Working in pairs, refer to pages 74 to 77 and answer the following questions.
- Identify 4 ways in which families are being influenced by the changes described in Box 7.
- According to Giddens, why are personal relationships in today’s society less stable?
- How does the new ‘negotiated’ family’ described by Beck and Beck-Gernsheim differ from earlier types of family?
- Stacey found evidence of all sorts of different family and household arrangements in her research. Make a list of all the different sorts of family and household arrangements you can think of. How many different types of family and/or household is an individual likely to part of during their lifetime?
- Why have sociologists often chosen unstructured in-depth interviews rather than other possible research methods for studying the life course and family practices?
