The formation of a family unit is the most important task of a person and one of the main functions of a society with healthy values. The value of full-fledged families in the modern world has been artificially underestimated more than once, however, the social status of the cell, where both parents and at least one child are present, has always been evaluated consistently high.
The concept of a complete family
A complete family is a related union of three or more people, due to the presence of a married couple and their common child (or children). It is believed that the concepts of a “full-fledged family” and “normal” are synonymous, but the factors adopted in society are normal, such as material security, decent upbringing and a healthy microclimate in the house, they are often present equally in complete and single-parent families.
The purpose of creating a marriage is to continue the family, which means that the whole system of building marital relations is normally based on the love of two people and their desire to spend the rest of their life together. Only under such conditions, the decision to give life to a new person can be considered responsible, and the internal atmosphere of the family - suitable for the appearance of the baby.
Social psychologist E. Harutyunyants names 3 types of positive relationships observed in modern society when the composition of the family is complete.
Traditional look
In the traditional approach, both parents are engaged in raising a child in the same way, and the basis for improving mutual understanding is the establishment of a strict vertical of power from father and mother to the child. The interests of the child are taken into account only if they coincide with the interests of the parents, but at the same time, all conditions for the normal development of the offspring are strictly observed.
Children who have grown up in the conditions of the indisputable authority of loving parents fit perfectly into any hierarchical society, but they are rarely able to occupy a high position in any of the noticeable structures themselves. Their reverence for a higher leader always prevails over the need to equalize their positions, and this is a serious obstacle to career advancement.
Detocentric education model
As the name implies, adult members of a complete family do not so much create a decent level of a child’s existence as they themselves exist around his person. The principle of upbringing in such families is also vertical, but comes from the youngest member of the family to the senior. The most accurate characteristic of a complete family of a detocentric species is to focus on the needs of the child with minimal filtering of the child’s admissible requests from unacceptable.
The result of being in such an educational environment is the child’s feeling of permissiveness and his own eccentricity, which complicates his further communication in society. Due to the fundamental non-observance of generally accepted norms, a young man, if he does not change his attitude to life, runs the risk of being in a social vacuum.
Democratic education
This model of a complete family is considered ideal. It clearly expresses bilateral horizontal communication from parents to the child and vice versa, and the interests of the younger family member are taken into account to the same extent as the interests of the older generation. As a child grows up, his relationship with his parents grows, however, it is based not on material or moral dependence, but on feelings of friendly disposition and full understanding.
Children raised in such a family are highly active and have leadership qualities, but they have almost no idea of ​​the hierarchical structure of society. This entails problems in obedience while in educational institutions, poor understanding of the needs of society and self-awareness as a unit of this whole.
Healthy Family Functions
A distinctive feature of a complete family is its fulfillment of all the functions required for the development and socialization of this microstructure in modern society. A complete list of such functions was proposed by I. V. Grebennikov, the author of the well-known pedagogical manual “School and Family”:
- reproductive function - due to the need for procreation;
- economic - participation in the production of goods and services and the country's monetary turnover, the formation of consumer demand;
- primary socialization - the organization of the correct social education of the child and the development of the principles of moral and ethical standards adopted in this society;
- educational - the formation of the younger generation of respect and tolerance for the outside world through similar relationships in the family;
- communicative - the ability of all family members to conduct a dialogue, establish friendly relations, interact with media sources.
Since a complete family is the basic unit of society, its functions directly depend on social needs and goals that are satisfied at different levels by fulfilling all of the above items of a family organization.
The traditional model of family behavior
A specialist in social psychology, Dr. M. S. Matskovsky, having conducted research among many complete families, came to the conclusion that the best option for maintaining family comfort is to instill in the household a traditional model of behavior. Matskovsky relates the following characteristic features of classical family foundations to such:
- the dominant position of the father as an indisputable mentor and leader;
- strict manner of communication with children;
- the mother is raising children, but the direction in which this education is carried out is determined by the father;
- parental labor does not hide from children and is an example for the younger generation;
- lack of disagreement between parents in the presence of children.
According to psychologist Matskovsky, the norm in family relations has always been determined precisely by the position of the father as an absolute dominant, and the obvious role of a woman was to serve her husband and preserve traditions.
What is a large family
Until the beginning of the 20th century, the moral values ​​of the Slavs were dictated by the canons of the Orthodox faith, propagating large families as one of the principles of following the word of God. Having seven or more minor family members was considered the absolute norm, and this fact was encouraged by society.
With the transformation of the country's economy into market social norms have undergone changes, and at the moment a large family is considered, in which there are three or more minors. Since society is increasingly witnessing episodes of intolerance towards families with the status of large families, the decent existence of such a social unit is a big question. In most cases, large families are in a constant struggle for survival and are forced to put up with the inability to give each child a decent education and provide him with everything necessary.
Features of large families with many children
Large families, due to their full parental composition, also have many advantages:
- children have enough communication, and they are more inventive in games and entertainment;
- older children grow up earlier and partially assume the functions of raising children;
- these children have a better sense of empathy than their peers, they are sensitive, sensitive to other people's weaknesses, lack of selfish inclinations.
But even a complete family with several children may face upbringing difficulties, which is especially evident when both parents are forced to work. Teens, knowing that it is impossible to exercise sufficient control over them, often skip or drop out of school. Adolescents from large families earlier than those of the same age, develop such bad habits: smoking, drug addiction, vagrancy.
A child in a large family rarely has the opportunity to boast of any property, and this develops in him a lack of respect for other people's property. Often in the struggle for personal space, children lose their sense of proportion and become instigators of protracted conflicts, which can only be resolved through the intervention of psychologists.