A Study On The Causes Of Changes In American Family In The Second Half Of The Twentieth Century

In the second half of the twentieth century, an increasingly diverse range of family types have replaced the breadwinner-homemaker family that once predominated in the United States in the 1950s. Significant trends occurred to the family life during the period of the latter half of the twentieth century in the U.S.: divorce rates have gone up considerably; cohabitation has increased significantly; birthrates have declined…Some have gone so far as to predict that the family is in the process of disappearing entirely. Others lament recent family changes and talk about recreating older patterns of family life that were popular in the 1950s. The author argues that the 1950s' version of family pattern was rooted in unusual historical period, and its decline can not be sees as a sign of disappearance of the family. The main trend of the American family is toward diversification of family forms rather than a single standard form. The paper aims to provide a general description of American family changes in the second half of the twentieth century and an analysis of its underlying forces. The data sources collected in the paper, as noted in Chapter One, are mainly the family data collected by the U.S. Bureau of the Census, Monthly Vital Statistics Reports and Current Population Reports. The author also uses data from other surveys or other researchers to fill in the gaps. Only by a careful look at what did and did not happen to American families in the postwar period is it possible for us to avoid any misleading notions about the trends. Chapter Two and Three sets out to examine the changes of the U.S. families in the latter half of the 20th century, with an emphasis on the changes of nuclear family. The term "nuclear family" is defined according to Sociologist Talcott Parsons' nuclear family model. The nuclear family, with husband acting as a breadwinner and wife as a homemaker has been shrinking as the percentage of household and its specialized roles between men and women have been undergoing significant transformation. The decline of the nuclear family is a proven fact of the limitedness of Talcott Parsons' nuclear family model, which is developed to explain the prevalence of the breadwinner-homemaker family in the 1950s. This nuclear family version in the United States in the 1950s is historically rooted in unusual times, therefore, its decline can not been seen as a sign of disappearance of family as an institution. Chapter Four examines some of the driving forces behind the changes in family structure since the 1950s in the United States. It provides explanations for the prevalence of breadwinner-homemaker family pattern in the 1950s and the distinctive changes in family life in the second half of the 20th century from economic, cultural and technological perspectives. Among these forces, the second wave of women's movement is seen as the major factor producing changes in the structure of the modern American family.Chapter Five emphasizes the responses to family changes and its consequences on the shaping of modern family structure.Chapter Six summarizes the argument and findings of the paper, and points out the limitations of the author's study in this field.