3 page Sociology Paper on Cohabitation, Divorce and Remarriage
HRW33Chapter 15
Remarriages and Stepfamilies
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Chapter Outline
- Defining and Measuring Stepfamilies
- Choosing Partners the Next Time
- Happiness Satisfaction, and Stability in Remarriage
- Day-to-Day Living in Stepfamilies
- Well-Being in Stepfamilies
- Creating Supportive Stepfamilies
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Defining and Measuring Stepfamilies
- Today, approximately 25 percent of all marriages are remarriages for one or both partners.
- Can be formed through legal marriage, cohabitation, marriage after childbirth, or other arrangements.
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Pathways to Stepfamily Living
- Can originate with a birth to a married or cohabiting couple
- Can originate from a birth to a single mother who is neither married nor cohabiting
- Children born to married or cohabiting parents can experience parents’ divorce or union dissolution or death
- After death or divorce of ex-partner, a parent may marry or remarry, forming a married stepfamily
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Pathways to Stepfamily Living
- Parent can also go on to form a cohabiting union with a new partner after divorce or death or an ex-partner
- A cohabiting stepfamily may be permanent, or it may transition to a married or remarried stepfamily
- Multipartnered parenthood and subsequent union dissolutions and formations add even greater complexity
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Pathways to Stepfamily Living
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Various Types of Stepfamilies
- Stepfamilies created by widowhood or divorce followed by remarriage
- Stepfamilies created by nonmarital childbearing
- Stepfamilies created by cohabitation
- Children and households living in stepfamilies
- Multiple-household stepfamilies
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Various Types of Stepfamilies
- Stepfamilies with adult stepchildren
- Race/ethnic diversity in stepfamilies
- Stepfamilies with gay and lesbian parents
- Other types of stepfamilies
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U.S. Children Under 18 Living in Stepfamilies, 2012
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A New Model of Stepfamilies
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Assumption | Traditional | Revised |
Union type | Remarriage | First marriage, remarriage, cohabitation |
Residence of children | Co-resident, static | Co-resident and nonresident; dynamic |
Stage of family life cycle | Child rearing; children ages 0-18 | Parenting across the life course (incl. children 18+) |
Race/ethnicity | White | All races and ethnicities |
Social class | Middle class | All classes |
Sexual orientation | Heterosexual | Heterosexual or homosexual |
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Perceptions of Stepfamilies: Stereotypes and Stigmas
- Stepfamilies are stigmatized in that they are perceived as being less functional and desirable than original two-parent families.
- According to this nuclear-family model monopoly, the first-marriage family is the “real” standard for family living, with all other family forms seen as deficient alternatives.
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Choosing Partners the Next Time
- Parents must consider their own needs as well as their childrens’.
- Can be challenging to accept a partner who accepts children as part of the relationship.
- Children and in-laws may be ambivalent about the new relationship.
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Dating with Children
- Courtship may proceed much more rapidly when dating before remarriage.
- Dating may also include outings with one or both partners’ children; or, couples may choose to keep their dating relationships and home lives separate.
- Couples with children can struggle to determine the “right time” to introduce children to dating partners.
- Couples with children from previous relationships sometimes “drift into” cohabitation.
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What Kinds of People Become Stepparents?
- Men with children are much more likely than childless men to cohabit or marry a woman with children.
- Women whose children see their nonresident fathers more often are more likely to remarry.
- For men, marrying someone with children is generally seen as undesirable. This is somewhat less true for women.
- Remarriage benefits women financially more than men, though both do benefit.
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Second Weddings
- Second weddings tend to have fewer guests, few or no wedding attendants, and forgo traditions such as the tossing of the bouquet.
- Remarriage wedding ceremonies are complicated, emotionally charged, and often awkward affairs.
- Many children are critical of their stepparents’ wedding ceremony.
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Remarrying couples differ from first-marrying couples in their degree of homogamy. This is because choosing a remarriage partner differs from making a marital choice the first time inasmuch as there is a smaller pool of eligible on any given attribute.
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Happiness, Satisfaction, and Stability in Remarriage
- Marital happiness and marital satisfaction are synonymous phrases that refer to the quality of the marital relationship whether or not it is permanent.
- Marital stability refers simply to the duration of the union.
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Happiness, Satisfaction, and Stability in Remarriage
- Research shows little difference in spouses’ overall well-being or in marital happiness between first and later unions.
- Evidence shows that there is more equity, or fairness, in remarriages than in first marriages.
- One study found that this appears to have more to do with an ex-wife’s less-than-satisfactory experience in her first marriage, and subsequent partner selection for remarriage.
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The Stability of Remarriages
- Remarriages are less stable than first marriages.
- Selection effect is prevalent.
- Post-divorce cohabitation is positively associated with remarital instability
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The Stability of Remarriages
People who divorce are disproportionately from lower-middle- and lower-class groups, which have a higher tendency to divorce.
People who remarry after divorce are more accepting of divorce and are willing to choose divorce as a way to resolve an unsatisfactory marriage.
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The Stability of Remarriages
Remarrieds receive less social support from their families of origin and are less integrated with parents and in-laws.
Remarriages present some stresses on a couple that are not inherent in first marriages.
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Day-to-Day Living in Stepfamilies
- Society offers members of stepfamilies an underdeveloped script.
- Noting the cultural ambiguity of stepfamily relationships, social scientist Andrew Cherlin thirty years ago called the remarried family an incomplete institution.
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Boundary Ambiguity in Stepfamilies
- Boundary ambiguity is any discrepancy in spouses’ or partners’ reports of shared children and/or stepchildren.
- Boundary ambiguity was present among 25 percent of couples with stepchildren; higher among couples with nonresident stepchildren than with resident stepchildren.
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Boundary Ambiguity in Four Family Forms
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Family Form | Boundary Ambiguity (%) |
Two-biological-parent family | 0.6 |
Single-mother family | 11.6 |
Married stepparent family | 30.2 |
Cohabiting stepparent family | 65.9 |
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The Stepfamily System
- Family Systems Theory
- Family systems theory emphasizes interdependence in family relationships.
- Because stepfamily members are often uncertain about how they should behave toward one another, they tend to look to other family members for cues.
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The Stepfamily System
- Triadic Communication
- Family dynamics can sometimes become set.
- Triads can be linked, outsider, adult-coalition, complete.
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Perceived Types of Triadic Communication Structures in Stepfamilies
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The Stepfamily System
- Visitation schedules can create disruptions.
- Stepsiblings may not get along.
- Children may not want stepfamilies to “work out,” hoping original parents will reunite.
- Dripolator and percolator effects come into play.
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The Stepfamily System
- Stepfamily Roles
- There is no cultural script to show members of stepfamilies how to play their roles.
- Role ambiguity is a significant issue in stepfamilies.
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The Stepfamily System
- Relatively low role ambiguity has been associated with higher remarital satisfaction, especially for wives, and with greater parenting satisfaction, especially for stepfathers.
- The roles of stepchild and stepparent are not well defined, clearly understood, or fully agreed upon by stepfamily members.
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The Stepfamily System
The Stepfather Role
- Stepfathers who adopt their stepchildren tend to be more involved with them than those who don’t.
- Close ties to stepfathers are more likely to develop when the adolescent has close ties to the mother before the stepfather entered the family.
- Discipline is likely to be a tricky area.
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The Stepfamily System
The Stepmother Role
Stepmother trap
- On the one hand, society seems to expect almost mythical loving relationships between stepmothers and children.
- On the other hand, they are stigmatized and seen as cruel, vain, selfish, competitive, and even abusive.
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Stepfamily Relationships
- Between stepparents and stepchildren
- Between biological parents and children
- Between full, step-, and half-siblings
- Stepparents’ decisions about having children
- Relationships with grandparents
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Financial Arrangements in Stepfamilies
- Money problems arise from two sources: financial obligations from first marriages and stepparent role ambiguity.
- Common-pot system or two-pot system are adopted by most stepfamilies.
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Legal Issues in Stepfamilies
- Because family law assumes that all marriages are first marriages, few legal provisions exist for remarried family challenges.
- Laws have not kept pace with the “fragmentation of fatherhood.”
- Most states consider stepparents and stepchildren “legal strangers.”
- Some legal issues can be averted if a stepparent legally adopts a stepchild, but this is often impossible.
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Well-Being in Stepfamilies
- Members of nontraditional families (not living in a married, two-parent household) generally do not fare as well on a range of economic and social and emotional variables.
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Well-Being in Stepfamilies
- The Well-Being of Parents and Stepparents
- Parents have lower levels of happiness and life satisfaction and higher levels of psychological distress than nonparents.
- Outcomes are worse for stepmothers than stepfathers.
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Well-Being in Stepfamilies
- The Well-Being of Children
- The majority of children in remarried households show few, if any, negative outcomes.
- Not all children living in stepfamilies are stepchildren.
- Stepparents make fewer investments in their children’s health than biological parents.
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Creating Supportive Stepfamilies
- Creating a supportive stepfamily is not automatic.
- The Stepfamily Cycle does not unfold in a neat and precise way, and it can take anywhere from 4 to 12 years to complete.
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7 Stage Model of Stepfamily Development
Fantasy—adults expect a quick adjustment while children expect that the stepparent will disappear and their parents will be reunited.
Immersion—tension-producing conflict emerges between the stepfamily’s two biological “subunits.”
Awareness—family members realize that their early fantasies are not becoming reality.
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7 Stage Model of Stepfamily Development
Mobilization—family members initiate efforts toward change.
Action—remarried adults decide to form a solid alliance, family boundaries are better clarified, and there is more positive stepparent–stepchild interaction.
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7 Stage Model of Stepfamily Development
Contact—the stepparent becomes a significant adult family figure, and the couple assumes more control.
Resolution—the stepfamily achieves integration and appreciates its unique identity as a stepfamily.
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