Research Paper on:
Twenty First Century Relationships, Marriage, and Family

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
- mother, father and children - these days, families are complex organisms shaped by society, the economy and even internal personalities. Therefore, when studying family and gender relationships, its important  not to generalize about the so-called "nuclear" family, but rather, to study other forces as well that could impact family development. Some of these could include, but are not limited  to racial and ethnic identity, the role of women in the workforce and family, the impact of economics on the family and intra-family violence, also known as domestic violence. In  short, then, according to Scott Coltrane and Randall Collins in their book Sociology of Marriage and Family: Gender Love and Property, the American family is alive and well - and  is more diverse than ever. This paper will attempt to examine family relationships, not based on the typically perceived model, but based  on external influences. While the majority of this paper will use examples from the book Sociology and the Family: Gender Love and Poverty by Scott Coltrane and Randall Collins, other  sources will be sprinkled throughout as well. The main question that Coltrane and Collins attempts to answer is why families look the way they do today, and this is the  same question this paper will answer. Sociological versus Psychological Studies During the 20th century, a variety of tools have sprung up to  evaluate the standard family. Among these two disciplines are sociology and psychology. While these disciplines overlap, particularly as they pertain to family dynamics, these are, in fact, two very different  studies from one another. Psychology focuses on the mental or emotional states of the family members that belong to a particular family unit, while the science of sociology is more