Absolute Nuclear (Light Yellow)
Definition: A family structure consisting only of parents and their children, with no extended relatives living together. Once children marry, they form their own independent households.
Regions: Predominantly in the UK, Ireland, and parts of Scandinavia. This reflects a cultural emphasis on individualism and early independence.
Egalitarian Nuclear (Orange)
Definition: Similar to the absolute nuclear family, but with more equality in inheritance and gender roles between spouses. Children still leave to form independent households, but there’s less rigid hierarchy within the family.
Regions: Found in Spain, Portugal, southern France, and parts of Italy. This structure aligns with Mediterranean cultural norms of balanced familial roles.
Stem Family (Light Blue)
Definition: A family where one child (usually the eldest son) remains in the parental home with their spouse and children, while other siblings leave to form their own households. The stem family ensures the continuity of the family estate.
Regions: Common in central Europe, including Germany, Austria, and parts of France. This reflects a tradition of preserving family property through one heir.
Incomplete Stem Family (Gray)
Definition: A variation of the stem family where the designated heir might not always stay with the parents, or the system is less rigid. Extended family involvement is limited compared to a full stem family.
Regions: Seen in parts of central and eastern Europe, like Poland and Hungary. This indicates a transitional family structure between stem and nuclear models.
Communitarian (Dark Blue)
Definition: A family structure where multiple generations live together, often with brothers and their families sharing a household. Inheritance is typically divided equally among siblings, and communal living is emphasized.
Regions: Predominantly in southern Italy, parts of the Balkans, and eastern Europe, including Finland. This reflects a collectivist culture prioritizing extended family unity.
This map is complete bullshit. I’m curious where op has sourced it though and where op is from.
Thanks, this is actually very clarifying! In short:
Your link leads to a NYT article.
The NYT articles references a scholarly article from 2007.
The scholarly article is paywalled for me BUT was also published and is still available as a discussion paper at London School of Economics. This is where this map is from. See: https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/33152/1/sercdp0009.pdf
However, the discussion paper and its map are, in turn, based on a book and map by Todd (1990). Todd’s original map is actually intended to show medieval family structures. But it is based on census data from the 1950’s and 60’s, which has been cross-checked against “a very large number of historical monographs” to better reflect medieval conditions.
So the colour codes of the map are not at all intended to show current conditions! (But, interestingly, the 2007 article claims that the old medieval patterns correlate with many other, modern regional differences). This would explain all the confusion! Thanks again for the link, wishing you a nice day!
This map is wildly wrong for Scandinavia. It should be absolute nuclear
Belgium is 100% not a stem family. Nobody lives with their parents if they can financially avoid it. It’s not a thing and hasn’t been for decades.
Hi there! I’m sorry but your map and the colour codes doesn’t correspond to reality at all. I live in one of these regions and I’m familiar with many of them. I’m afraid this is just nonsense and I wouldn’t even know where to start responding to this. Maybe you should check your sources and find new and more reliable sources of information? Kind regards and best wishes!
Given that Germany is divided, it’s probably just 30+ year old data.
Hmm, yes, good idea, but then former Yugoslavia would have been united?
Edit: ok I get it, it could be old colour data transposed on current borders
I looked it up and it seems that the map might be from a book published in 1985.
Interesting, thanks for the info! If the data really is about family structures I would guess it is even older, feels like a more agriculturally based economy where inheritance of the family estate (farm?) and such was a more central facor in the formation of families.
what’s wrong with it? it just shows the most popular type
Finland has not been communitarian in the coloured areas since the end of the 1800s. Perhaps the native Sami people further north, but not elsewhere.
In my experience, the entire continent have nuclear families except for parts of Italy and Greece.
Hi again! No, it certainly doesn’t! To start with something, among many errors, light yellow would be way more extended.
For switzerland the “stem” type probably only applies to farmers nowadays. The others live in a more nuclear family. 100 years ago the graphic might have been applicable ;)
Lol I’m going to call bullshit.
You mean to tell me that all of Denmark, with the exception of Fyn, is absolute nuclear, but Fyn is stem?
Does not compute.
This feels a bit weird, especially central Europe borders (or those three types together in northern Italy).
Is this which family type got the highest percentage in a certain region, but the winning type could still mean like only 30%?
Edit: Oh, it’s very old data prob representing silent gen parents. But still, some weird averaging must have gone into this. Back then charting all this on a more detailed basis must have been hard, but municipalities should have been the base unit (to show big cities separate from the villages & country side).
This is cool, thanks for teaching me some of those terms.
But i mean as someone who has lived around europe you can’t really make oversimplified assumptions like that because there is too much people families moving around and stuff. It’s way too heterogenous.
Maybe this could have worked a hundred years ago
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Hello there sweetie! I’m politely throwing sand in your face, whilst not offering any helpful or insightful data other than a single counter anecdotal observation. Hope that’s okay, and not passive-aggressive at all!
