Stepfamilies Families and Stepfamilies it

Stepfamilies

Families and Stepfamilies

It is a reality of the modern lifestyle that families find themselves challenged in terms of structure. Indeed, the high divorce rate, as well as other factors such as death and increasing births to single mothers, have led to structure changes. The "normal" family with two biological parents has decreased in number, while there is an increasing number of families where one or both parents are non-biological. Indeed, according to Dunn et al. (2001), 90% of children lived with both biological parents in 1970, whereas this number has decreased to only 69% in 1994. Statistics in the United Kingdom are just as grim: in excess of one in eight children in this country will have separated or divorced parents by the time that they are 16. The increase in stepfamilies can thus be explained by factors such as divorce and births to single mothers.

Many challenges face stepfamilies. These include he stereotypes imposed by society, as well as the effect on children of living with stepfamilies. It has been concluded by a variety of studies that adjusting to new families presents a challenge to children. Many variables are however inherent in such adjustments, and it is therefore a difficult subject to pin down. A very young child for example would find adjusting to a stepfamily easier than a child who has lived in a certain family situation for a longer time, and is older. On the other hand, a very young child who is very attached to the original family may find this adjustment more difficult than a more independent, older child. Personality and individual situations thus play a large role in family adjustment. The stepfamily itself is also a factor that influences adjustment, as is the aforesaid social stigma attached to stepfamilies.

Another problematic factor influencing conclusive studies on childhood and the influence of stepfamilies on behavior, according to Dunn et al. (2001), is the fact that the views of the children themselves have not often been adequately examined.

Adjustment to Stepfamilies

According to Wilcox Doyle et al. (2002), research show a tendency in children with stepfamilies to struggle with maladjustment and low self-esteem issues. When comparing these children to their peers from biological families, it is found that these problems are worse for children with stepparents. Such research, despite the shortcomings mentioned above, is increasing to match the increasing numbers of stepfamilies. The reason for this is the fact that many more adjustments are necessary for children from stepfamilies than for those from biological families (Dunn et al., 2001).

The first adjustment is when the original family structure changes. Unless the child is extremely young, it will be necessary to some extent to ensure that he or she has adjusted fully to the first change before imposing a new one. A child who lost a biological parent to either divorce or death for examples should be granted a chance to mourn this loss before having to adjust to yet another new situation. Furthermore the new family should be sensitive to adjustment and self-esteem issues that the stepchild may harbor.

Secondly, Dunn et al. (2001) mention the "social capital" model, according to which the integration of new family members into the relationship network requires time and energy for new relationships to develop in as healthy a way as possible. These factors may place extra tension on the family situation, as new relationships take additional energy to what is already required for the existing family. The concept of social capital then refers to the time that parents take to positively interact with their children. When social capital within a family is taxed, behavior problems may develop in both biological and stepchildren. When a new child enters a family for example, the biological children may feel neglected with more social capital is engaged in attention to the stepchild. Similarly, the stepchild may feel neglected and left out when the family interacts with greater ease when he or she is not integrated in the activities.

A third issue mentioned by Dunn et al. (2001) is the "incompleteness" of stepfamilies. By this is meant the cultural lack of a definite paradigm for the definition of roles within a stepfamily. The different roles required within a stepfamily for example are not clearly defined within society. Because this is the case, the requirements for competence in these roles are also not clearly defined. This is the troublesome point, since maladjustment is often the result of a lack of specific guidelines offered by the experiences of others. It is therefore left to the members of the family themselves to cope with the process of adjustment. The difficulty here, as explained by Dunn et al. (2001), is that family members are human. As human beings, and without clear official guidelines, family members differ in their role expectations. These may lead to conflict situations when role expectations and role fulfillment differ widely.

Wilcox Doyle et al. (2002) on the other hand address the variability of adjustment of children within stepfamilies. According to this author, providing theories for maladjustment problems are useful only in homogeneous cases, whereas in practice these problems affect different children in different ways. According to studies, some children are as well adapted to their stepfamily environment as their peers from biological families, despite experiences of strain in terms of social stereotyping and strained social capital.

Wilcox Doyle et al. cite the transitional events theory to account for this variability. According to this theory, the experiences of a child within a family transition vary in number and nature, and this is why the reactions to these experiences also differ so widely. Furthermore, the abilities of a child to handle these stresses are variable, which also influences the outcome of a child's adjustment to the new family situation.

According to Hetherington et al. (1998), explicating the individual factors influencing adjustment or indeed the lack thereof, is not necessarily as useful as is claimed by some critics.

The reason for the skepticism regarding these methods is the conflicting results and controversies that have been part of the conclusions of such studies. The difficulty is not only the variety of factors from sample to sample, but also the analytical methods applied to the data gathered. Other differences, such as individual factors of adjustment resources, have been mentioned above. Thus the authors have searched for different factors to apply to the problem. One of these factors is the influence of outside resources such as friends and family members who are not part of the inner stepfamily circle.

The Stepfamily Situation: Coping Resources and Adjustment Methods

Hetherington et al. (1998) show that close friendships both within and outside of the stepfamily are often a determining factor in developing coping resources in terms of adjustment skills. The study for example shows that there is a significantly lower experience of positive relationships with stepmothers within a family than between a child and a biological parent. The significance of this is that a positive relationship takes more social capital than a mother-child bond that is formed by birth. This may lead to jealousy issues within the home.

Positive feelings among children in stepfamily households have also been shown to be enhanced with a willingness to talk about problems that these children experience with moving between households. Furthermore, when children are given an active role in household decisions, positive feelings regarding this household also increase. It appears then that communication, along with making a child feel important to the household into which he or she enters, is important in creating more positive reactions. The above then appear to be positive steps that stepfamilies can take to simplify the adjustment process for stepchildren.

The main problem identified here by Hetherington et al. (1998) here is that children in stepfamilies are seldom supported communicatively, and are then obliged to find outside sources in the form of other relatives and friends to cope with pressure and stress. This however is coupled with the fact that statistically no more negativity is experienced in terms of general conflict in the home of children with stepparents than that of children with biological parents. It appears therefore that the lack of knowledge regarding how to handle the role of stepparent and child within a stepfamily should be addressed, rather than the fact that negative feelings or conflict occur more than usual.

Hetherington et al. (1998) furthermore identify five factors relating to problems experienced within stepfamilies. These include individual vulnerability, family composition, stress, parental distress, and disrupted family process. In stepfamilies, all of the above factors play a role in the ability or lack thereof in a child to cope with family transitions. The authors suggest that a transactional model be used to predict risk and protective factors that relate to and ensure the well-being of children.

All five factors differ for each individual case, yet Hetherington et al. (1998) suggest that risk factors can be mediated by support strategies for children in stepfamilies in order to help them with the adjustment. Risk factors then include elements such as socioeconomic disadvantage and parental distress. When stepparents however work to establish a close rapport with their children, these can be minimized by encouraging the child to talk about whatever his or her feelings are about the transformative events within the family, and also outside of the family. This will also be helpful in coping with the above-mentioned social stigma that is related to the stepfamily in society.

In creating a safe and warm atmosphere for children to talk about their feelings and experiences, dysfunctional elements such as conflict, negativity, lack of support and authority (Hetherington et al. 1998) can be overcome to create a better and warmer environment. This environment will then help to curb the negativity that has been observed in children from stepfamilies. However, because adequate knowledge and research lack in this area, it is often left to stepparents and their newly acquired children to attempt the adjustment themselves. The result is too often that emotional distress leads to resentment and anger on the part of both parents and children, thus causing the dysfunctional elements mentioned above. This is also often the cause of the frequently negative perception of stepfamilies harbored by society. It becomes a vicious cycle:

The Role of Society

Wilcox Doyle et al. (2002) cite several cases of evidence where stereotypes and bias are associated with stepfamilies. Of course this in many ways is part of the "evil" stepmother and stepsister syndrome with which children are frequently fed by fairy tales such as Cinderella. Furthermore this paradigm is part of the social dichotomy between "normal" and not normal. Families with two biological parents are perceived as normal and therefore "right." Divorce, death, or single parenthood are seen to be outside of this norm, whereas entering a new family to become a stepfamily is yet further removed from the perception of normal and right. This perception is frequently another reason for the lack of adjustment in children with stepfamilies.

Once again, it is a cycle: stepparents experience the stress of being perceived negatively in society, and communicate this feeling to their children. Children from these families are then further burdened by the societies in which they move. Neither parent nor child then finds an outlet for the stress so accumulated, nor do they find support within the family structure, because of the accumulated negativity. All of these things lead to maladjustment, dysfunction, and consequent problematic behavior in children.

Cooperation: The Perception of the Family from within Banker and Gaertner (1998) corroborate the finding that there appears to be more conflict within stepfamilies than first-married families. This is accompanied with feelings of dissatisfaction in both parents and children from these families with their lives in general. The authors suggest as the reason for this that there is a lack of unity, or the perception of unity and cooperativeness within such families. The premise of Banker and Gaertner's study is that biological families have an inherent perception of unity by means of bloodline. The parents are united by marriage, and children are part of the group by birth. There is therefore a single bond among all the individuals within this family. Once again, the perception that this is good and right impacts heavily on stepfamilies, where this biological unity is non-existent.

A lack of biological unity then leads to a lack of psychological unity within the stepfamily, which accounts for the general satisfaction experienced so often within these families. In Banker and Gaertner's work then, the aim of harmony within stepfamilies can most easily be accomplished by what is termed the "contact hypothesis." This means that the family group interacts by means of cooperative strategies and rules, such as egalitarian paradigms, mutual respect, and cooperation among the group members.

One of the basic problems occurring within stepfamilies is that "us" and "them" groups are formed and posed against each other (Banker and Gaertner, 1998). This results in a predetermined bias against family members entering the group of the original family. Banker and Gaertner suggest that, if these barriers are lowered with an attitude of in-group and out-group members being included in a less rigid group of "we," the group interaction will be less hostile and could even become friendly and cooperative, according to the requirements for successful intergroup interaction. Family harmony in stepfamilies are thus increased by imposing the perception of the family as one group of persons, rather than two separate families.

Once the interfamily perception changes, a more positive paradigm of interaction is easy to create. Children from the different families can then learn to relate in a positive way, while stepparents are also viewed in a more positive light. This can then begin to be the basis for the family to see each other as part of the same group, and so to begin cooperating for the harmony and well-being of the group. Experiencing harmony within the stepfamily setting will then also result in individual satisfaction for each family member.

In this regard it is interesting that Banker and Gaertner (1998) also found that even without conscious cooperation, the psychological effect of the one-group paradigm reduced bias among the group members, and created a generally friendlier atmosphere. Such a single-group paradigm within the stepfamily then can much reduce natural barriers created by biases of two different families adjusting to each other.

Factors that can increase the perception of unity and thus the perception of harmony within the stepfamily then include a conscious effort to foster relationships between stepparents and stepchildren. These relationships are then conducive to a feeling of harmony for both parents and children, thus creating harmony within the home. When this is achieved, the family can cooperate to continue creating such harmony.

Harmony within stepfamilies created by the perception of being one group rather than two leads to other factors of healing, such as allowing a child the space to mourn the loss of the original family setting. A warm and comforting atmosphere is created for all, since the interest of the group is also the interest of the individual. In this way, counseling for stepfamilies can focus on the goal of harmony and cooperation, as well as steps to change perceptions towards the single rather than two-group paradigm.

The Role of the Parent

Parents, as caretakers and leaders of the family unit, play a significant role in creating harmony within the stepfamily. However, it has been seen above that often, stressors affecting parents who remarry challenge them to a point where it is difficult to follow strategies that would result in family unity. The role of stepparents as cooperative partners within the family has however not been studied often, and thus once again little information is available on how to accomplish this more effectively. Further complicating the issue is the fact that stepfamilies might range from a fairly simple structure, with two parents with one previous relationship each co-raise children from both relationships, to extremely complex situations, where one or both partners had more than one previous relationship.