What is meant by the ideology of the nuclear family?

It is the set of taken-for-granted beliefs that presents the married heterosexual couple with children as the normal, natural and best family form, so that other family types appear deviant or inferior.

Explain Parsons' 'warm bath' idea.

Parsons suggested the family absorbs the stresses of adult working life the way a warm bath relaxes the body, allowing the worker to return to work refreshed and stable.

What is functionalist 'functional fit' theory?

Parsons argued that as society industrialised, the isolated nuclear family replaced the extended family because it was better suited to an economy needing a geographically and socially mobile workforce.

OCR A-Level Sociology H580

Introducing Socialisation, Culture and Identity

Topic overview Culture, norms, values and cultural relativism Subculture, high culture and popular culture Global and consumer culture, cultural diversity and hybridity Primary and secondary socialisation, the family and peer group Media, religion, education and the workplace as agencies of socialisation Lifelong socialisation and the nature/nurture debate Social control, sanctions and formal agencies of control Informal agencies and theories of social control The concept of identity, ethnicity and nationality Gender, class and sexual identity Age, disability, hybrid and intersecting identities

Families and RelationshipsComponent 01

Topic overview Family types and trends in marriage, divorce and cohabitation Demographic change, family diversity and newer family types Nuclear family ideology, functionalism and the New Right Marxist, feminist and postmodern views and the diversity debate Conjugal roles and the domestic division of labour Power, the dark side of the family and theories of partner roles The child-centred family, views of childhood and its extension Parent-child power, grandparents in an ageing population and feminist views

Youth SubculturesComponent 01

Topic overview Functionalist and neo-Marxist views of youth culture Hebdige, feminist and postmodern views of youth subcultures Class, ethnic and hybrid subcultures and consensus versus conflict Delinquent, criminal, spectacular and anti-school subcultures Gangs, newer deviant subcultures and patterns in youth offending Functionalist, New Right and Marxist explanations of youth deviance Labelling, identity, gender, ethnicity and moral panics in youth deviance

MediaComponent 01

Topic overview Representations of ethnicity and nationality, symbolic annihilation and the male gaze Representations of gender, social class and young people Representations of older people and theories of media representation Direct and indirect media effects models Active audience models, deviance amplification and moral panics

Research Methods and Researching Social Inequalities

Topic overview Positivism, quantitative data and interpretivism Verstehen, qualitative data and validity Reliability, representativeness, generalisability and theory Research topics, aims, hypotheses and primary and secondary data Operationalisation, pilot studies and respondent validation Longitudinal studies, interpreting data and social policy Sampling frames, sampling techniques and choosing a sample Access, gatekeepers and research ethics Questionnaires, structured interviews, statistics, content analysis and observation Unstructured interviews, ethnography and methodological pluralism

Understanding Social Inequalities

Topic overview Stratification, class, poverty, mobility and gender inequality Ethnicity, age, work and health inequalities Functionalist and Marxist explanations of inequality Weberian, feminist and New Right explanations of inequality

Globalisation and the Digital Social World

Topic overview Globalisation, the digital revolution and media convergence Social media, social capital and theoretical views of digital communication Digital identities, the digital divide and social class Gender, age, relationships and cultural impacts of digital communication

Crime and DevianceComponent 03

Topic overview Defining crime and deviance, social control and relativity Social construction of crime and police recorded crime The Crime Survey, victim surveys and self-report studies Crime patterns by social class, gender and age Crime patterns by ethnicity, crime trends and global organised crime Glocal organised crime and green crime Functionalist, strain and subcultural theories of crime Marxist, interactionist and left realist theories of crime Right realism, New Right, feminism and explaining ethnic and age patterns Left-wing crime reduction, social crime prevention and restorative justice Situational crime prevention, zero tolerance and punitive justice

EducationComponent 03

Topic overview Functionalist, Marxist and liberal views of the role of education Social democratic, New Right and feminist views and vocational education Class and ethnic patterns in educational attainment Gender patterns, global educational inequality and intersectionality Inside-school factors: labelling, setting, triage and institutional racism Material and cultural deprivation and cultural capital Explaining gender and ethnic differences and theoretical views of achievement Types of school and education policy since 1988 Ideology, marketisation and equality of opportunity in education policy

Religion, Belief and FaithComponent 03

Topic overview Defining religion, faith and belief, churches and denominations Sects, cults, new religious and new age movements and fundamentalism Measuring religiosity and believing without belonging Functionalist and Marxist views of the role of religion Neo-Marxist, Weberian, feminist, phenomenological and postmodern views of religion Religion, social change and whether religion is positive or negative Class and gender patterns in religiosity Women's changing religiosity and ethnic and age patterns Age cohorts, global religious trends and resurgence Defining secularisation and evidence of religious decline Pro- and anti-secularisation theories Religion and social policy, the golden age critique and global patterns

Families and Relationships

Nuclear family ideology, functionalism and the New Right

3 things to know
Component 01

Overview

Recall questions on the ideology of the nuclear family and Leach's cereal packet image, functionalist views of the family from Murdock and Parsons, including the warm bath, functional fit and loss of functions, the New Right view and Murray on welfare, and criticisms of both positions.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Your recallNot started

Key term

What is the 'cereal packet' image of the family, and who is credited with the phrase?

Key term

Name the four functions George Peter Murdock claimed the family performs.

Key term

State the two 'irreducible functions' Talcott Parsons attributed to the family.

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1
What is meant by the ideology of the nuclear family?
Model answer
It is the set of taken-for-granted beliefs that presents the married heterosexual couple with children as the normal, natural and best family form, so that other family types appear deviant or inferior.
2
What is the 'cereal packet' image of the family, and who is credited with the phrase?
Model answer
Edmund Leach used it to describe the idealised advertising picture of a happy married couple with two children, an image most real families cannot match.
3
Name the four functions George Peter Murdock claimed the family performs.
Model answer
Murdock identified sexual, reproductive, economic and educational functions.
4
State the two 'irreducible functions' Talcott Parsons attributed to the family.
Model answer
Parsons argued the family exists to carry out the primary socialisation of children and the stabilisation of adult personalities.
5
Explain Parsons' 'warm bath' idea.
Model answer
Parsons suggested the family absorbs the stresses of adult working life the way a warm bath relaxes the body, allowing the worker to return to work refreshed and stable.
6
What is functionalist 'functional fit' theory?
Model answer
Parsons argued that as society industrialised, the isolated nuclear family replaced the extended family because it was better suited to an economy needing a geographically and socially mobile workforce.

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Introducing Socialisation, Culture and Identity

Families and Relationships

Youth Subcultures

Media

Cram a whole paper in one sitting

Sort every topic into what you know and what you do not, then drill only the weak ones.

Murdock identified sexual, , economic and educational functions.

reproductiveemotionalpolitical

Blank Blitz makes facts automatic

Rapid timed gap-fills on the terms and numbers you need to recall without thinking.

AVictims may fear reprisal, or feel shame or economic dependence.

BAbuse in the home has historically been treated as a private matter.

CMany incidents are never reported or recorded.

Build It gets the exam shape right

Assemble a full-mark answer from its marking points, in the order an examiner wants them.

Sex refers to the biological category of male or female.

TrueFalse

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