Chapter 8 Learning Objectives

In this chapter, you should learn to do the following:

1.    Explain how social scientists define families and intimate relations.

2.    Outline the deinstitutionalization of marriage theory.

3.    Comprehend the evolution of marriage theory from institutional to individualized marriages.

4.    Account for how the social context influences the patterns by which people get married and start a family.

5.    Explain how families have been theorized by social scientists and apply these theories to their own lives and their social context.