This week in class we learned about family trends and how it has drastically changed since the late 1900’s. The first trend that was discussed was single mothers. 40% of children are born without dads and we can only assume that the numbers will continue to rise. The trend that went hand and hand with this is working mothers. If a mother is single, she is most likely the only provider within the household. Just like single mothers, we can assume that the amount of working mothers will increase. Being a single mother and having to work all the time puts a strain on her relationship with her children. Both the mother and children wouldn’t be spending much time together and it could affect the child. For example, the kids may not be learning the skills they necessary skills needed to grow up.
Delayed marriage is also one of the trends that we’ve seen increase. People are waiting to get married. The average age for men to get married is 29.5 and for women, 27.4. Being a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, it is normal for people to get married in their early 20’s. However, this trend pertains to people of the LDS faith as well. We see that it is happening in all aspects of every culture, religion, and family. Because people are getting married later, the age of having a first child is going up. I personally think that if you are having a child at an old age, you’re probably not going to have much kids. My reason for thinking this is because it’s dangerous to have kids when you’re old and it’s harder to take care of them.The trend that goes hand in hand with this is cohabitation. 60%- 80% of people cohabitate, meaning that they live together and have a sexual relationship not being married.
People are having fewer children and this is also becoming more common. The average birth rate was 2.13 but decreased to 1.8. That is a significant drop in numbers. Birth rates contribute to another trend which is living alone and household sizes. Because there isn’t much births happening, household sizes are getting smaller. There are fewer people in the house, usually it’s a person living alone. Personally, I don’t think I could live alone because I grew up always around family. Family makes things more enjoyable.
Another trend is divorce rates. During the 1970’s, the amount of divorces spiked up however, in 1980 it decreased. Most people say that when a marriage happens, there’s a 50-50 chance that a divorce will take place. That is not true. Divorce rates has never really reached 50%, maybe for certain years, but not overall.
Pre- marital sex is also a trend we discussed in class. To my surprise, stats revealed that sexual intercourse has dropped within the last 15 years. I thought that it would have greatly increased due to the society that we live in today, but I was wrong. The only reason I can assume that people are abstaining from having sex before marriage is because they don’t want to be tied down to someone. However, waiting til marriage to have sex is a great and sacred thing between you and your other half.
While examining all of these trends, there was one thing that came up in class. They are a sequence of events. One trend influences the next trend. You can see that a lot of the trends go hand in hand with one another and are somewhat related. I found that learning about these trends were very interesting, especially when I saw the numbers. Hopefully, you learned something new and found it interesting also.
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