FAMILY IN THE INDIAN CONTEXT

The family in its most common form- a lifelong commitment between the man and woman
to feed, shelter, and nurture their children till they reach maturity- arose tens of thousands
of years ago among our hunting-and-gathering ancestors. No two families are the same;
they vary as much as their individual members. Nevertheless, the families do share some
common features. In particular, they all change over time, and certain processes operate
in all of them.

As we go through life, our families go through a life cycle. The stages of the family life
cycle are as follows (Carter & McGoldrick, 1989):
• Leaving home and becoming a single adult is the first stage in the family life
cycle, and it involves launching, the process in which youth move into adulthood
and exit their family of origin. In a successful launching, the young adult separates
from the family of origin without cutting off ties completely or fleeing to some
substitute emotional refuge.
• The new couple is the second stage in the family cycle. This stage involves not
only the development of a new marital system, but also realignment as the families
of origin and friends include the spouse.
• Becoming parents and a family with children is the third stage in the family
life cycle. When they enter this stage, adults move up a generation and become
caregivers to the younger generation.
• The family with adolescents represents the fourth stage of the family life cycle.
Adolescence is a period in which individuals push for autonomy and seek to develop
their own identity.
• The family at midlife is the fifth stage in the family life cycle. It is a time of
launching children, linking generations, and adapting to midlife changes. Because of
the lower birth rate and longer life of most adults, parents now launch their children
about 20 years before retirement, which frees many midlife parents to pursue other
activities.
• The family in later life is the sixth and final stage in the family life cycle.
Retirement alters a couple’s lifestyle, requiring adaptation. Grand parenting also
characterizes many families in this stage.

Besides promoting survival of its members, the family unit of our evolutionary ancestors
performed the following vital services for society:
• Reproduction. Replacing dying members.
• Economic services. Producing and distributing goods and services.
• Social order. Devising procedures for reducing conflict and maintaining order.
• Socialization. Training the young to become able, participating members of society.
• Emotional support. Helping others surmount emotional crises and fostering in each
person a sense of commitment and person.

The Family as a Social System

Urie Bronfenbrenner analyzes the social contexts of development in terms of five
environmental systems:
• The microsystem, or the setting in which the individual lives, such as a family, the
world of peers, schools, work, an so on
• The mesosystem, which consists of links between Microsystems, such as the
connection between family processes and peer relations

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 • The exosystem, which consists of influences from another setting, such as parents’
work, that the individual does not experience directly
• The macrosystem, or the culture in which the individual lives, such as the nation or
an ethnic group
• The chronosystem, or the sociohistorical circumstances, such as the increase in the
number of working mothers, divorced parents, and stepparent families.

Family systems theorists recognize that parents do not mechanically shape their children.
Rather, bidirectional influences exist, whereby family members mutually influence one
another. These system influences operate both directly and indirectly.

Direct Influences: Studies of families of diverse ethnicities show that when parents are
firm but warm, children tend to comply with their requests. And when children cooperate,
their parents are likely to be warm and gentle in the future. In contrast, parents who
discipline with harshness and impatience tend to have children who resist and rebel. And
because children’s misbehavior is stressful for parents, they may increase their use of
punishment, leading to ore unruliness by the child (Stormshak Et al., 2000).

Indirect Influences: A range of relationships- mother with father, parent with sibling,
grandparent with parent-modify the child’s direct experiences in the family. Third parties
can serve a supports for development, or they can undermine it. Even when parental
arguments strain children’s adjustment, other family members- such as grandparents-
may help restore effective interaction.

Adapting to change: The interplay of forces within the family is dynamic and ever
changing, as each member adapts to the development of other members. For example, as
children acquire new skills, parents adjust the way they treat their more competent
youngsters. Parents’ development affects children as well. The mild increase in parent-
child conflict in adolescence may be due to the fact that while the adolescent presses for
greater autonomy, the parent presses for more togetherness.

Various communities or cultural groups transmit values, skills, beliefs, motives and so
forth to their new members, usually children, by way of what is called cultural
transmission including the processes of enculturation and socialization. The process of
enculturation refers to an encompassing or surrounding of the individual by one’s culture.
In contrast, socialization refers to the process of deliberate shaping, by way of tutelage, of
the individual. Related to enculturation, acculturation refers to cultural and psychological
changes brought about by contact with people belonging to different cultures and
exhibiting different behaviors (Berry, 1990).

Although the family is given central importance in the study of socialization practices,
there have been periodic shifts in the study of its role and significance in child socialization
process. In the early phase of research, the focus was primarily on parent-child
relationship especially, the mother-child dyad and later, on characterizing the influence of
parental characteristics on children’s social and personality outcomes (Bandura, 1976).
More recent approaches to the understanding of socialization have gone beyond the
reciprocal and bidirectional model to suggest a dynamic, multidirectional, systematic
perspective (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). In this tradition the focus is on the complex
transactions between the parent-child dyad and the surrounding social environment.
Within this framework the family is viewed as a network of primary relationships
embedded in a larger social matrix surrounding it.

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The Institution of Family
The family is regarded as a universal, basic social institution that performs important
social functions (Leslie & Korman, 1984). Most scholars tend to agree on the universality of
the family in the sense, that, they acknowledge the presence of some form of family
system in all cultures, at all times (Lee, 1987). However, there is less agreement on what
aspects of the family are universal
According to Kolenda (1987), the structural aspects of the family refer to “…what relatives
compose the various types of families”.

The Indian Family System

The family in India occupies the central position in the life of the Indian people and is one
of the basic units of the Indian society. According to Karve (19530, the Indian family
organization is one of the three most essential aspects for understanding of any cultural
phenomenon in India, the other two being configurations of linguistic region and institution
of caste.
The joint family is identified as the traditional form of family in India. Kolenda (1987) has
referred to a range of family types in India with their important correlates. These family
types are found to coexist in the Indian society but in different proportions at different
points of time. The nuclear family comprises of husband, wife and their unmarried
children. The term elementary family is sometimes used to denote that it is the most basic
family structure with the minimum of essential components of a family namely, parents
and their children. The terms extended or joint family are used to refer to a combination of
two or more nuclear or elementary families based on an extension of the parent-child
relationship (Shah, 1981). It may also be a combination of nuclear families of two or more
brothers.
The Indian family system is characterized by certain identifiable features. The first is that
it consists of a definite system of role relationships and sentiments that bind its members
together. The members share feelings of family solidarity or familism and strive to uphold
family dignity and status in the society.
Age seniority determine both ritual and authority status of the person. A great deal of
value is attached to age seniority and due respect is shown to the older members which
extends in the world outside the family too.
Male supremacy is another characteristic feature of Indian families. The male members
occupy a position of greater power and authority while females are placed in a secondary
position in all spheres of life; be it status, power, nutrition, health or education. Emphasis
is placed on peace, harmony and on reducing conflicts and avoiding controversies that
may harm the family unity.

Parenting Styles and Discipline

Parenting requires interpersonal skills and makes emotional demands, yet there is little in
the way of formal education for this task. Baumrind that parents should be neither too
punitive nor aloof. Rather, they should develop rules for their children and be affectionate
with them. She identified four types of parenting styles
• Authoritarian parenting is a restrictive, punitive style in which parents exhort the
child to follow their directions and to respect their work and effort. The authoritarian
parent places firm limits and controls on the child and allows little verbal exchange.
Children of such parents are often unhappy, fearful, and anxious about comparing
themselves with others; they tend to fail to initiate activity and have weak
communication skills.
• Authoritative parenting encourages children to be independent but still places
limits and controls on their actions. Extensive verbal give-and-take is allowed, and
parents are warm and nurturant towards the child. Children of such parents are
often cheerful, self-controlled, self-reliant, and achievement-oriented.
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 • Neglectful parenting is a style in which the parent is much uninvolved in the
child’s life. Children whose parents are neglectful develop the sense that other
aspects of the parents’ lives are more important than they are. These children tend
to be socially incompetent.
• Indulgent parenting is a style of parenting in which the parents are very involved
with their children but place few demands or controls on them. These parents let
their children do what they want. Children never learn to control their own behavior
and always expect to get their way.

Socialization Process in Indian Families

The mother is the primary agent of socialization usually helped by her own mother or, her
mother-in-law and even sister(s)-in-law. The child grows up seeing many faces and
knowing many relationships. The child is constantly in body contact with adults, cuddled
and hugged by them.
The infancy stage is delayed and the child remains dependent on the mother for a longer
period. In the extended family this stage is particularly delayed because of the availability
of more adults who tend to make a lenient view of the mastery of developmental tasks. In
the nuclear family there may be a constraint on the lone mother to devote all her time to
child care and therefore the dependency stage may not be too delayed.
The father in Indian families plays a restricted role in child socialization. His relationship
with the child is generally formal and marked with deference. In the extended family this
relationship is not only formal but relatively distant because the father restrains himself
from becoming too close to his child. Such distancing helps to preserve the unity of the
extended family but precludes the intensification of father-child relationship. Carstairs
(1958) found that tenderness and affection were not expressed by the fathers out of
respect for elders.
The disciplining techniques used in socializing the child are most often harsh and strict.
Ross (1961) found that more than half the total number of respondents had experienced
very strict discipline at home. However, he reported absence of resentment or ill feelings
among children toward their parents probably because: “right” and “wrong” behaviors
were clearly spelt out. Children understood the reasons and accepted them uncritically.

• Socialization for Autonomy vs. Dependence: Findings from a variety of studies

suggest that the Indian family system and socialization practices foster dependence
and hamper autonomy. In an early study, Whiting and Whiting (1975) had noted
that Indian children were high on the dimensions of dependence (seeks help and
attention) and dominance (seeks dominance). Ramanujam (1978) found that
independence is not valued in the Indian families and is equated with disobedience.
Subordination to authority is regarded a virtue and the hierarchical structure
reinforces and sustains such a value system. The family practices and rituals
heighten the individual’s feeling of belongingness to family and the psychological
identification is so great that any attempt at independence and moving away from
the family are stressful. Kakar (1978) points out that in the Indian culture
dependence and a lack of self reliance training maybe equated with good behavior,
obedience, and a familistic orientation and maybe seen as serving important family
goals.

• Socialization for Individuation vs. Conformity: The emphasis on stability and

unity of the family structure results in greater emphasis on fostering conformity
behavior where the growing child is let to think in terms of We rather than I. quite
early in life the child is introduced to a range of relationships and the rights and
duties towards these are explained (Ross 1961). The child begins to see himself as

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 intricately linked to others in his immediate social circle with reduced emphasis on
the ‘self’ as different from significant others.

• Socialization for Social Competence: The emotionally rich and satisfying early
relationship with the mother and other nurturant adults prepares the Indian child to
step into the social sphere with openness. Loved and wanted, the child feels secure
in entering relationships. The Indian child learns to live under authority, and is
governed by numerous kinship bonds also arranged hierarchically. The social world
of the child thus comes to be highly ordered where age and status seniority assume
significance.

• Socialization for Adult Roles: Very early in life children begin to experience
gender based differentiation in their relationship with others, in distribution of
family resources and in entitlement to family membership, nutrition, healthcare and
education. Kakar (1978) states that the preference for a male child is as old as
Indian society itself. The birth of a male child is greeted with joy and mother is
showered with affection and special care. The birth of female child, by contrast, is
made to be a low key affair (Dube, 1988). Marriage is regarded as the ultimate goal
of a girl’s life when she will break her relationship with her natal family and enter a
new home that is often referred to as being unfriendly and harsh. Girls are generally
socialized for homemaker and child bearing roles and boys for provider and karta or
head ship roles. Ross (1961) found that girls were imparted skills and qualities that
will train them as efficient housewives and mothers. Boys, on the other hand, were
allotted more of outside tasks presumably to learn to tackle the external world.

Careful analyses undertaken by Konklin (1988) and Ramu (1988) suggest changes in the
Indian families in terms of their role patterns, ethos and values. The growing feelings of
competitiveness, consumerism and materialism are replacing the joint family values of
sharing, accommodativeness, mutual dependence and conformity with greater feelings of
individualism, personal freedom, autonomy; and self-determination. Accordingly, children
are being socialized to adapt and adjust to the changing value system and ethos.