Child Development and Progress vis-vis Socioeconomic Status - Case Study Example

Sociology Case Scenario Assessment Name ....................................... Sociology ............................... Professor ............................... April 10, 2014 Presentation The scenario presents the following predicaments: Mum is worried about her son's future and thinks his job is eating into his university study work, one reason why he failed his university assignment. The son doesn't admit it to her, even as he seems to realise that it could be a reason for failure, but the mum has got a valid reason to think so. Due to his work commitment the son took only four hours on the assignment, whereas it required a lot more time to pass. The son is caught between the work-study dilemmas; both are important but he is able to give full time only to one: that is his job as the boss is unwelcoming. The son is bound by the compulsion to raise money for himself as he finds it quite disillusioning to seek monetary support from his dad as he was laid off around four years ago and it was unlikely he would be offered another job at this age. If the son takes any liberties with his job, he is scared of being 'punished' by not offering good number of shifts enough to meet his expenses. Mum's work too is in quandary as the self-service checkouts offered at Woolies, where she works, have minimised outlet's dependence on manual labour. Right next week the son's expenses will increase because of the car rego, tyre replacement and insurance due for renewal. The son can't give up the car and rely on public transport to university as that is not predictable. Dad seems to add to the negative side of the scenario when he repeatedly talks of good old times and bad present times. In other words, it is three people of the same family bound to each other by family bonding but separated by a generation gap and turn of times, and struggling to keep their lives going on in hard times. Inference This scenario presents work-study-family conflict and synergy among two generations involving three people. Discussion In order to understand these predicaments further, it is important to understand the concept of generations first. In this case two generations are pinned to different sets of life experiences and different sets of compulsions too. Mannheim (1952) was first to introduce the concept of generations and how their life experiences have had lasting and deep impact on them. He is also being credited for explaining interactions between individuals of different generations and the impact of historical events or circumstances that change attitude of life of each. Since son belongs to a different generation, which is contemporary, his vision of the world is not as "natural" as his parents. This is why he tends to interpret his expectations and experiences from life in a manner which is different from that of his mother. Both mother and father on one hand and son on the other are qualitatively fixed in differing subjective areas. All the members have been shaped by different developmental events; but mother's concern stems from a universal bond of motherhood and all are caught in a quagmire that is not predictive, and complexity of life that is affecting them almost in a similar fashion. That brings the scenario to Greenhaus and Beutell (1985) who have explained work-family conflict. They call it an ‘interrole conflict’, according to which families are mired in mutually incompatible situations when role pressures from family and work domains clash. This scenario reflects a typical situation of what is termed as "directionality of role interference". Mesmer-Magnus and Viswesvaran (2005) have suggested that family can interfere with work and work can interfere with family. Beutell (2010) has noted that the problem arises when roles tend to be in constant tension in a familial setting; though the tension is not required. These tensions arise from several stressors related to both work and family, from the expectations of support or accomplishment, positive balance or even spill-over and just the opposite of the same, synergy and enrichment. There is a greater deal of synergy and positive energy when moods are participatory and not contradictory. But in this case the synergy is difficult to attain. Mother is worried about her son's educational accomplishment; father is too helpless to provide any support to his son since he has been laid off, the son being witness to the bad circumstances at home feels untoward in seeking his father's support. There could also be another side to it; even if he abandons what seems to be his alter ego, but in reality is not, he still knows that his father would not be in a position to help. The overall atmosphere in the family is that of desperation, compulsion and deprivation. Furthermore, this scenario can be seen in the light of generational differences and expectations from each member in the family. Father could have been supposed to be working and supporting the family; but he has been laid off and is not expecting any job on account of age. So the son cannot look up to him for financial support, even as under normal circumstances he was accountable for his son's education until he got on his own feet. Mother has chosen to work to support the family, and son could have rested on her support. But she is again going through a bad phase at Woolies and her job seems to be inching towards a perceivable risk every day. That closes the doors on son's expectations, who is also under stress to pass and move further in his studies. Again, it leaves the son with a choice to work, but work costs him in terms of time which he should have otherwise been able to devote to his studies. The complex set of factors are affecting each one of them, but what comes out of the whole scenario as an emotional and even helpless situation is that despite everything negative going on in the family, mother still wants that her son must pass, he must scrap work and devote more time to his university work. If seen objectively, this is a very despondent situation for her when it comes to her son as she is hoping against hope. Of the three predictors related to work-family conflict, two seem to be impacting the scenario; one is job-related and another social support. Job for mother and son is compulsion in this case, for father it is only a distant hope now. All three, practically, deserve social support, but have to look towards each other for the same as there is no reference to an external support having been made in the scenario (Kossek et al, 2011; Thompson and Prottas, 2006). One thing could, however, have been termed as socially supporting had son's and mother's workplaces been far more conducive than obtrusive at the moment. More dependence on manual labour at Woolies could have been reassuring for mother as she would have been provided more shifts, which, unfortunately, is not the case. The son's boss could have been deemed as socially supporting to him had he not been as ruthless as he is. A considerate boss could have provided succour to the son by realising that university was as important to him as the job. Byron (2005) has remarked that an inverse relationship exists between conflict and social support. Good social support means greater work-family synergy. The scenario is replete with instances of psychological theories on stress and each member is having his or own share of it. There is a continual display of interaction between stressors, situation of each individual and external demand (Smith, 1987). Father goes into a flashback mode about good times of past because he finds stressors at present too demanding, mother is caught between the twin demands of expecting good performance from her son and at the same time hope of supporting the family in a better manner and son's stressors are taking a toll on his university performance. Several complex sets of negative consequences are creating innumerable inconveniences to the family. Such consequences are impacting both mental and behavioural processes of all the members (Folkman, 1984). Financial stress in the family is at the core of everything. Financial demands are high, but the inflow is very low. The financial stress is intruding into son's engagement with his university. It is sort of a 'between devil and the deep sea' situation for the son. The economic situation in the family has blocked the way to clear and concise judgement and has greatly influenced son's university going and choice. Clearly this aspect has distorted his university experience. He can't give it up because of mother's pressure and he can't give up the work because of dealing with a bad boss. A number of studies have been conducted to see how financial pressures absorbed by university students affect their attitude or time that they devote toward education. Those with less financial stress have been found to engage in more of university work than those who have greater financial stress. Different students utilise different coping strategies to counter the stress; in this case the son finds sticking to the job his only choice, least realising that it is eventually going to do more harm to him than good. Probably this is lurking at the back on mother head and she is able to visualise a bleak future for him this way; one reason for her to sit on his back and expect him to devote more time to the university and pass. This can further be demonstrated in the light of social class theories which have particularly reflected in families more prominently in the last decade-and-a-half. This is because there have been drastic economic changes that have taken in families in this time period. Today's families face greater financial issues than families fifteen or twenty years back. Current economic crisis is to be directly blamed for this. Social class theories suggest that financial issues have a great bearing on parent-child relationships, stability and satisfaction in the families. The scenario is suggestive of lack of satisfaction on almost all fronts in the family. The family is demonstrative of an ‘interactionist model’ of relationship between the members of the family. This is demonstrative of social selection and social causation perspectives among its members. Angell (1936) was the first social scientist to say that during economic hardships families are first to suffer. Such hardships deprive the families of effective moderation of dialogues between different members of the family. The son in this case belongs to the new millennium's first decade i.e., 2000-2009 and this decade has been one that of instability and uncertainty. His parents can be supposed to having belonged to 1960s or above; a period when economic growth averaged 4 percent. In 2000 it was just half at 2 percent. This gives father enough reason to brood over the past. Since the economic decline has placed significant financial pressures on families particularly in the last decade by inflicting fewer resources, reduced employment opportunities and overall financial distress, both parents and children alike have been feeling at being crossroads in terms of what they must prioritise and what they actually are not able to do. This scenario reflects one such typical situation. This statement is supported by several randomized experiments done on low income families, which have demonstrated that economic downturns in families have been greatly affecting child development and progress in such families. The findings, though, have been complex and even age and gender dependent, but most of them have suggested that children in families having better family incomes tend to gain more than those who have low incomes and also have positive social, behavioural and psychological effects on parents and children alike (Huston et. al., 2005; Leventhal, Fauth, & Brooks-Gunn, 2005; Morris, Duncan, & Clark-Kauffman, 2005). Under this background, child development and progress vis-à-vis socioeconomic status, two theoretical frameworks have come to light; both unequivocally focussing on family income and wealth (Conger & Donnellan, 2007; Gershoff, Aber, Raver, & Lennon, 2007; Yeung, Linver, & Brooks-Gunn, 2002). One is family stress model or FSM and another investment model (IM). The scenario presents both on the negative side. References Angell R.C. (1936). The family encounters the depression. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. Beutell N.J. (2010). 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