Why 70s generated and accepted new definitions for family structures and gender roles - Essay Example

This meant that even servants were part of the family (Ellwood and Christopher, 34). In the present structure, even the non-parental adults qualify as family members as long as they are actively involved in the upbringing of the children of others. The implication of this is that there is no universal definition of family. One of the reasons is the fact that the family has evolved over the years. In the middle ages, the nuclear family was the most common family setup. Ideally, a nuclear family consisted of the father, the mother and the children.

However, there were some instances around the same time where sets of nuclear families resided together. The family in the United States has also seen a high degree of evolution. The evolution was mainly as a result of the changing perceptions in the culture of marriage starting from as early as the 18th century (Furstenberg, 34). Most views on family change are usually not representative of the facts on the ground. For instance, there has been a general increase in single-parent situations since the 1970s.

This is mainly attributed to out of wedlock and fatherless children. The American society largely views the changes in gender roles as well as the new family definitions to be mainly caused by three factors namely, economic factors, development factors and last but not least, moral factors (Furstenberg, 40). The economic problems of single motherhood are mainly stemmed in the fact that very few single moms can actually get a good wage. In addition to this, they have to juggle between their professional deities as well as their role of upbringing their children.

This ultimately reduces the amount of money they make at the end of a typical month. The government often offers some financial support to single mothers but the money is not usually substantial. These are the main reasons why the issue of