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Love and Social factors

e with a spouse, 137 women and 92 men are divorced (Arendell, 1986). In addition, divorce appears to be higher among Blacks than among Whites, with 176 divorced Black males and 265 divorced Black females as compared to 86 White males and 128 White females per 1,000 married individuals (Arendell, 1986). These figures represent a significant increase in the total number of divorced individuals when compared to 1960, when only 28 males and 42 females per 1,000 married people were divorced (Arendell, 1986). While these raw figures are indicative of the increase in the overall divorce rate, they also profile significant changes taking place within the family unit.

Perrucci and Knudsen (1990) have noted that the changes which are now being observed in the composition of the traditional American family began in the nineteenth century, when institutions other than the family itself became significant in the lives and shaping of individuals and their attitudes. Schools, which emphasized individual achievement, jobs in industry which were individual rather than family positions, and courtship shifts in which the interest of the individual became paramount - each of these factors was somewhat instrumental in eliminating the power, authority and influence of the family unit. Slowly these external social chances were incorporated into the family. Patriarchal authority diminished, repression of sexuality and sexual drives became less and less severe, and the nuclear family became virtually independent of the kin group (Perrucci and Knudsen, 1990). The traditional nuclear family, in which a man and wife were expected to remain together literally until "death do us part," was also affected by such twentieth century social changes as the freeing of women from the demands of homemaking, the advent of improved methods of birth control allowing for more effective family planning, the so-called sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s which facil...

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Love and Social factors. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 14:03, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1701266.html