The family in historical and psychological aspects

The term "nuclear family" is usually used to refer to married families. A "married" family includes only spouses and unmarried children who have not reached the age of majority. A single-parent family consists of a single parent with their children, where the parent is either widowed, divorced (and has not remarried), or has never been married. The parent may exercise sole custody of the children, or separated parents may have a co-parenting agreement in which the children divide their time (possibly equally) between two different single-parent families or between one single-parent family and one mixed family. Compared with sole custody, the physical, mental and social well-being of children can be improved by co-parenting and by having children have greater access to both parents. Most single-parent families are headed by the mother, but the number of single-parent families headed by the father is growing.

The term "extended family" is also common, especially in the United States. This term has two different meanings:

1. It serves as a synonym for "blood family" (consanguineous means "of one blood").

2. In societies dominated by the married family, this refers to "kindred" (an egocentric network of relatives beyond the home group) who do not belong to the married family.

These types refer to ideal or normative structures found in certain societies. In any society, there will be some differences in the actual composition and concept of families.

Historically, extended families have been the main family unit in Catholic culture and countries (such as Southern Europe and Latin America), as well as in Asian, Middle Eastern and Eastern Orthodox countries.

The term "mixed family" or "foster family" describes families with mixed parents: one or both parents remarried, as a result of which children from the former family ended up in a new family. Also in sociology, in particular in the works of social psychologist Michael Lamb, a traditional family refers to a middle-class family with a father who earns a living and a stay-at-home mother who are married to each other and raise their biological children, and an unconventional family refers to exceptions to this rule. Most U.S. households are currently non-traditional according to this definition. Critics of the term "traditional family" point out that in most cultures and in most cases, the extended family model was the most common, rather than the nuclear family, although in England it had a longer tradition than in other parts of Europe and Asia, which contributed to the influx of large numbers of immigrants to America. The nuclear family became the most common form in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s.

As for communication patterns in families, there is a certain set of beliefs in the family that reflect how its members should communicate. These family communication patterns stem from two basic sets of beliefs. Firstly, it is a communication orientation (the degree to which the importance of communication is appreciated) and secondly, a conformity orientation (the degree to which families should emphasize similarities or differences in attitudes, beliefs and values).

Mixed families are complex families, ranging from foster families to cohabiting families (a person living with guardians who are not married to half-siblings). Although this is not too different from foster families, cohabiting families have a strong psychological impact on young people. Some teenagers are prone to "delinquent actions" and experience problems at school, ranging from declining academic performance to increased problematic behavior. This coincides with other studies on the development trajectories of foster families, where some had family ties and others lacked connections. Emotional detachment from foster family members exacerbates this uncertainty, heightening the tensions that can arise in these families. The transition from an old family to a new one, which falls under the category of mixed families, can also become problematic, since actions that were once performed in the old family can be poorly transmitted to teenagers in the new family.

A monogamous family is based on legal or social monogamy. In this case, the individual has only one (official) partner during his lifetime or at any given time (i.e. serial monogamy). This means that a person cannot have several different legal spouses at the same time, as this is usually prohibited by bigamy laws (the act of marrying one person while still legally married to another) in jurisdictions that require monogamous marriages.

Polygamy is a marriage involving more than two partners. When a man is married to more than one wife at the same time, such a relationship is called polygyny; and when a woman is married to more than one husband at the same time, it is called polyandry. If several husbands and wives are involved in a marriage, it can be called polyamory, group or joint marriage.