Family Environment Essay

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Children grow up in a number of different family environments in today’s society (Grusec and Hastings, 2007). This assignment will put forward the variety of environments that children are developing into. Also taking into account the social and economic impacts these environments bring about to the families. The main focus will be looking the effects of poverty and class on families in today’s society. Kolb’s model of reflection will then be put forward to analyse and explain the aspects of my own childhood and how these environments have had an impact on my family and upbringing. Berk (2009) supports this statement as he refers to 17 different family types in which children are being bought up, which includes; never-married single parent …show more content…

While not being a specific framework, this layer is comprised of cultural values, customs, and laws. The effects of larger principles defined by the macrosystem have a cascading influence throughout the interactions of all other layers (Berk, 2009). For example, if it is the belief of the culture that parents should be solely responsible for raising their children, that culture is less likely to provide resources to help parents. This will in turn have an effect on the structures in which the parents function. The parents’ ability or inability to carry out that responsibility toward their child within the context of the child’s microsystem is likewise …show more content…

Zinnia was brought up in a black community in an American city. Due to a lot of unemployment issues within the area it forced her to move to Atlanta to look for work elsewhere. At the age of 18 she was a mother living in a high-rise house with her daughter and two sons. She struggled day in and day out trying to provide for her family by feeding them, paying babysitters, finding the children’s father to get money from him and trying to dig herself out of debt. The children ate when they were hungry or bored and had very little space to play with their rags and food cartons. After observing Zinnia with her children over this amount of time it was found that she had cut off from her family, the community and her children. This was due to financial stress and daily hassles that accompany poverty that lead Zinnia to gradually weaken within her own family system (Berk,

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