā women: 30 years, and

average less than 2 births per woman.• In 2006, tamaiti aged under 15 >35% of Māori

population in Aotearoa (compared with 20% for Pākehā)


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Social changes and the family in NZ

• Families are spread around the country and around the world

• Lengthening lifespan means more generations are alive at the same time

• More women are going out to work• Child-bearing and child-rearing are taking a

smaller proportion of a woman’s lifespan• Many nuclear families have two parents in the paid

work force• Single person households, and households with

one parent and children, are increasing


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What is best for families?

• More mothers are working outside the home• More families have both parents in paid work• More generations are alive at the same time BUT• There are more single person households• Fewer families where the mother stays home and

the father goes out to work • There are more single parent families• Most single parent families are led by a woman at

or approaching mid-life• Many children live in poverty


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Effects of immigration

• Immigration means adjustment – but we don’t all want to lose our culture of origin

• Intergenerational families are more common in ‘less-developed’ countries

• Attitudes differ in whether children in the family are expected to contribute to the family business

• Immigration may mean some generations are left behind

• This can also happen when young people leave Aotearoa and settle elsewhere


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Influential theories of development

• Does the nuclear family form serve development better than other forms?

• Theorists Freud and Erikson have helped support the idea that what happens to you in childhood has an enduring influence on who you will become

• Most Euro-Western cultures accept that quality of relationships within families is important

• Understanding of ‘quality’ relationship is a cultural construct


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Maternal deprivation

• Concept proposed by John Bowlby – Studies of displaced and homeless children in two world

wars– Children were often kept lying in cots– Distress of these children was ascribed to lack of

mothering

• Can you think of other reasons why these children would be distressed?


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Theory of attachment

• Attachment forms the basis for development:– To develop a sense of self (individuation)– To become socially competent– To be assured enough to explore their environment

• Tests for attachment include:– Strange situation experiment

• Children may be categorised as:– Securely attached – Avoidant – Ambivalent or resistant


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Developments in attachment theory

• These traits are seen as patterns of relating with others

• Recently hypothesised to persist into adulthood• Possibly reflected in patterns of intimate relating• Bonds with significant others are often seen as

lacking in young offenders• Developing the capacity for attachment has

become a therapeutic goal in clinical work with offenders


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Critiques of attachment theory

• Many cultures expect responsibility for children’s upbringing to be shared

• This includes working class families who often share care of children

• Many children in middle and upper class 19th century England were brought up by nannies or in boarding schools

• Children may have several significant others• Quality of care is found to be more important than

who is doing the caring


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Fathers

• Research continues to suggest that mothers spend more time than fathers caring for children

• How to offer quality care is learned• Both mothers and fathers can learn how to care for

even very small children• We do not espouse the idea that mothers have a

genetic or ethological advantage• Fathers can be good ‘mothers’!• Fathers’ role in children’s lives is related to

structures of paid work in society


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Do families ‘break down’?

• The idea that families work best with a mother and a father in the same home may be correct

• It has been found that conflict in families is more destructive of children’s well-being than the presence of both parents

• Children can recover well from separation and divorce of their parents

• Parents will always be the parents of their children• The quality of parents’ cooperation (or lack of it)

after separation affects the children more than the separation itself


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Different family forms

• There are many different kinds of family• Couples without children can be the target of

social pressure• There is no evidence to suggest that children

growing up in “Rainbow” families are deprived• Single parent families are often under stress

because of lack of income (see also chapter 10)• Single parent families can be just as healthy or

unhealthy an environment for children as two parent families

• The quality of care is important


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Complex constructionist ecology

• Developmental outcomes are the result of complex interactions in families and outside them

• Complexity: within the family there are many different relationships and many influences at work

• Thinking ecologically: the family is nested within a complex of other networks of relationship

• The quality of care for children is the primary issue in developmental outcomes

• Development is constructed. Mothering and fathering are products of multiple influences; quality of parenting is not inevitable or ‘natural’.


. 2-1 Copyright 2010 McGraw-Hill Australia Pty Ltd PPTs to accompany Claiborne & Drewery, Human...

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