The Shift of Family Role and Function in Atomistic Family in Urban
Society
Siti Mas’udah
1
and Priyono Tri Febrianto
2
1
Department of Sociology, Universitas Airlangga, Dharmawangsa Dalam, Surabaya, Indonesia
2
Faculty of Education, Universitas Trunojoyo Madura, Bangkalan, Indonesia
Keywords: Atomistic Family, Extended Family, Nuclear Family, Socialization.
Abstract: The role and function of family in the social life are very crucial. However, globalization and modernization
have brought changes on the variety of family models, including the atomistic family, in which individuality
is likely more important than the family ties. Nowadays, in postmodern societies it is easy to find families
which members are not living in the same house. This research aims to describe the implementation of
socialization function in atomistic families. This research employed qualitative method with purposive
sampling. Data collection was conducted through in-depth interviews of six families, in which spouses live
separately. Informants interviewed live in Surabaya and their spouses live outside Surabaya. The findings
reveal that globalization brings immense social change including changes in family structure. The shift of
family structure from extended family (traditional society) leads to nuclear family (modern society) and in
postmodern era shifting to atomistic family. The shift of family structure brings consequences on the
shifting role and function of family, especially in case of child care and socialization. Atomistic family
requires generalized others that are parents, baby sitter, household assistants and neighbours. More
economically established families have a greater chance of meeting face-to-face with family members than
the lower-class families.
1 INTRODUCTION
The family framework applies influence of high-
profile people towards the youth development, with
implications of teenager’s adjustment
(Bronfenbrenner, 1986). Healthy family bond leads
to diminished risk of teenager problems such as
sexual behaviour and downheartedness (Greenberg
and Lippold, 2013). Family bond is also connected
with health and happiness (Lippold et al., 2014).
Bold and vigorous childhood creates healthy
adulthood (Repetti et al., 2002). Family has the role
not only to reduce the teenager’s development risk
as well as support them from the impact of the risk,
but also constrain their healthy development (Fraser
et al., 1999). The success of family-based prevention
programs may lead to teenager’s happiness and
reduce their risky behaviour (Greenberg and
Lippold, 2013; Van Ryzin et al., 2015).
The infrastructure of couple and family
relationship has shifted from social and institutional
obligations to companionship and love and also to
self-fulfillment and life enrichment (Amato et al.,
2007). Furthermore, it guides to the emergence of
family structure demographic trends which include
relationship dissolution and re-partnership,
cohabitation, non-marital childbearing, and multiple-
partner fertility (Brown et al., 2016).
According to Zimmerman (2008), family,
marriage and divorce are not taboo to discuss in a
modern society. This is the underlying concept of
the atomistic family. Based on a study of the
sociological history of family development,
Puolimatka (2017) argues that negative educational
outcomes in the family is one of the foundations for
the formation of family atomization structures.
Misguidance in raising children may result in their
becoming rebels and having negative personalities.
When the norm in marriage is broken, the identity
and rights of the child are taken away. It might be
one of the factors leading children to grow up as a
rebellious generation without a strong sense of
identity.
Zimmerman (2008) adds that in the second
decade of the 19th century America and Britain
reacted to the revolution in France. The change had
Mas’udah, S. and Febrianto, P.
The Shift of Family Role and Function in Atomistic Family in Urban Society.
In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education (ICSE 2017) - Volume 2, pages 297-302
ISBN: 978-989-758-316-2
Copyright © 2018 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved
297

an impact on the concept of family. The change also
took place in Greece and Rome. Throughout the
19th and early 20th centuries the concept of family
in society has led to the destruction of family ties.
Family relationships are no longer the main ones,
but the ability of the individual takes precedence.
The study of the family has been conducted by a
number of researchers. However, the study of
atomistic family has not been fully explored by
previous researchers. Recent urbanization and
industrialization have brought about the variety of
family structures. The family structure undergoes a
shift, from extended family to traditional society to
the nuclear family in modern society and then to
atomistic family in the postmodern era. In the
atomistic family, people likely have more
importance than family ties. Nowadays, in
postmodern societies, it is easy to find families who
are not living in the same house. Atomistic families
have consequences for changing family roles and
functions.
The condition of families whose members live
separately might challenge our understanding and
perception of the family. According to the United
Nation’s Preamble of the Convention on the Rights
of the Child, it is stated that the family functions as
the basic nature of the children’s personality
development insisting on the parental advisory in
transmitting such values and norms (The United
Nations, 1989). This provision implicitly requires
the full presence of the parents which marks and
ensures the work of cultural transmission in the
family. Nevertheless, it might be in contrast with the
daily practical experiences. In the 20th century the
world witnessed dramatic changes of the form of
family life since the new forms of relations, the
opportunity for jobs in particular place, and
technological advance undermine such single
conceptual understanding of the family and make it
less standardized (Mortelmans et al, 2016). It thus
requires attention to the extent to which the new
forms of family produce daily experiences which are
influential in the sustainable function of the family
as the social apparatus for the cultural transmission.
Previous academic works have tried to deal with
this issue. Andresen et al. (2012) suggested that
children who grow up with their parents tend to have
higher well-being index than those who live in
separated family. This in some degrees create
children’s personality which may affect their
performances in relation to the satisfaction toward
members of their family. Moreover, in order to
analyze youth behaviour, Ermischa and Gambetta
(2010) imply that children who used to live
separately from their parents are more susceptible to
behavior problems. It is due to their reliances on the
trustworthiness outside their own families.
This article emphasizes the important role of the
family in the social life regardless of what kind of
social changes that occur. The sociological approach
employed in this model starts from the notion that
basically people tend to live together in a particular
form of a group. This approach then stresses on the
process of the social interaction in which members
interplay in such interaction and influence one
another among individuals, individuals and groups,
and among the groups. Moreover, a family is an
element of the social structure to which other social
institutions rest their existence. In recent urban
societies, families have to choose to live separately:
husbands, wives, and children live in different
houses. This study aims to explore how people
experiences the atomistic family models related to
their social functions in transmitting norms and
values of the society within the family.
2 METHODS
This research employed qualitative method with
purposive sampling. Data collection was conducted
through in-depth interviews of six families, in which
spouses live separately. Informants interviewed live
in Surabaya dan their spouses live outside Surabaya.
The choice of informants was based on the
classification of family income per month. The six
informants are two middle-class housewives, two
middle-class women working in the formal sector,
and two women from the working-class family
employed in the informal sector. After the editing
and classification process, the data were then
analyzed and interpreted.
3 RESULT AND DISCUSSION
Zimmerman introduces his formulation on the cycle
of family changes in three stages: trustee family,
domestic family, and atomistic family (Goode
1995). The trustee family refers to the condition
where the family performs state-like functions which
exercise their power to control and oversee the
family members. In addition, the domestic family
situates the balance between state and society; the
state and family share the influence among each
other while actually state has already gained control
over family members. In the atomistic family, the
ICSE 2017 - 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education
298

state has infinite power because of the decreasing
family control and the strong state position within
society in the one hand and the spread of individual
philosophy within society in the other hand.
The atomistic family might similarly consist of
the husbands, wives, and the children; however, the
relation among them has no longer produced the
meaning of the family as it did before but it has only
produced an atomized individual which moves in its
cycles. Nevertheless, taking this model for granted is
quite problematic since it stands upon the simplified
single assumption of the nuclear family.
In addition to that phenomena, several studies
show different features. Despite the problem of its
perspective, the path to probe recent family changes
by suggesting the involvement of other parties such
as extended families and colleagues in parenting,
allowing the working of alloparenting. It is likely
suitable in the more complex societies, in which one
of the features is multiple partnership system
extending the family ties beyond the conventional
nuclear and extended family model. Affirming this
approach, Meehan et al. (2013) expand the
alloparenting model by showing that in recent cases
where allomaternal seems hard to practice, the
mother’s ability to delegate her parenting task
determines whether the alloparenting works or not.
Indeed, choosing grandmother for doing the
mothering task is the best option since the
grandmother is categorized as the most important
allocareer (Meehan et al., 2013).
According to the framework above, this study
points out that in the atomistic families where
husbands and wives live separately there are various
means carried out to preserve the household. The
direct meeting might be the most chosen solution. It
varies from weekly, monthly, and even a half-yearly
meeting. Yet this option depends on the economic
condition of the family. For the higher economic
level families, the direct meeting is more frequent
instead of the lower ones. In addition, they also keep
communicating by phone and other social media.
Based on the interviews, the atomistic family
illuminate’s various experiences from six atomistic
families living in Surabaya. An informant from
middle-class housewives, said that she had to
intensely adopt to her family life when she married
to an army officer. Long distance relationship with
her husband was the risk she had to take. She only
strengthens herself and fully trusts her husband. She
believes that when her husband is at home, he
belongs to her but when he is far away in his duty,
he belongs to God.
Other informants from the working class family
employed in the informal sector imply different
impression to live in the atomistic family. Simply
extracting, love and affection between the pairs are
seemingly the keys to undergo such atomistic family
life. They set pairs’ psychological nature enabling
them to accept any condition of each other. In an
atomistic family whose economic condition is weak,
the pair choose patience regarding their financial
problems while the distance is still separating them.
The pair feels ikhlas to face this condition. Ikhlas is
an emic faith-based cultural concept in Islamic
tradition expressing the acceptance of any conditions
and problems in life and the belief that there would
be a good time in the near future as God has
promised. In this atomistic family, an informant who
currently works in Surabaya has to live modestly to
save his money for his wife in Pacitan. Away from
his family is something he does not want, but he is
ikhlas for making money in other places.
The job is seemingly the major cause of the
atomistic family engendering the various form of
experiences. However, it is not only related to
financial problem of the family. More than this, the
working career can also be important. Although
financial factor is not a problem, the career might
necessitate someone to live away from his family.
An informant from middle-class women working in
the formal sector said that she has to be apart from
her husband when he was appointed to the higher
position in his institution. As her husband had more
income, the distance was no longer a big problem.
She usually brought their children to visit her
husband and had holiday there. The husband’s job
might separate the pair and children but their feeling
was closer since they could manage interactions
even they were away from each other. The hardest
time, however, did occur when the wife was in an
urgent situation which emotionally demanded the
husband’s presence. It was during the pregnancy that
most women felt very weak. At that time, the
women frequently wished their husbands to get jobs
closer to their houses even though they had actually
understood that their wishes were hardly fulfilled.
Overall, although both husband and wife have jobs,
they must limit their living expenditures as long as
they live separately. They believe that staying in
different place and house means they have cover the
cost of two kitchens.
Economic factor, particularly a job or career, is
the main reason of atomistic family. It occurs when
both husbands and wives engage in the labour
market that might necessarily ask them to live in
different places. This is potential for the emergence
The Shift of Family Role and Function in Atomistic Family in Urban Society
299

of a new family model shifting the conventional type
where the pair must live in the same house as it did
in the past. This recent phenomenon symptomizes
the family across the different economic classes
resulting various experiences and models of
interaction. This new economic-based impetus and
desire have changed the meaning of the marriage
and its functions and have shifted the traditional
perspective of human personality. Moreover, it has
also altered the meaning of happiness from which
individuals legitimize the fulfilment of their own
desire. Hence, it consequentially changes the
structure and functions of the family (Khairuddin,
1997). Indeed, the blood-tied parents are no longer
the children’s allocareer. Their parenting functions
have been extended to broader parties either within
the extended family such as the grandmother,
grandfather, uncle, and aunt, or outside the family
relation including friend, colleague, and the
babysitter.
In doing her function in her family, an informant
confessed that due to frequent separation from her
husband she used to manage her household solely by
herself. When her children were underage, her
parents helped raised her children with the assistance
of a housemaid. Since her parents did not help her
anymore, she took care of the children by herself,
with the help of her housemaid in managing her
house. In doing so, she allocates a few hours in a day
to spend with her children. Giving much advice is
the way she transmits values and norms. Relatives
like uncles and aunts also help in transferring values
and norms through pieces of advice. The other
informant also shares similar mothering experiences.
In fact, she used to ask her mother-in-law in
assisting her taking care of her children when she
was on duty.
The involvement of mother or father in law is
important, particularly when wife’s parents are
absent. A wife who worked as a factory worker in
Tangerang shared their story. Her parents used to
help when she left for work. Yet it was not for long
until they passed away. Her mother in law then came
and helped raise her children. However, functions of
the mother in law were limited only to the domestic
matters including parenting, managing the house
when she worked, and so on. She and her husband
had to cover her financial needs. Sometimes
relatives came to help but not as frequent as the
mother in law. From these stories, it is worth to note
that while the role of the extended family members
is very important but it is only for those who live in
closer places.
Relationships within the family are important for
the development of children's well-being, as well as
for their evaluations of their family and their overall
life satisfaction. Children living in separated families
tend to be less satisfied with the people they live
with and their family life. This trend was found in all
participant countries, although it was less prevalent
in Israel and Algeria. The discussion offers several
possible explanations to the findings, and
emphasizes that the source of the differences may be
complex and may include macro and micro
explanations (Dinisman et al., 2017).
The role of relatives is less significant for the
atomistic family who lives away from their extended
families. The distance is the only reason why they
are less functioning. Furthermore, neighbours or
babysitters are influential to provide help for the
atomistic family. Based on the interview, an
informant who lived in Surabaya felt that the role of
their extended family was less important in helping
her compared to the role of her neighbours. When
she was at her office, her neighbour kept informing
her about her children in her home. Though it seems
limited, to her the neighbours were very helpful and
she became less worried. In addition to the
neighbours, two housemaids she employed were also
important. Their tasks were managing her house
such as cleaning the floor, cooking, washing the
clothes, and the more importantly taking care of her
children, including taking them to school. The
relatives sometimes visited her house but in
particular occasions only.
Those experiences describe an important
message that theoretically needs more attention. In
the patriarchal societies, the division of labour
places women mostly in the domestic domain where
their tasks are parenting. In contrast, the emergence
of the atomistic family seemingly shifts the meaning
of parenting and consequentially challenges such
division. The women’s engagement in the labour
market has expanded the role of broader parties in
doing the household task. Relatives, neighbours,
housemaids are among which the alloparenting
could possibly work.
Sociologically, there is a shift regarding the role
and the function of a family in this atomistic model.
In the conventional household, the role of the
extended family is significant in covering the family
needs, the reinforcement of the family role and
function, from the production, distribution, and
consumption. Yet in the modern era, the extended
family is less important when the concept of nuclear
family changes the social landscape of modern
societies, where the involvement of broader family
ICSE 2017 - 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education
300

is less important. The pairs prefer to live separated
rather than living together among their extended
family.
Nowadays when human mobility’s increase, the
atomistic family is likely suitable since it gives more
chance to the individual to meet their desires.
Women can possibly reach their career as high as
their husband’s. They are no longer tied to the
traditional division on who deserve to work in a
public space and who have to stay in domestic
domain. When the children come into their life, they
delegate their task back to the extended family
members to transmit the values and norms.
Moreover, when the extended family members are
absent, the broader parties such as neighbours,
babysitters, and housemaids fill this space.
This study thus shows that the social network
becomes an important aspect in the current societies,
particularly for those who live in the atomistic
family. As Meehan and hawks (2014) points out that
in Africa grandmother holds important role for the
parenting. But when she is absent, the broader social
network will change her task. In addition, to
highlight the re-functioning of the extended family
among the recent parenting models, this study also
shows that neighbours who actually have no blood-
tied relation and never gain any economic profit are
involved in the alloparent role of the atomistic
family. Conceptually this fact indicates the extension
of the kinship beyond conventional understanding
which is mainly based on blood-tied relation. The
recent urban societies tend to develop the kinship
based on geographical aspect, in this case, the
neighbourhood. It is understandable that most of
them are migrants who come to the city for
economic reasons. They are far away from their
family, both nuclear and extended, and building
closer relation with the neighbours is the most
common option. In doing so, the primordialism
affects their preference in which people tend to build
the relationship with neighbours who come from
similar places. It is because the similar experience to
be a migrant and the primordial feeling facilitates
their emotional and builds the sense of belonging to
each other. This construction, however, encourage
people to take care of each other even though they
have no economic profit from this practice.
The shift of family structure based on the form of
society can be divided into 3. The family structure
has shifted, from extended family to traditional
society to nuclear family in modern society and to
atomistic family in postmodern era.
The existence of families in atomistic family is
mostly found especially among the migrants in the
city of Surabaya. This results in a shift in the role
and function of the family. The shift mostly involves
many parties. For non-migrants, large families
function to replace the roles and functions of parents
while working. For migrant neighbours, baby sitters
become generalized others to substitute parents. In
this case, technology plays a role to help parents in
controlling the child while being cared for by the
maids, babysitters and neighbours. For example, the
use of cell phones, WhatsApp, Webcam, Skype,
Black Berry Messenger, Video Call and other social
media become means for parents to control the
children. The use of this technology is necessary
because parents in the atomistic family cannot
directly supervise their children every day. The
responsibility for parenting is temporarily
transferred to the generalized others who are trusted
by parents to supervise the children during work
time. In the atomistic family, parents become part-
time parents because they spend some time
outdoors. Technology not only gives a positive
impact on the shift in family structure. With the
growth of information and communication
technology, the use of technology by children must
also be controlled so that children do not perform
actions that deviate from social norms.
4 CONCLUSIONS
The pair in a family ideally lives in the same house.
Globalization brings immense social change
including changes in family structure. The shift of
family structure from extended family (traditional
society) leads to nuclear family (modern society)
and in postmodern era shifting to atomistic family.
The shift of family structure brings consequences on
the shifting role and function of family, especially in
case of child care and socialization. Atomistic
family requires generalized others that are parents,
baby sitter, household assistants and neighbours.
More economically established families have a
greater chance of meeting face-to-face with family
members than the lower-class families.
Yet globalization, industrialization and
modernization have caused the increased number of
women who have the substantial task in a public
space instead of staying in the domestic one. Due to
this demand, the pair have to live separately in the
different houses and even cities. Commitment, trust,
and devotion become the basic elements for the pair
in choosing to live in this atomistic family.
Interactions among the family members are thus
very limited. This distinguishes the atomistic family
The Shift of Family Role and Function in Atomistic Family in Urban Society
301

with the other models. It changes the role and
function of the family itself. It necessitates the
involvement of other parties in managing the house
and parenting the children. In addition to the
extended family, other parties outside the blood-tied
relation might be involved such as the neighbours
and babysitters. Finally, atomistic families still need
the social roles of extended families and social
networks in their neighbourhoods. Social control is
no longer done by parents, but also by others in
socializing children to have a good personality and
character.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We express a sincere gratitude to the Dean of
Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Universitas
Airlangga for giving permission to this research. We
also acknowledge support from people who agreed
to participate in the study.
REFERENCES
Amato, P. R., Booth, A., Johnson, D., and Rogers, S.,
2007. Alone together: How marriage in America is
changing, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Andresen, S., Hurrelmann, K., and Schneekloth, U., 2012.
Care and freedom: Theoretical and empirical aspects
of children's well-being, Child Indicators Research.
Springer.
Bronfenbrenner, U., 1986. Ecology of the family as a
context for human development: Research
perspectives, Developmental Psychology.
Brown, S. L., Stykes, J. B., and Manning, W. D., 2016.
Trends in children’s family instability, Journal of
Marriage and Family. Wiley Online Library.
Dinisman T, Andresen, Montserrat, Strózik, Strózik T.,
2017. Family structure and family relationship from
the child well-being perspective: Findings from
comparative analysis, Children and Youth Services
Review. Elsevier.
Ermischa, John and Gambetta, Diego., 2010. Do strong
family ties inhibit trust?, Journal of Economic
Behavior and Organization. Elsevier.
Fraser, M. W., Galinsky, M. J., and Richman, J. M., 1999.
Risk, protection, and resilience: Toward a conceptual
framework for social work practice, Social Work
Research. Oxford Journals.
Goode, J. William., 1995. Sosiologi Keluarga, Bumi
Aksara [In Indonesian].
Greenberg, M. T., and Lippold, M. A., 2013. Promoting
healthy outcomes among youth with multiple risks:
Innovative approaches, Annual Review of Public
Health. Annual Reviews.
Khairuddin., 1997. Sosiologi Keluarga, Liberty.
Yogyakarta [In Indonesian].
Lippold, M. A., McHale, S. M., Davis, K. D., Almeida, D.
M., and King, R. B., 2014. Experiences with parents
and youth physical health symptoms and cortisol: A
daily diary investigation, Journal of Research on
Adolescence. Wiley Online Library.
Meehan CL, Quinlan R, Malcom CD., 2013. Cooperative
breeding and maternal energy expenditure among Aka
foragers, Am J Hum Biol. Wiley Online Library.
Meehan CL, Hawks S., 2014. Maternal and allomaternal
responsiveness: the significant of cooperative
caregiving in attachment theory. Different Faces of
Attachment: Cultural Variation of a Universal Human
Need, Cambridge. Cambridge University Press.
Mortelmans, D., Matthijs, K., Alofs, E., and Segaert, B.,
2016. Introduction: A view through the family
kaleidoscope. In D. Mortelmans, K. Matthijs, E. Alofs,
and B. Segaert (Eds.), Changing family dynamic and
demographic evolution: The family kaleidoscope,
Edward Elgar. UK.
Puolimatka, Tapio., 2017. The Educational Implications of
the Atomistic Family Structure: How the Atomization
of the Family Undermines the Education of Critical
Citizens by Making People Vulnerable to
Indoctrination and Propaganda, Acta Paedagogica
Vilnensia. Vilniaus Universiteto zurnalai.
Repetti, R. L., Taylor, S. E., and Seeman, T. E., 2002.
Risky families: family social environments and the
mental and physical health of offspring, Psychological
Bulletin. American Psychological Association.
The United Nations., 1989. Convention on the rights of the
child. Treaty Series, 1577, 3.
Van Ryzin, M. J., Kumpfer, K. L., Fosco, G. M., and
Greenberg, M. T. (Eds.)., 2015. Family based
Prevention Programs for Children and Adolescents:
Theory, Research, and Largescale Dissemination, New
York. Psychology Press.
Zimmerman, Carle., 2008. The Nineteenth Century and
the Rise of the Atomistic Family (part1) in American
Conservative Thought. Wilmington, Delaware. First
Principles.
http://www.firstprinciplesjournal.com/articles.aspx?art
icle=378andtheme=cothoandpage=4andloc=bandtype=
ctbf
Zimmerman, Carle., 2008. The Nineteenth Century and
the Rise of the Atomistic Family (part 2) in American
Conservative Thought. Wilmington, Delaware. First
Principles.
http://www.firstprinciplesjournal.com/articles.aspx?art
icle=381andtheme=cothoandpage=2andloc=bandtype=
cttf.
ICSE 2017 - 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education
302