Alternatives in child rearing in the 1970s.

Abstract

Drawing upon pilot interviews and home observations representing 50 families from rural and urban communes, single middle-class mothers, and "unmarried marrieds," the child-rearing practices, values, and beliefs of counter-culture groups are examined and compared with those of two-parent nuclear families of the 1970s. Attitudes and practices of "new" families bring into focus a number of fundamental issues, such as effects of multiple caretaking, anti sexist attitudes, heightened interest in social relationships, and generalized trust of adults on the psychological growth of the child. Since 1965 there is considerable jour nalistic and informal evidence that many variants of the two-parent nuclear family have been appearing on the American middle-class scene. 7• 12• 1�-2G. w. 4�• nn Many of these alternative family styles grew out of the "counter-cultures," which were vocally and visibly alienated from society. As many of the social sci-entists who studied the original middle class, turned-off adolescents and young adults in the middle and late 1960s had noted, members of these groups had come from cultured, sophisticated, eco nomically advantaged homes, and had been carefully reared by mothers (often well-educated and trained) who had assumed traditional roles and who had

Nonconventional Family Life-Styles and Sex Typing in Six-Year-Olds

“…The Family Lifestyles Project (FLS) was designed to follow a group of these countercultural families from the late 1960s and early 1970s as they established families and raised children (Alexander, 1978;Eiduson, Cohen, & Alexander, 1973;Eiduson, Kornfein, Zimmerman, & Weisner, 1982;Eiduson & Weisner, 1978;Weisner, 1986;Weisner & Eiduson, 1986). The FLS has followed over 200 families since 1974-1975, collecting data about the life-styles they chose, the values they espoused, and how parents put these values into practice in their roles as mothers and fathers.…”

The American Dependency Conflict: Continuities and Discontinuities in Behavior and Values of Countercultural Parents and Their Children

“…We identified eight values orientations which both characterized the countercultural movements and mattered to parents (Eiduson et al 1973). These include alternative achievement goals (Weisner 1982), pronaturalism (environmental concerns, emotional openness, being "laid-back") (Weisner et al 1983), gender egalitarianism (Weisner and Wilson-Mitchell 1990), humanism, a present rather than future orientation, an acceptance of nonconventional authority and distrust of conventional social authorities, relatively low interest in a scientific/rational approach to life, and antimaterialism.…”

Parenting in the early years: Current perspectives

“…Eiduson, Cohen and Alexander (1978) points out that in American society the mushrooming of alternative family styles grew out of the counter culture of the mid 1960s. Alternative modes of family life, such as the dual worker family, the single parent family, the reconstituted family, the communal family and the "unmarried marrieds" present life styles and patterns of child rearing which are at variance with the traditional model of family life.…”