Chapter 16

Summary

Chapter 16 starts out stating that stepfamilies are formed after divorce, remarriage, and after widowhood. Many divorced people prepare for remarriage by living together. The US remarriage rate is the highest in the world and nearly 85% of divorcees remarry. The most common decision factors for remarriages are age, gender, race, social class, and the presence of children. There are considered to be 6 different stages of divorce and they are as follows: emotional remarriage, psychic remarriage, community remarriage, parental remarriage, economic remarriage, and legal remarriage. Step-siblings are siblings who share a biological/adoptive parent and a step parent, and half siblings are siblings who share only one biological or adoptive parent. 3 basic types of stepfamilies are mother-stepfather family, father-stepmother family, and joint stepfamily. Some problems stepfamilies face are: naming, sexual boundaries, legal issues, distributing economic resources, distributing emotional resources, developing “step” relationships, establishing discipline and closeness, gender differences in children’s adjustment, and intergenerational relationships. Studies show that children in stepfamilies don’t fare as well as children in biological studies.

Interesting Topics

I found the little sub article on sexuality in stepfamilies incredibly interesting. It seems both taboo and appropriate at the same time. On one side siblings aren’t supposed to be attracted to each other, and on the other side (step) siblings in stepfamilies aren’t blood related which is something that our culture teaches us to look for in attraction 101; you can’t have a relationship with your own blood.

Question

I was wondering if anyone could shed light on how a stepfamily feels? For those of you who are a member of a step family how was the transition into it?

Steve Boser