SOCIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF THE FAMILY.

This article presents information regarding sociological research of the family. In the effort to establish categories for the description of the family one is at once confronted with the question of criteria for his selection. As far as the physical composition of the family is concerned, i.e., the number and kind of persons composing it, the task is fairly simple, but when one attempts to distinguish what are termed family structures, i.e., the established behavior patterns, the problem becomes more difficult. One at once becomes aware that these behavior patterns largely reflect the mores of his own culture and that he tends to describe those structural characteristics which seem to him to be essential to family life under his existing situation. Obviously certain of these characteristics are not essential for family life under other conditions. Some recent contributions to the study of family life illustrate this point very clearly. Thus N.L. Whetten, in outlining a research project on the Relationships between Family Organization and Consumption, seeks to compare the relation of consumption usages to a high or low degree of family "cohesion."