Childbearing and the life course | AQA A-Level Sociology
Updated: 2 days ago
For Specification 7192
AQA A-Level Sociology | Free Revision Notes
Estimated study time:Â 55 minutes
This Childbearing and the life course A-Level Sociology revision page examines changing patterns of childbearing and the sociological importance of studying family relationships across people's lives. AQA requires students to consider childbearing and the life course alongside changes in marriage, cohabitation, separation and divorce, the sociology of personal life and contemporary family diversity.  Building on changes in intimate relationships [Marriage and cohabitation] and relationship breakdown [Separation and divorce], this lesson shows how family lives can involve both continuity and change.
Learning Objectives 🎯
By the end of this revision page, you should be able to:
Define childbearing and explain what sociologists mean by the life course.
Examine evidence concerning changing patterns of childbearing.
Explain why the life course is important for understanding contemporary family life.
Analyse relationships between individual family lives and wider social change.
Apply structural and social action approaches to changing family experiences.
Evaluate sociological explanations and evidence concerning changes in family lives.
Revision Notes đź“š
Childbearing and the life course A-Level Sociology revision overview
AQA requires students studying Families and Households to examine changing patterns of:
marriage
cohabitation
separation
divorce
childbearing
the life course
alongside the sociology of personal life and diversity in contemporary family and household structures.
These patterns should also be studied in relation to AQA's wider requirements concerning:
social structure and social change
the economy and state policies
socialisation, culture and identity
social differentiation, power and stratification
structural and social action explanations.
AQA expects students to consider both the evidence and the sociological explanations relevant to the topics they study.
What is childbearing?
Childbearing refers to having children and the patterns surrounding this within people's family lives.
Sociologists are interested in childbearing not simply as an individual or biological event, but as a social pattern.
They may therefore investigate questions such as:
whether patterns of childbearing change over time
when in the life course people have children
how childbearing relates to other family relationships
whether patterns are the same across all social groups
how wider social circumstances may influence family decisions.
This makes childbearing part of the wider sociological study of changing families and households.
Childbearing and demographic change
Childbearing also connects with the demographic content of Families and Households.
AQA separately requires students to understand UK demographic trends since 1900, including:
birth rates
death rates
family size
life expectancy
the ageing population
migration and globalisation.
The detailed demographic analysis belongs in population change and family size [Birth rates, death rates and family size].
For this lesson, the important distinction is that childbearing concerns people's family lives and decisions, while a birth rate is a population-level demographic pattern.
⚠️ Do not use these terms as if they mean exactly the same thing.
What are the changing patterns of childbearing?
AQA explicitly requires students to examine changing patterns of childbearing.
How to describe a changing childbearing pattern
When examining evidence, first establish exactly what the evidence shows.
A good description should identify:
What is being measured.
Whether the pattern increased, decreased, remained stable or fluctuated.
The period covered by the evidence.
The size of the change, if this can be calculated or identified.
Any differences between groups or stages of the life course.
Avoid explaining the pattern before you have described it accurately.
Childbearing is not the same as birth rate
This distinction is especially important.
Childbearing is concerned with the experience and patterns of having children within people's lives.
A birth rate describes births at the population level.
Therefore:
Evidence of changing birth rates may be relevant to the study of childbearing, but the concepts should not automatically be treated as interchangeable.
The demographic pattern is studied in greater depth in births, deaths and changes in family size [Birth rates, death rates and family size].
Description and explanation
As with marriage and divorce, a changing pattern does not explain itself.
Description identifies what happened.
Explanation attempts to establish why it happened.
For example, an answer stating that a pattern of childbearing changed over a particular period is descriptive.
To explain the change sociologically, students need to connect the pattern to:
wider social circumstances
social structure
social change
people's meanings and actions
where supported by evidence.
đź“Ś Exam tip:Â Whenever you use evidence, follow it with the question, "Why might this pattern exist?"
Childbearing as part of social change
AQA requires families to be studied in relation to social change.
Changing childbearing patterns may therefore be understood as one aspect of wider changes in family life.
This creates a connection with relationships between families and wider social change [Families, social change and the economy].
A sociological explanation might ask:
Do changing social circumstances influence when or whether people have children?
How might childbearing itself affect people's family relationships?
Does wider change affect all families in the same way?
How much choice do individuals have within wider social conditions?
The supplied specification establishes these broader sociological questions but does not identify particular causes of specific childbearing trends.
What is the life course?
The life course refers to the way people's social circumstances, relationships and experiences develop and change across their lives.
This concept is sociologically useful because it challenges the idea that family life is one permanent and unchanging arrangement.
An individual may experience different:
relationships
households
family roles
responsibilities
personal connections
at different points in life.
The life course therefore encourages sociologists to understand family life as dynamic rather than fixed.
The life course is not a single compulsory sequence
It is important not to interpret the life course as one fixed set of stages that everyone must follow.
The specification places the life course alongside:
marriage
cohabitation
separation
divorce
childbearing
personal life
family diversity.
This points towards considerable potential variation in people's experiences.
A sociological life-course approach therefore allows us to examine different family pathways rather than assuming everyone necessarily experiences the same sequence.
Connecting relationship patterns across the life course
Earlier lessons have examined marriage, cohabitation, separation and divorce.
The life course helps connect these topics.
Rather than studying each event separately, sociologists can examine how people's relationships may change over time.
For example, the analytical framework is:
earlier family circumstances → changing relationships and experiences → later family circumstances
This does not imply that everyone follows the same path.
Instead, it recognises that family relationships can change throughout people's lives.
Childbearing within the life course
Childbearing can also be examined as part of people's wider life courses.
Rather than asking only whether an individual has children, Sociology can examine:
the relationship between childbearing and other aspects of family life
how people's family roles may change
how personal relationships may develop over time
how childbearing connects with wider social circumstances.
This links individual experiences with broader social patterns.
Why the life course matters sociologically
The life-course perspective is significant for several reasons.
It recognises change
Family circumstances are not necessarily permanent.
People's relationships and responsibilities may change across their lives.
It allows different family experiences
There is no need to assume one universal family pathway.
Different people may experience different relationships and family arrangements.
It connects individual lives to wider social change
The circumstances in which one generation experiences family life may differ from those affecting another.
It helps explain family diversity
If individuals can experience different family arrangements over time, diversity exists not only between people, but potentially within one person's life.
This creates an important link to contemporary family and household variation [Family and household diversity].
Life course and family diversity
AQA specifically includes contemporary family and household diversity alongside the life course.
The two ideas are closely related.
Family diversity draws attention to differences between contemporary family and household structures.
The life course draws attention to changes in people's family circumstances over time.
Together they challenge a simple model in which:
everyone belongs to the same type of family
people's family circumstances remain fixed
everyone follows exactly the same relationship pathway.
This is one reason why the life course can be useful when evaluating broad claims about "the family".
The sociology of personal life
The specification also includes the sociology of personal life in the same section as childbearing and the life course.
This creates an important next step in the course.
The sociology of personal life examines relationships and connections that may extend beyond narrow or conventional definitions of family.
You will explore this directly in relationships and connections in personal life [The sociology of personal life].
For now, the important connection is that the life course encourages attention to people's changing personal relationships rather than treating family life as one fixed structure.
A structural approach to the life course
A structural approach emphasises the role of wider society in shaping people's lives.
From this perspective, life-course experiences occur within:
wider social structures
economic conditions
government policies
systems of inequality
processes of social change.
People's family experiences therefore do not take place in a social vacuum.
This develops the ideas from Families and the social structure and Families, social change and the economy.
Structural explanations of changing childbearing
Applied to childbearing, a structural approach suggests that changing population patterns should not be explained solely as unrelated personal decisions.
If a pattern changes across large numbers of people, sociologists may look for wider social circumstances that could have changed the opportunities or constraints surrounding family life.
The general reasoning is:
Individuals live within wider social structures.
These structures can change.
Changing structures can alter people's circumstances.
People make family decisions within those circumstances.
Patterns across many individuals may therefore change.
This provides an explanation of how large-scale social patterns and individual lives may be connected.
Strength of structural explanations
Structural explanations can help account for large-scale patterns.
If substantial numbers of people show similar changes in family behaviour, it may be sociologically useful to examine whether they share wider social circumstances.
This prevents family change from being reduced entirely to unrelated personal choices.
Limitation of structural explanations
Structural explanations may become too deterministic if they suggest wider circumstances automatically produce one family outcome.
People facing similar circumstances may:
interpret those circumstances differently
have different personal relationships
make different choices
follow different life courses.
A structural explanation may therefore be strongest when combined with recognition of social action.
A social action approach
A social action approach gives greater attention to people's:
interpretations
meanings
interactions
actions.
Applied to the life course, it emphasises the way individuals actively participate in creating their personal relationships.
People are not simply moved through a predetermined sequence by social structure.
They interpret circumstances and may respond differently.
Structure and action across the life course
The relationship can be summarised as:
Social structure | Social action |
Provides wider opportunities and constraints | Concerns how people interpret and respond to them |
Can help explain broad patterns | Can help explain individual variation |
Connects family lives to wider society | Emphasises meanings and choices |
May explain common circumstances | Helps explain different life-course pathways |
A good evaluation does not need to choose absolutely between the two.
A person's actions may be meaningful and active while still taking place within structural circumstances.
Childbearing and the economy
AQA specifically requires students to examine the family's relationship to the economy.
Economic organisation may therefore form part of an explanation of changing family lives where appropriate evidence establishes the relationship.
The general sociological principle is that economic circumstances can be considered part of the wider structural context in which family lives occur.
Childbearing and state policies
The same applies to state policies.
Government intervention forms part of the wider social structure surrounding families, as examined in Families and state policies.
Where evidence supports a relationship, policy might be considered alongside family change.
However:
a policy change and a childbearing change occurring at the same time do not automatically prove causation.
Students need to explain how government intervention might change circumstances and how that could affect behaviour.
Socialisation, culture and identity
Socialisation, culture and identity is one of AQA's two core themes.
This reminds students that family lives cannot be understood only in economic or demographic terms.
The meanings individuals attach to:
relationships
family roles
personal identities
may also be sociologically relevant.
The specification does not provide a named cultural explanation of changing childbearing, so named theories or claims should not be added without appropriate supporting material.
Social differentiation, power and stratification
AQA's second core theme is social differentiation, power and stratification.
This creates several important questions when examining childbearing and the life course:
Do all social groups experience the same patterns?
Are opportunities and constraints distributed equally?
Can an overall trend conceal important differences?
Does everyone have equal power within family relationships?
A population-wide pattern should therefore not automatically be generalised to every social group or individual.
Gender roles and changing family lives
AQA separately requires students to examine gender roles, domestic labour and power relationships within the family.
Childbearing and the life course may connect with these issues because family roles and responsibilities can form part of people's changing experiences.
However, the detailed evidence belongs in gendered responsibilities within families [Gender roles and domestic labour] and power and inequality within families [Power relationships within families].
The supplied specification does not provide a specific gender explanation of changing childbearing patterns.
Childbearing and childhood
Childbearing also connects logically to the specification's later study of:
the nature of childhood
changes in children's status within families and society.
However, these are distinct specification areas.
This lesson focuses on changing childbearing patterns and the life course, rather than detailed sociological explanations of childhood.
Life course versus family life cycle
For this resource, the focus remains on the specification's term life course.
Do not assume that everyone's family experiences must follow a fixed or predetermined sequence.
A life-course perspective can instead examine:
continuity
change
variation
different personal pathways.
This is especially important when connecting the topic to family diversity.
Family lives involve both change and continuity
The life course helps students avoid another common error: equating social change with total transformation.
Some aspects of a person's family life may change while others continue.
Similarly, society may show changing patterns while older relationship forms remain present.
When evaluating family change, consider:
What has changed?
and
What has remained?
This usually produces a more balanced sociological conclusion.
Individual change and social change are different levels
A person's family life changing is not exactly the same as a population-wide pattern changing.
There are at least two analytical levels:
Individual level | Societal level |
Changes within one person's life course | Changes in patterns across a population |
Personal relationships and experiences | Large-scale trends in family life |
May be explored through meanings and experiences | May be identified through quantitative evidence |
Sociology is interested in connections between these levels.
One person's experience alone does not establish a national pattern, while a national pattern does not describe every person's experience.
How evidence about childbearing can be investigated
AQA requires sociological methods and the strengths and limitations of research design to be integrated into substantive topics.
Changing childbearing may be investigated using quantitative and qualitative evidence.
Quantitative evidence
Quantitative data are numerical.
They may allow sociologists to identify:
changes over time
the scale of demographic patterns
differences between groups where the data provide them
relationships between variables.
AQA includes official statistics as a source of sociological data.
These may therefore be relevant when examining large-scale childbearing patterns.
Evaluating quantitative evidence
When analysing numerical data, ask:
What is the measure?
Do the figures show births, birth rates, family size or another measure?
These should not be confused.
What time period is being compared?
A short-term fluctuation should not automatically be presented as a permanent change.
Are the figures absolute numbers or rates?
These communicate different information.
Is there variation between groups?
An overall pattern may conceal social differentiation.
Can the figures explain people's reasons?
Usually not on their own.
Statistics can describe population patterns without revealing the meanings individuals attach to their decisions.
Qualitative evidence
Qualitative data provide non-numerical information about meanings and experiences.
This could help sociologists investigate how people understand their:
family relationships
changing roles
experiences across the life course.
Such evidence can therefore complement statistical patterns.
A quantitative pattern may identify what is changing, while qualitative evidence may help sociologists investigate how people experience or interpret change.
Evaluating qualitative evidence
Qualitative evidence may provide greater depth, but this does not make it automatically superior.
As required by AQA, students should consider the strengths and limitations of the research design used to obtain evidence.
The usefulness of evidence depends on the question being asked.
Evidence does not automatically explain causation
Suppose evidence identifies:
a change in a wider social condition
a change in childbearing during the same period.
This may suggest a possible relationship.
It does not automatically establish that the first change caused the second.
A sociological explanation needs to identify the mechanism connecting them.
A strong answer may therefore write:
This evidence is consistent with the explanation, but additional evidence would be needed to establish whether the proposed factor caused the changing childbearing pattern.
Evaluating explanations of changing childbearing
When evaluating an explanation, ask several questions.
Does it explain the evidence?
A good explanation needs to account for the actual pattern observed.
Does it identify a mechanism?
Simply stating that society changed is not enough. Explain how the wider change could affect family life.
Does it account for differences?
A theory may be weakened if it assumes everyone responds identically despite evidence of variation.
Does it recognise structure?
An explanation entirely based on individual choice may ignore the circumstances in which choices are made.
Does it recognise social action?
A highly structural explanation may make individuals appear passive.
Does it distinguish correlation from causation?
Evidence that two trends occur together does not automatically establish a causal relationship.
Evaluating the life-course approach
The life-course perspective has several sociological advantages.
Strength: it recognises change over time
People's family circumstances can change rather than remaining fixed.
Strength: it accommodates diversity
Different people may follow different family pathways.
Strength: it connects family topics
Marriage, cohabitation, separation, divorce and childbearing can be understood as potentially related experiences rather than isolated topics.
Strength: it links personal and social change
Individual lives take place within changing societies.
Limitation: individual experiences do not automatically explain social patterns
Studying a person's life in depth does not by itself tell us how common that experience is.
Evidence about individual lives and population patterns therefore needs to be used appropriately.
Why the life course matters for contemporary family life
The concept has particular importance because AQA also requires students to study the diversity of contemporary family and household structures.
The life course encourages us to think of diversity in two ways.
Diversity between individuals:Â different people may experience different family arrangements.
Diversity across time:Â the same individual may experience different arrangements during their life.
This provides an important foundation for Family and household diversity.
Avoid assuming childbearing defines family life
The specification includes a wide range of relationship and household patterns.
Students should therefore avoid defining contemporary family life entirely through childbearing.
Childbearing is one important area of family change, but AQA also requires:
marriage and cohabitation
separation and divorce
personal life
household diversity.
A sociological explanation should therefore avoid assuming one universal form of family experience.
Avoid a single "normal" life course
Another common mistake is to treat one sequence of relationships as the standard against which every other person's life should be judged.
The specification's inclusion of diversity and the sociology of personal life makes this unnecessarily restrictive.
Instead, use the life course as a way of understanding:
variation
timing
transitions
continuity
change.
Connecting this lesson to personal life
The next lesson, The sociology of personal life, develops this approach further.
Rather than beginning with one rigid definition of family, it examines relationships and connections beyond conventional family definitions.
The life-course perspective prepares for this because it encourages students to think about the changing relationships that may matter across people's lives.
Building an examination argument đź§
AQA requires students to demonstrate knowledge and understanding, apply Sociology to issues, and analyse and evaluate theories, concepts and evidence.
For an extended response on childbearing and the life course, a strong argument could:
Identify the changing childbearing pattern accurately using valid evidence.
Explain what the evidence does and does not demonstrate.
Develop a structural explanation of the change.
Explain the mechanism connecting wider social circumstances to family behaviour.
Evaluate structural explanations using social action.
Consider variation between different individuals and social groups.
Apply the life course to changing family relationships.
Link life-course variation to contemporary family diversity.
Evaluate the quality of the evidence.
Reach a reasoned judgement about why family lives change.
đź“Ś Exam tip:Â Do not simply state that "people have more choice nowadays". A sociological explanation needs to identify what is changing, explain the processes involved and consider how individual action relates to wider social structures.
Key Words 🔑
Key word | Student-friendly definition | How it may be used in an exam |
Childbearing | Having children and the patterns surrounding this within people's family lives. | Describe and explain changes in family behaviour. |
Life course | The development and change of people's relationships and social experiences across their lives. | Explain why family circumstances should not be treated as fixed. |
Social change | Changes in social patterns, relationships or organisation over time. | Connect childbearing and family lives with wider changes in society. |
Social structure | The organised relationships and patterns making up wider society. | Explain structural influences on people's family lives. |
Social action | An approach emphasising people's actions and the meanings they give to social situations. | Evaluate explanations that make family behaviour appear determined by wider society. |
Family diversity | Variation in contemporary family and household structures. | Explain why different people may experience different life courses. |
Birth rate | A population-level measure relating to births. | Distinguish demographic trends from individual childbearing experiences. |
Quantitative data | Numerical information used to identify and compare social patterns. | Analyse changing childbearing patterns. |
Qualitative data | Non-numerical information about meanings and experiences. | Explore how individuals understand changes in their family lives. |
Social differentiation | Differences between individuals and social groups. | Evaluate whether an overall childbearing trend applies equally to everyone. |
Common Mistakes ⚠️
Mistake: Treating childbearing and birth rate as identical
Why this is incorrect: Childbearing concerns people's family lives, while a birth rate is a population-level demographic measure.
How to improve: Check exactly what an Item or table measures and use the appropriate concept.
Mistake: Inventing statistics about childbearing
Why this is incorrect: The supplied specification does not contain numerical childbearing trends.
How to improve: Use figures only when supplied by a valid course source or examination Item.
Mistake: Describing a changing pattern without explaining it
Why this is incorrect: AQA requires students to examine both evidence and sociological explanations.
How to improve: After describing the trend, identify the sociological processes that could account for it.
Mistake: Treating the life course as one fixed sequence
Why this is incorrect: The specification also requires family diversity, personal life and a range of changing relationship patterns.
How to improve: Think of the life course as allowing different pathways and changing experiences rather than one universal set of stages.
Mistake: Explaining family change entirely through individual choices
Why this is incorrect: This ignores the specification's emphasis on social structure and social change.
How to improve: Consider the social circumstances in which individual decisions are made.
Mistake: Treating people as completely determined by social structure
Why this is incorrect: AQA also requires understanding of social action.
How to improve: Recognise that people can interpret and respond differently to similar structural conditions.
Mistake: Assuming a population trend describes every individual
Why this is incorrect: Aggregate evidence may conceal differences between groups and individual life courses.
How to improve: Distinguish population-level patterns from individual experiences.
Mistake: Assuming correlation proves causation
Why this is incorrect: Two trends changing during the same period does not demonstrate that one caused the other.
How to improve: Explain the mechanism connecting the proposed cause with the childbearing pattern and consider alternative explanations.
Exam-Style Questions ✍️
Questions
1. Which one of the following concepts refers to changes in people's relationships and social experiences across their lives?
A. Birth rate
B. Life course
C. Social stratification
D. Official statistics
[1 mark]
2. Define the term life course.
[2 marks]
3. Explain one difference between a changing pattern of childbearing and a changing birth rate.
[4 marks]
4. Explain two reasons why the life-course approach is useful for understanding contemporary family life.
[6 marks]
5. Read Item A and answer the question that follows.
Item A
Patterns of childbearing may change as the wider circumstances in which family life takes place change. However, people experiencing similar social conditions do not necessarily make identical decisions about their relationships or family lives.
Using material from Item A, analyse two differences between structural and social action explanations of changing childbearing patterns.
[10 marks]
6. Read Item B and answer the question that follows.
Item B
A researcher uses numerical evidence to investigate patterns of childbearing over several decades. The data show a population-level pattern but provide little information about the meanings individuals attach to their family decisions. The overall figures may also conceal differences between social groups.
Using material from Item B, analyse two limitations of relying only on quantitative evidence to understand changing childbearing patterns.
[10 marks]
7. Explain two ways in which a life-course approach may help sociologists understand family and household diversity.
[6 marks]
8. Evaluate sociological explanations of changes in childbearing and family lives.
[20 marks]
Answers and indicative mark scheme
Question 1
Answer: B. Life course
Award 1 mark for the correct answer.
Question 2
Award up to 2 marks for an answer recognising that the life course concerns:
people's relationships, social circumstances or experiences
developing or changing across their lives.
Question 3
Award up to 4 marks for a developed distinction.
Indicative content:
Childbearing concerns having children within people's family lives.
Birth rate concerns births at a population or demographic level.
Evidence concerning birth rates may inform the study of childbearing, but the concepts operate at different analytical levels.
A stronger response explains the distinction rather than merely giving two definitions.
Question 4
Award up to 3 marks for each developed reason.
Possible answers include:
It recognises that family circumstances may change across people's lives.
It allows different people to follow different family pathways.
It connects marriage, cohabitation, separation, divorce and childbearing rather than treating them as isolated topics.
It helps explain family diversity.
It connects individual family experiences with wider social change.
It avoids treating one family structure as permanently fixed.
Question 5
A strong answer should use Item A directly.
Structural explanation
Item A refers to "wider circumstances".
Structural explanations emphasise the social context within which family decisions occur.
They can help explain large-scale patterns affecting many people.
Social action explanation
Item A states that similar circumstances do not produce identical decisions.
Social action approaches emphasise meanings and individual responses.
They help explain variation between life courses.
Analysis
Stronger responses may conclude that structural approaches help explain common opportunities and constraints, while social action approaches help explain why individuals respond differently.
Question 6
Strong responses could develop two of the following.
Lack of meaning
Item B states that numerical evidence gives little information about meanings.
Statistics may show a pattern without explaining how individuals understand their decisions.
Qualitative evidence may provide greater depth about these experiences.
Variation between groups
The Item states that overall figures can conceal social differences.
An aggregate trend should not automatically be applied equally to all groups.
Explanation and causation
Numerical evidence may identify what has changed without explaining why.
Additional sociological evidence is required to establish an explanation.
Question 7
Award up to 3 marks for each developed way.
Indicative content:
Different individuals may experience different relationship pathways across their lives.
The same individual may experience different family or household arrangements at different stages.
The approach challenges the idea that there is one universal family sequence.
It connects changing relationships with the diversity of contemporary families and households.
Question 8
A strong response should demonstrate knowledge, application, analysis and evaluation.
Indicative AO1 content
Students may explain:
childbearing
the life course
social change
social structure
structural explanations
social action
family diversity
social differentiation
quantitative and qualitative evidence
relationships with the economy or state policies where relevant.
Indicative analysis and evaluation
Developed answers might argue that:
Structural approaches are useful because childbearing takes place within wider social circumstances.
They can help explain why large-scale changes may occur across populations.
However, structural explanations risk becoming deterministic if they assume people respond identically.
Social action approaches recognise individual meanings, choices and different responses.
An explanation based entirely on individual choice may nevertheless underestimate wider opportunities and constraints.
The life-course approach is useful because it recognises that family circumstances change over time.
It accommodates different family pathways rather than assuming one universal model.
This makes it particularly useful for understanding contemporary family diversity.
Population-level statistics can identify patterns but should not automatically be generalised to every individual or social group.
Quantitative evidence may show what is changing without explaining people's meanings.
Qualitative evidence may provide deeper insight into experiences but should still be evaluated according to its research design.
Relationships between wider social changes and childbearing trends do not automatically establish causation.
Explanations should consider both change and continuity rather than assuming all aspects of family life transform together.
Judgement
A well-supported conclusion could argue that changing family lives are best understood by connecting people's life courses to the wider social structures in which they live. Structural explanations can account for common circumstances and population-level patterns, while social action helps explain variation in people's responses. The life-course perspective is therefore particularly useful because it connects social change, individual experience and different forms of contemporary family life [Family and household diversity].
The next lesson develops this focus on people's relationships further through personal relationships and connections beyond conventional definitions of family [The sociology of personal life].
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