Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Respect is an important value to be taught when growing up. Through the years I have learned that in order to learn anything you must have respect for others. I have learned many valuable lessons from listening to my grandmother. She has told me many of her experiences, which has made me a better person. Having respect for other people has allowed me to be more open-minded and see qualities in people that most would not. I have always listened to what my friends and family has to say. That doesn’t always mean that I agree with them, but it is their opinion, so I respect it. In return I receive respect from them. As people begin to respect me more their trust in me also grows. Trust is a value that was very hard for me to learn. I was always afraid that someone was going to hurt me one way or another. My mother was always telling me that I should learn to trust others so that they could help me from time to time, but I never could do it. Eventually I finally learned to trust others a few years ago. I have realized that other people can do many things for you if you just trust in them. This helps me in the relationships I have with my friends. In addition to demographic change, several social changes over the twentieth century have altered family relations involving older people. First, alternative family forms (blended families, single parent families, cohabiting relationships, gay and lesbian unions) have become more common and more accepted. It is not clear how this diversity of “family” forms will affect the lives of older people in the twenty-first century. On the one hand, the plurality of forms may create a broader range of available kinship ties. On the other hand, these alternative kin relationships may not be as strong as the enduring parent-child relationships that have been the primary source of long-term caregiving for disabled older people. The negative effect of divorce on the strength of intergenerational relationships tends to be more significant for males than females.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay PaperMore than half the children in the United States are living in homes without two married parents.  In fact, in 2013, the Pew Research Center explained that 46% of kids under 18 years of age are living with parents in their first marriage; 34% are with a single parent, 15% are with two parents, one or both of whom are remarried; and 5 % have no parents at home.

Family life becomes much more demanding when one parent shoulders the responsibilities of the household. Kids in single-parent families sometimes feel cheated or feel a sense of loss. Because single-parent families result from different circumstances, it is important for single parents to recognize the specific needs of their children.

Families

In human context, a family is a group of people affiliated by consanguinity, affinity, or co-residence. In most societies, it is the principal institution for the socialization of children. Occasionally, there emerge new concepts of family that break with traditional conceptions of family, or those that are transplanted via migration, but these beliefs do not always persist in new cultural space. As a unit of socialization, the family is the object of analysis for certain scholars. For sociologists, the family is considered to be the agency of primary socialization and is called the first focal socialization agency. The values learned during childhood are considered to be the most important a human child will learn during its development.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Conjugal and Consanguineal Families

A “conjugal” family includes only a husband, a wife, and unmarried children who are not of age. In sociological literature, the most common form of this family is often referred to as a nuclear family. In contrast, a “consanguineal” family consists of a parent, his or her children, and other relatives. Consanguinity is defined as the property of belonging to the same kinship as another person. In that respect, consanguinity is the quality of being descended from the same ancestor as another person.

Other Types of Families

A “matrilocal” family consists of a mother and her children. Generally, these children are her biological offspring, although adoption is practiced in nearly every society. This kind of family is common where women independently have the resources to rear children by themselves, or where men are more mobile than women.

Common in the western societies, the model of the family triangle, where the husband, wife, and children are isolated from the outside, is also called the oedipal model of the family. This family arrangement is considered patriarchal.

The impact of industrialization on kinship has
been no less dramatic. The consequences for
kinship, can be seen in its changing functions,
smaller size, altered composition, and changing
roles of its members
In industrial societies, many of the familys
traditional functions have been eliminated or
greatly altered.The family is now an
economic unit only in terms of consumption,
not of production. Families no longer control
the political system; nepotism may still occur,
but it is not accepted as legitimate. Schools,
religious groups, and other organizations have
assumed much of the responsibility for the
education, socialization, and supervision of
children, and a wide variety of organizations,
from youth groups to summer camps and
universities, have taken over the task of
providing young people with the skills they will
need in their adult lives Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper
Some of the most critical functions, however,
still fall to the nuclear family ).
Marriage today is taken for more personal
reasons and is undertaken primarily to enhance
personal happiness

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Many sociologists argue that the family has lost a number of its functions in modern industrial society. Institutions such as business, political parties, schools, and welfare organizations now specialize in functions formerly performed by the family.

Talcott Parsons argues that the family has become ‘on the “macroscopic” levels, almost completely functionless. It does not itself, except here and there, engage in much economic production; it is not a significant unit in the political power system; it is not a major direct agency of integration of the larger society.

Its individual members participate in all these functions, but they do so as “individuals”, not in their roles as family members’. However, this does not mean that the family is declining in importance. It has simply become more specialized. Parsons maintains that its role is still vital.

By structuring the personalities of the young and stabilizing the personalities of adults, the family provides its members with the psychological training and support necessary to meet the requirements of the social system.

This view is supported by N. Dennis who argues that impersonal bureaucratic agencies have taken over many of the family’s functions. As a result the warmth and close supportive relationships which existed when the family performed a large range of functions have largely disappeared.

How Have Families Changed over Time, and Why?

The structures, or forms, of the family vary as much as the definition itself. There is no single “true” family form. In Western Europe the nuclear family (a single set of biological parents residing together with their children) was prevalent in the Middle Ages, but at that same time in Eastern Europe multiple generations of the same family lived together in the same household (Coltrane and Collins, 2001). Indeed, the United States has also seen many types of family forms throughout its short history. Stephanie Coontz’s (2005) research on the history of marriage reveals that the family forms we see today in the U.S. are actually the result of an evolution of the family that began with an important shift in the culture of marriage in the mid-18^th Century.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Coontz (2005) found that only in the mid- to late-18^th Century in Western Europe and North America “did the notion of free choice and marriage for love triumph as a cultural ideal…[opening] the way for it to become an optional and fragile [institution]” thus influencing the structure of the family at that time and into the future (p. 7). Earlier in history, during the Stone and Middle Ages, marriage was not based on love and men and women had very little choice about whom they married. In the Stone Age men and women married in order to improve the economic situation of their respective clans, then in the Middle Ages and into the 18^th Century marriage served the economic and political needs of a particular extended family group (Coontz, 2005).

As marriage evolved in the mid- to late-18^th Century into a union based on love, other economic, cultural, and political shifts in the U.S. and in other nations were happening that would further influence the structure of the family. In the 19^th Century an ideal of the husband as breadwinner and the wife as homemaker became popular, but the majority of families could not achieve this ideal, as few jobs paid wages high enough to support a single-earner family. This changed as World War II ended and the U.S. experienced a time of dramatic economic growth. The economic prosperity of the time combined with the popular cultural ideal gave rise to family trends in the 1950s and early 1960s that had never been seen before. “Ozzie and Harriet” families that married young, remained married, and had many children were the major family form at this time (McLanahan and Casper, 2001). The realization of the Ozzie and Harriet ideal did not last long, however. In the late 1960s and 1970s divorce rates rose, births to unmarried women increased, and the average age of first marriage also rose. The reasons for these changes in the ’60s and ’70s were many: real wages for women rose while those for men fell, the economy weakened, wives joined the workforce due to the downturn in the economy, and women gained access to legal rights, education, birth control, and paid work (McLanahan and Casper, 2001; Coltrane and Collins, 2001). This historical examination of the evolution of the family and marriage shows that the family has constantly been under pressure to evolve and shift with changes in the economy, our values, and even politics. The evolution of marriage into an institution of love along with changes in the economy, our culture, and the political scene since the 1950s has meant that American men and women have been able to realize their ideals of the male breadwinner and marriage for the sake of love and personal freedom as time changes.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

These influences and trends in marriage, divorce, and non-marital fertility did not escape rural America. Comparing urban and rural parts of the country between 1950 and 1970 reveals, however, that rural divorce rates were lower, fewer women age 20-24 were unmarried, and the number of children per 1,000 ever married women age 35-44 was slightly higher in rural America (Brown, 1981). The changes in marriage, divorce, and fertility we observe during the 20^th Century in all parts of the U.S. demonstrate that the structure of families are changing and becoming more diverse. While there are now many forms available to people, the family itself is not disappearing.

Why Do Families Matter?

The increasing diversity of the family in the U.S. has led scholars to examine if and how different family forms are associated with different groups of people who then may experience different outcomes. Research has found that not all racial groups participate in each family type equally, thus not all family forms are equally available to all people (McLanahan and Casper, 2001). Scholars have also found that each type of family (e.g., married with kids, married with no kids, single-parent with young children, etc.) is associated with different economic, child, and health outcomes. Demographers Sara McLanahan and Lynne Casper (2001) explain that past research has found that:

Children who grow up with only one of their parents”¦are more likely to drop out of high school, to become teenage and single mothers, and to have trouble finding and keeping a steady job in young adulthood, even after adjusting for differences in parents’ socioeconomic background (McLanahan & Sandefur, 1994). (p. 6)Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

They clarify, however, that “about half of the disadvantages associated with single parenthood are due to lower incomes [of single parents]. Most of the rest are due to too little parental involvement and supervision and too much residential mobility” (p. 6). Stephanie Coontz (2005) also clarifies that the psychological, health, and economic benefits of marriage for families are due to a number of factors like: the effect of selection (people who are already healthier, more psychologically stable, and better able to manage finances tend to marry more than those who are not), the “expectations about responsibility, fidelity, and intimacy” in marriage, and the freedom to exit psychologically, physically, and economically stressful unhappy marriages (p. 309-310). While we see increasing diversity in family types in the U.S. across time it is clear that not all types lead to equal outcomes or are equally available to all.

Dennis argues that in the impersonal setting of modern industrial society, the family provides the only opportunity ‘to participate in a relationship where people are perceived and valued as whole persons’. Outside the family, individual’s must often interact with strangers in terms of a number of roles.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Adopting roles such as employee, customer, teacher and student, they are unable to express many aspects of themselves or develop deep and supportive relationships. Young and Willmott make a similar point arguing that the emotional support provided by family relationships grows in importance as the family loses many of its functions.

They claim that the family can provide some sense of wholeness and permanence to set against the more restricted and transitory roles imposed by the specialized institutions which have nourished outside the home.

The upshot is that, as the disadvantages of the new industrial and impersonal society have become more pronounced, so .the family has become more prized for its power to counteract them’. Not all sociologists argue that the family has lost many of its functions in modern industrial society.

Ronald Fletcher, a British sociologist and a staunch supporter of the family, maintains that just the opposite has happened. In The Family and Marriage in Britain Fletcher argues that not only has the family retained its functions but those functions have ‘increased in detail and importance’.

Specialized institutions such as schools and hospitals have added to and improved the family’s functions rather than superseded them. Fletcher maintains that the family’s responsibility for socializing the young is as important as it ever was.

State education has added to rather than removed this responsibility since ‘Parents are expected to do their best to guide, encourage and support their children in their educational and occupational choices and careers’.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

In the same way, the state has not removed the family’s responsibility for the physical welfare of its members. Rather than removing this function from the family, state provision of health services has served to expand and improve it.

Compared to the past, parents are preoccupied with their children’s health. State health and welfare provision has provided additional support for the family and made its members more aware of the importance of health and hygiene in the home.

Even though he admits that the family has largely lost its function as a unit of production, Fletcher argues that it still maintains a vital economic function as a unit of consumption.

Particularly in the case of the modern home-centred family, money is spent on and in the name of the family rather than individual. Thus the modern family demands fitted carpets, three-piece suites, washing television sets and ‘family’ cars.

Young and Willmott make a similar point with respect to their Stage 3 family. They argue that, ‘In its capacity as a consumer the family has also made a alliance with technology’. Industry needs both a market for its goods and a motivated workforce.

The feelings kids have about their relationships with both present and absent parents create dynamics that affects their capacity to trust.  For example, hostility and anxiety of children during divorce also generates very different kinds of emotions than the feelings of grief and resentment a child may feel when a parent dies that may affect the relationships of that child with members of the opposite sex positively or negatively. In both of these situations, however, experiences of abandonment and loneliness may interfere with a child’s ability to trust and invest in relationships.

In divorce, children often feel torn between their allegiances. Many struggle to balance or negotiate a connection with both parents. Parents are often unaware of or unable to manage the strain that their marital plight places upon their children.  While the circumstances of divorce may disable coordinating parental guidance of relationships and sex education, parents need to communicate clearly about specific relational and sexual needs that their children are confronting for their overall well-being.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

The sometimes reactive and changing moods of teens, especially in families of divorce or with children whose parents have died, can set parents into a tailspin. It’s helpful to keep in mind that many adolescent manage their angst and defy parents even in the most stable homes. When intense stressors occur for families, it’s understandable that emotions intensify that can be particularly overwhelming for single parents. At the same time, it’s important to recognize that for children, the dissolution of the family or home means dissolving both critical established relationships and parts of their very life. No matter how our children act out, it will help if we can sympathize with their needs and offer reassurance about love and intimacy.

It’s true that without direct experience of demonstrable intimacy and love between their own parents, this discussion may feel remote, yet the demonstration of accessible love for them becomes the foundation for learning lessons of how the power of love can overcome pain and loss. Building blocks for intimacy and love are created through our own relationship with our children and through working through discussions of appropriate loving and intimate experiences in relationships that we have with others or in relationships that exist around us, and in managing the struggles of emotions and communication.

To appreciate the powerful impact that a single parent can have, consider how the feelings of one mother affected her son when single parentingemerged not from the struggles of divorce but of an absent parent (Note details are changed to protect confidentiality):

Lou, a handsome, young man in his early twenties came to see me in therapy because of erectile dysfunction. A competitive kick-boxer, Lou had created a macho public persona that many women found attractive; however, Lou felt deep feelings of inadequacy that led him to overcompensate in school and work. Lou was a classic perfectionist, never letting up on himself. He knew that a medication for erectile dysfunction wouldn’t help him because he realized that the source of his difficulty was primarily emotional.

Changes in family patterns are being produced by many factors. The important among these are science and technology (industrialization), expansion of towns and cities (urbanization) and employment of men and women both within organizations outside family influence.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

The material condition of industrial-capitalist society is the main cause of change in the family. Greater affluence, geographical and occupational mobility and economic independence of (some) women are the main contributing factors for the change in patterns of residence and family life.

The global factor (technology and industrial change) is nearly encom­passing everything. Since it is everything, naturally it causes everything. Industrial change or industrialization includes not merely machines, but the science and engineering that produced them, the secular attitudes of the modern era, anti-traditionalism, job placement on the basis of competence, an open-class system, high geographical mobility and urbanization.

Industrial­ization in this enveloping sense does ’cause’ the modern social and family patterns. These changes are tending to produce a worldwide movement towards nuclear family systems, eroding extended (joint) family forms and other types of kinship group. It is opined that there is a ‘fit’ between industrial­ization and the conjugal (nuclear) family.

There is also some sort of natural harmony between the modern complex of industrialization and the conjugal system. The industrial system has increased the demand of emotional satis­faction which is provided by conjugal bond only. Thus, this family system is attuned to serve the needs of industrialization.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

The extended family system is unfit to the demands of industrialization. Decreasing emphasis on land ownership also increases the ease in mobility. The conjugal family is neo-local and its kinship network is not strong, thus it puts fewer barriers in geographical mobility.

Due to its purchasing power, the family is believed as the most important consumers buying unit by many marketers (Dalakas & Shoham, 2005). Therefore, a great number of previous studies have been done to understand how a family makes purchasing decisions over the years. As new social trends, the structure of family has changed dramatically in the past three decades in most countries in the world (Brace et al, 2008). The family is convinced as composing by parents and unmarried children in traditional mind. However, in the modern society, the definition of family has moved from only couple and children to family household. According to European Community Household Panel, a family household is a group of people who live together, share the bill and housekeeping arrangement (Askegaard et al, 2006). In view of most marketers, changes in family structures provide marketing opportunities. As the differentiation of the composition, families’ need and demand is diversified than before.

Changes in family structure and modern family

Family household types in modern society are diversified, such as single parent families, reconstituted families, unmarried cohabitation families, traditional families, couple with no children families and roommate family households. The reason of diversified family household type is that unmarried cohabitation, delayed marriage and delayed childbirth are trends for young people in the recent years. Furthermore, there have been increases in the proportion of the return of mothers to the workforce and the number of divorces and a decrease in the proportion of “intact” family unit (two biological parents and their dependent children). It is known that 76 per cent of UK children in 2004 lived in a family unit headed by a couple (UK Office of National Statistics, 2005). But, this official data does not differentiate families by couples who are intact or step parent. Also, it is acknowledged that 83 per cent of children in step parent families or single parent families live with their natural mother (Brace et al, 2008). Therefore, most of single parent households are headed by females.

Although the family types are diversified in the present day and age, intact families, step parent families and single parent families are three major types of composition for modern families. Haskey (1998) indicated there has been an obviously decline in the intact or traditional family household type and step families are more prevalent than single parent households. People are remarrying more often than before, and male is more likely to reconstitute a family than female. For example, step families are the fastest growing type of family in the UK (Mintel, 2005). There are totally 35 per cent British parents live as a non-traditional family unit. Concretely, 19 per cent of British parents are single parents. 16 per cent of British parents have children with ex-wife or ex-husband and now reconstitute families with new partners and the children (Mintel, 2005).Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Family structures have changed, which influence family decision making. Thus, some researchers argue that family communication has become more open and democratic (Belch and Willis, 2001). Particularly, the role of women has changed in the present society. The changes include education, increasing number of double-income families and the advent of career women. Further to say, these changes have impacted on family buying decisions and the role structure between family members. An increasing number of women are contributing to the incomes of their families and more women are motivated to succeed in their careers. For instance, nearly 60 per cent of women in New Zealand are employed in the workforce (Beatty & Lee, 2002). This is much higher proportion than before.

Some previous studies indicated that a person’s power to make family purchasing decisions depends on his/her ability to satisfy his/her marriage partner’s needs (Beatty & Lee, 2002). Therefore, the more a husband contributes to the resources of the family, the more the wife will accept the husband’s buying decisions. In the same way, if the wife contributes significantly to the family income, then the wife’s impact on family buying decisions would be greater than in families where the wife does not provide income to the family. It does not mean the person who contributes a dominant income to his/her family must accounts for the completely dominant position in the family buying decision making process. It is more likely that there is more equality in double-income families. Therefore, a wife’s occupational status has an obviously effect on the family decision making.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

The prevalence of women working outside the home is not only because of the necessity to help the family in finance, but also because of the changes in social and cultural trends. Therefore, women obtain more power in some families which both family members will make decisions jointly. This type of family is more likely to be called modern family and it has a more democratic influence structure. In contrast, a traditional family has a more dictatorial husband and the decisions are made more autocratic.

Family life cycle

There are many factors influence family buying decisions. Despite the family type and women’s role in the family, family life cycle (FLC) also significantly affects the family purchasing decisions. The family life cycle describes the changes that occur in family and family structures as they progress over time (Askegaard, 2006). The FLC shows the changes in both the family income and family composition over time. As the time passed, the needs and demands of families tend to change. Therefore, their preferences and behaviours will be changed. Families in similar stages of the life cycle share similar demographic, financial and buying characteristics. In contrast, families at different life cycle stages show different interests, needs and demands and use different communication strategies (Lee & Levy, 2004).Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Children’s roles in family buying decisions

Since 1990s, the growing awareness on children’s role is largely because of children’s steadily increasing impact on family buying decisions and increasing spending power (Caruana & Vassallo, 2003; Dalakas & Shoham, 2005; Fan & Li, 2010). Many previous studies pointed out that children have became an extremely vital consumer group which influences family purchases of various products in many ways (Burns et al, 2007; Caruana & Vassallo, 2003). Thus, many marketers recognize children as a primary market, an influencing market, and a future market. For example, children in the USA directly spent over $60 billion and influenced over $380 billion of spending by other members of their family per year (Chou & Wut, 2009). In Australia, the adolescents’ market is estimated to be worth about $3.9 million, and in New Zealand the market size is about $800,000 (Wimalasiri, 2004). Therefore children are increasingly attractive targets for marketers.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Children as independent consumer

In the contemporary world, as primary market, children have increasing spending power in terms of being independent customers. They are seen as different from previous generations. Today, children are more connected, more direct and more informed. They have more personal power, more money, more impact on family decisions and attractive more attention than their parents and ancestors. Most of teenagers receive allowances from their parents or eldership. Also, a great number of adolescents have income from jobs. Past study showed 51.1 per cent of the high school students admitted that they get an allowance from family members in the USA and the median amount was $50 (Dalakas & Shoham, 2003). Moreover, Chou & Wut (2009) indicated children who between ages of 2 to 12 independently spent $29 billion per year by using their own money and further to say, they indirectly influence $320 billion worth of household purchase.

Children’s influence on family buying decisions

In addition, children are also major influencers within the family decision making unit. They attempt to and succeed in influencing family purchasing decisions. Several researches have shown that the children’s degree of influence in purchase decisions varies with the type of product (Beatty & Lee, 2002). They have the most influence on buying decisions when they are the primary users of the products, for example, toys, games, and school supplies. They are also influential in purchase decisions about products which for all family members, for example, vacations, furniture, movies, and eating out. However, they have less impact on these products than in the products which they are the primary consumers. According to Dalakas & Shoham (2003) reported, 34 per cent of nine to 14-year-olds acknowledged they influenced their parents’ purchasing decisions on videogame systems, 19 per cent affected decisions on vacation choice, 18 per cent have impact on stereo equipment, and 14 per cent participated the family decisions making process on computer equipment, VCRs, and televisions. Moreover, adolescents’ influence has been affected by the cost of the products on purchasing decisions. Their influence decreased for expensive family purchases. Furthermore, they have most influence as regards product type, colour and brand.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

One of the areas where children have the major impact is food purchasing decision. Food plays a vital role in family life and it is the main expenditure for most families. Children have most influence on the food and the meals which are easy to prepare. US studies have shown that in the major categories of food and drinks, playthings and clothing and TV programmes, children have an obviously influence (Chou & Wut, 2009). In the UK, 84 per cent of parents said that their children decided what food to buy. 29 per cent parents admitted that their children impact on the choice of furniture. Even 20 per cent of parents said they like to listen to their children’s suggests about their own clothes when purchasing (Dalakas, & Shoham, 2005). Also, through a survey, cable television networks in the USA found that children affected average of 43 per cent of total purchases which are made the decisions by parents. Further to say, mothers who shop with their kids normally spend 30 per cent more than they originally plan and fathers spend 70 per cent more (Caruana & Vassallo, 2003).Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

The ways and factors for children to affect family decisions

Generally speaking, there are four different ways for children to influence family buying decisions. First, they hugely involve in affecting their parents to purchase products which they are the finally users. Second, older children buy the products which they want directly by using their own money. This money is received as allowances or salary. Third, children participated and affected their parents in family buying decisions making process for family products. Lastly, parents consult their children’s opinion for some of their own purchase. Therefore, children exert a certain influence on the overall family decisions.

Children have more influence during the problem recognition and information search stage, but their influence decreases at the finally decision making stage. Their influence can be direct or indirect. Young children more tend to impact family purchases by directly asking. However, older adolescents may use various strategies to impact their parents’ decision making. Except the direct requests, they also take other actions like bargaining, persuasion, or using emotional strategies.

A child’s age is an important related factor of the child’s influence on family decision making. Older children have fewer requests than younger children and their parents more tend to satisfy their request. The parents believe the older children have more experience with shopping and products, so they easily yield than before. Also, parents are convinced that their older children possess more understanding of economic concepts and have higher skills on shopping than younger children. Furthermore, children’s influence on family decisions is affected significantly by family type. Children in single parent families or one child families have more influence than others and the adolescents in modern families affect their families more obviously than adolescents in traditional families.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

The reasons for children influencing family decisions

In the current era, family communication has become more open and democratic. Parents pay more attention to their children and spend more time to listen to their children’s opinions. These changes in family communication caused children can exert influence on family purchasing decisions making process. Furthermore, the influence of each child has increased because of the trends of smaller number of children in families. Because of the returns of women to workforce, most families’ economic status is in good condition. It not only means parents can afford enough money to satisfy their children request, but also pushes the children to take more responsibility for family decisions. This is because working couples have little time to make decisions and have to give their children more power.

The analysis of implication for marketing

There are many factors influence the children when they making purchasing decisions and shape their habits at the present. The top three influence factors are family, friends and media. All of them have outstanding impact on children’s shopping skills and behavior. In details, the family has been believed as it has the most influence on children in the purchasing process of food products, health care products and furniture. On the other hand, friends and the media play an extremely important role in affecting the discretionary purchase of the children. In fact, most of marketers consider the media as the most powerful affecting factor to impel the children to make purchasing decisions. They are convinced the television advertising is the greatest influence marketing communication tool. Moreover, previous marketing researches also suggested the companies to access the children seriously with child friendly amenities, colourful and playful displays and even credit cards (Caruana & Vassallo, 2003).Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

In addition, it is known that most of children have low brand loyalty for most products. Because of their strong curiosity, they are easily to be attracted by original and distinct products. However, once they build the brand loyalty for one particular brand, they will be lifetime consumers for the brand.

Furthermore, for the ethic thinking, the marketers ought to avoid displaying violent or pornographic pictures to children in their advertising. This is because children are not mature enough and cannot understand the meaning of this kind of advertising. Further to say, children very like to imitate what they saw. Thus, it is dangerous for children to access violent or pornographic advertising. For example, there was lots of news regarding that children did violent events after playing violent games, such as GTA, Counterstrike, or watching violent movie.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

An analysis of the situation of children in China

Children in China have become the most significant target consumers for many marketers. This is not only because China has the largest population of children in the world, but also due to the fact that Chinese children have more economic power and influence in their families than children in other countries. Fan & Li (2010) mentioned that there are 1,321.29 million people in China at the end of 2007. Among others, 19.4 per cent (about 256.60) are under the age of 14. This made China become the largest potential market.

In the present China, children have more discretionary income compared with before and also exert a greater impact on family buying decision than other countries’ children. One couple – one child has been a basic state policy in China for a long time since the early 1970s. Therefore, as the only child in the family, both parents and grandparents give most of their love and attention to the child. Even it caused a seriously problem raised in China, the Chinese children have been considered as being like “Little emperors/empresses”. A part of parents would like to satisfy their children’s each request as possible as they can.

Due to the importance of Chinese children, marketers did many researches to seek the most relative information sources for Chinese children. Finally, they found that TV, parents, store visits and friends were ranked as the most significant sources to receive information for Chinese children (Fan & Li, 2010).

In recent years, the relationship between parents and children has profoundly changed.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

For one thing, the decision about whether or not to have children is voluntary. Electing not to have children is no longer stigmatized in the way it was.  “Child-free” adults are no longer casually dismissed as shallow and self-absorbed.

As a result, for most adults, the decision to have a child is deliberate and purposeful. Having a child represents a self-conscious decision to become a mother or father and to assume the responsibilities that parenting entails.

Whenever any change takes place, it leaves an impact on other aspects of society as well. And then these become reasons for bringing about change in the family type also. These reasons may be Economic, Social, Political or Philosophical.

Economic Reasons

(a) Industrialization:The industrial revolution brought about many changes in all types of families. Earlier the family was in real sense a virtuality self-sufficient economic unit. But as a result of industrialization, what was produced in home is now being produced in factories. Thus, the families have changed from producer-consumer entity to only a consumer unit.

(b) Material standard of living:

Previously, man used to think more on spiritual and religious lines and lived a simple and contended life. The attitude and outlook has become more materialistic and the standard of living is gradually becoming more and more materialistic and the things which were considered luxury at one time; have now become a necessity for day-to-day living. To fulfill his materialistic or worldly desires, man marries late and plans less children. He may marry for dowry or do overtime to earn more money to achieve all this.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

(c) Economic independence of women:

It all started with industrial revolution. Most household chores became easier and were quickly accomplished through mechanization or were done by outside agencies. Also the girls started getting higher education. As a result of both of these factors, women started going out of house to earn money and became economically independent. This change of economic independence also brought about many changes in the outlook, attitude and form of the family as a unit of society.

Social Reasons

(a) Urbanisation::

The rural families used to be joint, having a common occupation. As they moved to cities their structure had to change because they now have no common occupation but they are compelled to adopt separate occupations for a living and also could not find cheap big houses in cities for all the members of a joint family to live in. This made them to disintegrate into nuclear families with separate status.

(b) Mobility of population:

In order to maintain a good standard of living, people prefer to move to a new place where they get a better and more paying job. This results into mobility of families as well as society.

(c) Education of women:

With the education of girls, their average age of marrying increased. With increased awareness and better personality, they started choosing their life partners. With their education and increased independence, they have a definite and effective say in family matters. Less number of children and increased rate of divorces are also an outcome of independent thinking and attitude of girls.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

(d) New sexual morality:

In old times sexual morality had different standards for men and for women. But in modern times, moral code for men and women are same. Both are punishable for any offence.

(e) New direction of recreation:

Most of recreation today is sought outside from agencies like movies, clubs, bars, discos, video houses, etc. For this reason, members of family usually prefer to enjoy outside and devote less time for family members.

Political Reasons

(a) Change in Authority:

In old days father or head of family had a lot of power towards well being of the family, but in modern family the father has much less influence. Now the state has taken over some of the responsibilities of a family like education, health, etc.

(b) Women’s rights:

Now the women have a right to vote on the political front whereas previously they did not have a say even in their own homes. The woman now has a right to inherit father’s property by law besides a right to go to court against any crime against them. These reforms have strengthened the status of women in family, resulting in drastic changes in family patterns.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Philosophical Reasons

(a) In olden times, marriages in our society were thought to be fixed in heaven. One (especially woman) had to adjust with whatever life partner they got in the arrangement made by their elders. Marriage was thought to be a religious binding, releasing the partners from bondage only after death. But today, the attitude and outlook has changed wherein the marriage is considered to be a contract which if and when unsuitable, may be broken by either of the partners.

(b) The individuals in olden times had very close ties with the blood relations and even a person of same village or town was considered as ‘one’ this own’. This kinship and attachment of oneness is now rarely to be seen. The individuals are becoming more and more self-centered and the ‘WE’ and ‘OURS’ have been replaced by ‘I’ and ‘MINE’. This has changed the very thinking and behavior of man.

Parenting itself has become problematic in a way that differs sharply from the past.  In today’s society, it is impossible to raise a child unselfconsciously.  Bombarded with conflicting advice about the relative merits of breastfeeding versus bottle feeding, crib sleeping and co-sleeping, early versus delayed toilet training, each parent must decide for her- or himself how best to rear a child.  Labels abound: attachment parenting, natural parenting, positive parenting, slow parenting.

Lacking the clear and authoritative guidelines set by earlier childrearing experts like Dr. Benjamin Spock, moms and dads must decide whether to be strict or lenient, achievement and performance focused or indulgent, pushy or laid back.  Today’s parents receive sharply conflicting messages about whether or not to prioritize academics and other accomplishments or, instead, give their children free time, freedom, and free range to explore their environment.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

At the same time, parents have grown far more sensitive to the risks that their children face, both physical and psychological. Anxiety has become the hallmark of contemporary parenting. Even before their child is born, prenatal testing leads parents to worry about potential birth defects to an extent absent in the past. This is followed by a preoccupation with children’s safety.

Stoking parental fears are sensationalistic media accounts of the risks posed by pedophiles and the prevalence of stranger abduction of children, as well as reports about the potential perils posed by bullying, vaccines, additives, and various environmental hazards.

The result: The geography of childhood has contracted, indoor time has mounted, and adult supervision of children’s activities has greatly increased.

Equally important is a profound reversal in parental expectations.  Early in time, parents expected their children to love them.  Today, in stark contrast, parents seek to ensure that their children love them.  To that end, many seek to ensure that their children are happy and never bored.

As mothers and fathers devote more time to work, a sense of guilt also colors parent-child relations.   Even though recent research indicates that parents actually spend more face-to-face time with their children than did their 1950s counterparts, mothers and fathers worry that they are not able to provide the kind of safe, secure childhood they themselves enjoyed, involving a great deal of free unstructured play with neighborhood friends. Consequently, many overcompensate.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

Underlying the shift in parent-child relationships are a raft of historic shifts.  Delayed parenthood, better educated parents, and reduced birthrates all lead parents to increase their fixation upon individual children.  In a society in which marital relationships have grown much more fragile, many parents look to their children as a source of permanent attachment and emotional fulfillment.  The increase in single parenthood and two-earner households has also altered parent-child relations, since children in these settings must take on greater responsibility for self-care and for helping out than did those in homes with full-time mothers.

Perhaps the biggest force for change in parent-child relationships lies in parents’ worries about their ability to transmit their class status to their children.  As the economy has grown more competitive and entrepreneurial, many parents seek to give their child a leg up, and as a result invest more time and resources in enrichment activities: reading to their children, conversing with them, and providing toys and activities aimed at enhancing their development.

Today, parenting does not end at 18 or 21.  Most parents not only expect to contribute to their children’s college education, but to its aftermath: To supporting them during their twenties and helping them, later, in making a down payment on a house.Changes in Roles and Relationship within the Family Essay Paper

For all the disdainful talk about hovering, overinvolved, and overprotective helicopter parents, the fact is that parents today are, on average, closer to their adult children than in the past. Parent-child hierarchy has given way, to a remarkable extent, to a relationship that is closer, more intimate, and more egalitarian than ever existed in the past.  If it has become harder for some children to cut the umbilical cord and establish an independent identity, and if it has become more difficult for some parents to let go and grant their kids a fully autonomous life, for most, the ongoing bond between child and parent proves to be a crucial source of meaning and personal happiness.