H2>ABSTRACT ‘We’re going to support activities that help couples who choose marriage for them selves develop the skills and knowledge to form and sustain a healthy marriage,’ said Dr. Horn. Wade F. horn, an assistant secretary for children and families at the department of health and human services of the bush administration, proposes that the solution to the current welfare problem would be to direct the $100 million to promoting healthy, two-parent households. The welfare problem he is referring to is that there are a beyond necessary number of people currently depending on welfare benefits. His research involved exposure to opinions of several government officials involved in the social affairs sector. He also suggested that experiments be done aimed at strengthening families and reducing out-of-wedlock births through premarital counselling and marital enrichment classes, the overall aim being to ‘figure out what works’.
Dr. Horn found it uncomprehendable why people would be against ‘helping low income families who choose marriage for themselves access the skills and marriage to build a healthy marriage’. He states that his main concern in promoting marriages is not the marriage itself, rather it’s the well being of the children. For some families, the existence of economic distress is the key role player in weak marriages. Alike ninety percent of Americans who either have been married, were married or will be married, low-income people also want to achieve the goal of a healthy marriage. Dr. horn applied the concept of functionalism to his research. Using the functionalist approach enabled him to efficiently analyse the large-scale structure of welfare.
The Essay on Marriage and the family
Throughout the course of time, family dynamics and components have evolved along with society. In recent history the contemporary family has evolved into more of a dual earner family, leaving the traditional division of responsibilities ever changing and progressing. In today’s society it has become more common to see women taking on the traditional responsibilities of men both financially and ...
It also enables them to analyse the contribution that this activity (marriage) makes to the continuation of the society as a whole, that is, social reproduction. Functionalist thinking in sociology was originally pioneered by August Komte who saw it as closely bound up with his overall view of the field. August Komte is arguably the founder of ‘sociology’. He believed that this new field could produce a knowledge of society based on scientific evidence and therefore earning his credit as functionalist. As a Frenchman he drew up ambitious plans for the reconstruction of French society in particular and for human societies in general based on scientific knowledge. Another theorist involved with functionalism is Emile Durkheim. He had a much more lasting impact on modern sociology than those of Komte. Durkheim was the one who introduced the concept of social facts, aspects of social life that shape our lives as individuals, (for example ceremonies like marriage).
The sociologist Robert k. Mertom introduced and distinguished the phenomenon of manifest functions verses latent functions. Since marriage has a consequential effect on its participants, it will have to be classified as a latent function. On the contrary, manifest functions are those known to, and intended by, the participants in a specific type of social activity. VARIABLES A variable is any dimension along which individuals or groups vary. Examples of common variables include age, differences in income, crime rates and in our case, economic distress caused by negative marital influences.
The two variables existing in the article have a causal relationship that is, an associating in which one event or situation produces another. The independent variable is one the produces an effect upon another variable. The variable affected is the dependent one. In this situation, the independent variables are the negative marital influences, which include weak marriages, and single parent households. The dependent variables are economic distress and the current welfare situation explained earlier. Marriages and single-parent households are operationalized as those who have children outside wedlock or when they are still young. HYPOTHESIS STATEMENT People’s reliance on welfare and economical distress are brought about as result of the negative influences that single parents or weak marriages have on children.
The Essay on Parents in child’s life
Parents are an integral part of any child’s life. They are his safe haven, his stepping stones and his personal cheerleaders. They are the people who create a person in the first place hence he/she owes their existence to them (Laura, 11). They give a child his name, his characteristics and his personality. They also give him both his negative and positive traits. So, in my opinion it is a ...
Methodology The methods used by the researcher in this article are very general in places. He mostly operates in questions asking people for their opinion of the project he wishes to take forward. People asked include Wendell Primus, Tommy G Thompson and Wally Herger. These questions can arguably be viewed as a survey, but if so, a very general one at that. The survey has no specific questions (questionnaire), and no systematic record of the results. Another procedure applied by the Doctor is that of use of secondary information. In the article, the issue of the 1996 law was mentioned as well as some statistical data was acquired, specifically referring to the percentage of children born to unmarried women.
Other than that, most of the article consisted of opinions from different figures who are, in one way or the other, connected to the social sector, for example Bruce Reed, a domestic policy adviser to the Clinton Admin. or Robert Rector, an analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation. An overall view of the methodology applied would conclude to the fact that Dr. Horn took a qualitative approach, rarely applying quantitative methods. Findings Findings can be classified into two categories. These are those made by other people and those made by Horn himself. The findings made by others include include the following: Stated by Tommy G. Thompson, secretary of Health and Human Services, a third of births were to unmarried women in 2000, including 68.5 percent of the births among blacks, according to data released by the Centres for Disease Control and prevention.
Stated by Isabel V Sawhill, a welfare expert at the Brookings Institution, Children growing up in one-parent families are four times as likely to be poor as those growing up in two-parent households Stated by Robert Rector, an analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation, there has been a rise in the percentage of children born to unmarried women, to 33.2 percent in 2000 from 5 percent in 1960 Dr. Horn himself stated the following: Too often the government is not neutral on marriage but actually created disincentives against it. The empirical literature is quite clear that, on average, kids who grow up in stable, healthy, married, two-parent households do better than kids who grow up in some other kind of arrangement Conclusion The researcher acknowledged the fact that the existence of married couples is prominent within the country and therefore it’s promotion is not the problem. The problem, however, is ensuring strong marriages. By directing the $100 million dollars efficiently towards the development of strong and healthy marital relations, it would a tremendous towards a bettering our society. Opinion Personally I found the study to be rather informative and helped me in expanding and applying my knowledge. If I were the one conducting this study I think I would have involved more people in my research. The more people are involved in the study, I think it may have the effect of reducing error.
The Essay on Divorce Children Parents Family
I intend to look at all the different aspects of children in what would typical be called a dysfunctional family. There have been many studies on this fact. It has been shown time and time again that children that do not come from stable environments are far more likely to be delinquents. I will reference several of these studies, such as the studies done in Rochester, Denver and Pittsburgh. This ...
I would have also included the opinion of the people involved in the research. By saying this I’m referring to the actual children or single parents who are on welfare. I also think that although the study cost a lot of money, it was well worth it. Solving these problems would ease several other things such as crime. All in all, I think this study has shed a light on the problems related to welfare and how they are linked to aspects of sociology..
