On the Day of Family, Love and Fidelity, we talk about the eternal - about the relationship between a man and a woman. It has its own irrational mechanisms and cultural codes that are mobile and change all the time: what was considered folk wisdom 10 years ago is now pseudo-truth. ELLE figured out which relationship stereotypes no longer work.

The strength of a woman is in her weakness

Even Shakespeare and Dumas said that the strength of a woman is in her weakness. Allegedly using this power, a woman is able to create and destroy, awakening in a man the qualities of a patron and protector. In fact, the strength of a woman in relation to a man lies in tenderness, understanding and responsiveness, but not in defenselessness and helplessness. As the great Ranevskaya said: “Women are not the weaker sex. The weak floor is rotten boards.

Relationships are hard work

“I blinded him from what was” - there is no more useless activity than to remake your partner and break yourself (grinding into the habits of a new person and finding compromises is a completely different story). If it’s hard to exist in a relationship, then you are on the wrong track. It shouldn't be hard, because the very meaning of being in a couple is to make each other's life easier and happier, and not complicate it even more. There is no need to beat on a closed door, you just made a mistake with it.

Men like bitches

Manual “Men love bitches. A Guide for Too Good Women also goes into the trash. Perhaps this opinion has always been erroneous. Nobody wants to have a relationship with a conflicting and hysterical woman. Most likely, "bitchy" once became synonymous with "temperamental", hence the misconception. Indeed, the representatives of the stronger sex are interested in courageous girls who are able to openly express their feelings, whose self-esteem does not need confirmation from the male side. Obviously, “good” in this context were considered women who were restrained and shy, and it would really be difficult for them to find a partner.

Men are afraid of strong women

The stereotype that the goal of a woman's life is to get married is cultivated by various institutions, including gloss and the wedding industry, which is mostly focused on brides, but not grooms. However, the influence of the West and Europe has made its own adjustments, and today the attitude towards the stamp in the passport is becoming more unobtrusive. Setting priorities, a modern woman does not give marriage the first place, preferring to engage in self-realization. Moreover, the idea of ​​girls striving for marriage even gave rise to a fear of marriage, not only among ladies, but also among gentlemen.

Stereotypes of interaction- these are stable ways of behavior of family members, their actions and messages, which are often repeated. Examples of interaction standards can be joking of family members over each other, emphasized respect, constant expression of dissatisfaction, etc. Such stereotypes, as a rule, are dominated by a certain emotional attitude towards a family member (members): accusation, irritation, acceptance, admiration, contempt, alienation pain, anxiety, etc.

The standards of interaction between family members are manifested in communication; communication here means absolutely any event that occurs in the family. Lateness and silence, frank conversations and general fun, shopping and cooking - all this is informative, special, unique communication for this system. Even seemingly lack of communication, silence is a powerful informative message. You can stop talking to a person (child, husband, wife), and it will be clear to everyone that this is an expression of disapproval and discontent and the desire to subject the guilty to ostracism.

At the same time, the standard of behavior of one family member is often closely related to the standard of another and even controls it (information circulation). There are many recurring events in the family, and each of them is a certain message for all its members.

All interaction standards can be considered as acts of family communication that include certain messages, that is, they have a certain meaning for family members. Communication is divided into a number of stages that ensure the process of information exchange between relatives: 1) the choice of the content of the message, 2) its encoding, 3) transmission, 4) decoding, 5) the choice of the content of the response message.

Messages can be single-level and multi-level. The sound of a slamming door is one-level, it is transmitted only through the auditory canal. In direct communication between people, messages are always two-level - verbal and non-verbal. They are congruent if their content, transmitted through two channels, is the same. Impulsive, abrupt movements, slamming the door, the roar of pots express without words the state of mind of a person, and what he wants his family members to know about this state.

Family myths.

Family rules form the external basis of "family myths". This term, proposed by A. X. Ferreira, denotes certain defense mechanisms for maintaining unity in dysfunctional families. Its synonyms are the concepts of “belief”, “beliefs”, “family credo”, “role expectations”, “consensual defense”, “image of the family” or “image of “we”, “naive family psychology”, etc.

The purpose of the myth is to camouflage family conflicts and unmet needs and to reconcile the idealized perceptions of family members about each other.

Under the “family myth”, many researchers also understand a certain unconscious mutual agreement between family members, the function of which is to hide rejected images (ideas) about the family as a whole and about each of its members from awareness.

Here are some of the more common myths:

Happy spouses do not argue, most people find all their needs met in the family system;

Spatial proximity is essential for family cohesion;

In successful marriages, spouses always tell each other everything;

People who really love each other should be aware of all the desires and needs of a partner;

The appearance of a child, a love affair or getting a divorce will solve all problems.

The myth sets the norm of feeling. Myth gives rise to rules and rituals. Breaking the rules, especially systematic ones, can destroy the myth. Myth is the banner under which the family gathers, it is the motto, it is faith. If someone in the family does not share the family myth, he cannot be a member of this system, the system expels him. The only time this is possible is if the family has a rebel myth. Then disagreement with the main myth confirms another myth, and the system remains unchanged.

Family stories.

Family history is a specific, emotionally charged problem around which a conflict periodically recurs in the family. The theme determines the way life events are organized and outwardly manifests itself in stereotypes of behavior that are reproduced from generation to generation. This parameter was first studied by Murray Bowen, who showed that over time, dysfunctional patterns accumulate in the family, which ultimately leads to the pathology of its members (the concept of "transmission"). Bowen proposed the genogram method to record family histories.

Family history may be associated with unpredictable life events, such as the death of a relative, a sudden illness, the birth of an illegitimate child, the divorce of parents, a forced change of residence. These events are referred to as "systemic trauma". The effect of such incidents can be devastating for the family, despite its attempts to adapt to them. If there was a systemic trauma in the family, then under the influence of the family theme and the mechanism of identification, one of those born later unconsciously begins to imitate the "hero" of the family history and thereby "reanimates" someone else's fate. Moreover, this path is not consciously chosen, it is not taken into account and therefore it is not resisted.

Stressors on the vertical axis can create additional problems, so even a small amount of horizontal stress can have a major impact on the system.

Studying family history allows you to better understand:

What underlies the choice of a marriage partner;

How does the way spouses interact with each other and with children correlate with the patterns of relationships in their parental families;

What changes have occurred in the structure of the nuclear family and the nature of communication in it in the course of historical development, and what events have had the greatest impact on the family;

What events precede the current family crisis and why the family came to see a therapist right now;

The place and function of symptomatic behavior in a wider family and historical context.

Family Stabilizers.

family stabilizer is what holds the system together, what keeps people together. All the parameters described above are stabilizers, especially the family myth. In a sense, a family is a group of people who share a common myth. A common myth or common myths is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the existence of a family. Different stabilizers work at different periods of a family's life. Common affairs: household, distribution of functions, common budget, common children, fear of loneliness - these are the usual stabilizers that are naturally present in every family. The external macro system is also a good stabilizer, especially in those societies where the value of marriage is universally recognized, where single women or single men are perceived as losers. There, the very fact of divorce is perceived as a negative phenomenon and public opinion is a family stabilizer.

Stabilizers act as important factors of family integration. Stabilizers can also include a common place of residence, common material and spiritual values, traditions and rituals, joint activities and entertainment, emotional relationships between family members, and even illnesses and problems. Stabilizers are functional and dysfunctional. In the first case, they contribute to meeting the needs of the family, in the second, they hinder the implementation of its functions.

Children stabilize the marriage by uniting their parents in a common cause - care and upbringing. However, then the children grow up and leave the family. And then the marriage is often broken, because it suddenly turns out that the spouses have nothing in common, except for parental responsibilities.

Traditions and rituals are an important factor in stabilizing the family system, a supporting element that strengthens it and reduces anxiety among its members.

Family values ​​are an ideal developed, openly approved and cultivated by family consciousness, which contains abstract ideas about the attributes of due in various spheres of life.

Shared activities and hobbies are one of the most powerful family stabilizers. Parents are united by caring for children, professional interests.

The family is stabilized by emotional relationships, primarily relationships of love and affection. Another example of a family stabilizer is adultery.

A popular stabilizer of the family system is disease. You can't leave a sick person, you can't leave a sick child.

Family structure.

There are many different options for the composition, or structure, of the family:

"nuclear family" consists of a husband, wife and their children;

"complete family"- an enlarged union in its composition: a married couple and their children, plus parents of other generations, for example, grandparents, uncles, aunts, living all together or in close proximity to each other and making up the structure of the family;

"mixed family" is a "rebuilt" family, formed as a result of the marriage of divorced people. A blended family includes step-parents and step-children, since children from a previous marriage merge into a new family unit;

single parent family is a household that is run by one parent (mother or father) due to divorce, departure or death of a spouse, or because the marriage never took place (Levi D., 1993).

A.I. Antonov and V.M. Medkov is distinguished by composition:

Nuclear families, which are currently the most common and consist of parents and their children, that is, from two generations. In a nuclear family, there are no more than three nuclear positions (father-husband, mother-wife, son-brother, or daughter-sister);

Extended families are a family that unites two or more nuclear families with a common household and consists of three or more generations - grandparents, parents and children (grandchildren).

In repeated families(based on a second, not the first marriage), children of a given marriage and children of one of the spouses brought by him to a new family may be with the spouses (Antonov A.I., Medkov V.M.)

A.E. Lichko (Lichko A.E., 1979) developed the following classification of families:

Structural composition:

complete family (there is a mother and father);

incomplete family (there is only a mother or father);

a distorted or deformed family (the presence of a stepfather instead of a father or a stepmother instead of a mother).

There are various classifications of types of distribution of roles in the family.

So, according to I.V. Grebennikov, there are three types of distribution of family roles:

autonomous- husband and wife distribute roles and do not interfere in the sphere of influence of the other;

democratic- family management lies on the shoulders of both spouses approximately equally.

Types of family structures according to the criterion of power (Antonov A.I., Medkov V.M., 1996) are divided into:

patriarchal families , where the head of the family state is the father,

matriarchal, where the mother enjoys the highest authority and influence, and egalitarian families in which there are no clearly defined family heads and where the situational distribution of power between father and mother prevails.

22. Life cycle (dynamics) of family development according to E. Duval.

The family, like its social context, is constantly in the process of change. The functions and structure of the family may change depending on the stages of its life.

E. Duval divided the life cycle into eight developmental stages:

0 – involvement. Meeting future spouses, their emotional attraction to each other;

1– married couples without children. Tasks of the stage: to form a marriage relationship that satisfies both spouses; resolve issues related to pregnancy and the desire to become parents; enter the circle of relatives;

2 – the appearance of children(child's age - up to 2.5 years). Tasks of the stage: adaptation to the presence of the child, care for the proper development of babies; organization of family life that satisfies both parents and children;

3 – family with preschool children(the age of the oldest child is from 2.5 to 6 years). Tasks of the stage: adaptation to the basic needs and inclinations of children, taking into account the need to promote their development; overcoming difficulties associated with fatigue and lack of personal space;

4 – families with children - junior schoolchildren(the age of the elders is from 6 to 13 years). Tasks of the stage: joining families with children of school age; encouraging children to achieve academic success;

5 – families with teenagers(oldest child - from 13 to 20 years). Tasks of the stage: establishing a balance in the family between freedom and responsibility; creating a range of interests for spouses that are not related to parental responsibilities, and solving career problems;

6 – departure of young people from the family(from the departure of the first child to the moment when the youngest leaves the house). Tasks of the stage: the ritual of the release of young people from parental care; maintaining the spirit of support as the basis of the family;

7 – average age of parents(from "empty nest" to retirement). Tasks of the stage: restructuring of marital relations; maintaining family ties with the older and younger generations;

8 – aging(from retirement to the death of both spouses). Tasks of the stage: adaptation to retirement; dealing with bereavement and loneliness; maintaining family ties and adapting to old age.

A stereotype is a variant of a personal attitude. An attitude is a kind of prism through which, under certain conditions or in relation to a certain object, a person perceives the world and behaves in only one way. Our world is saturated with stereotypes. You can't get away from them, as they are a product of public consciousness. Stereotypes are both good and bad.

The term "stereotype" was coined in 1922 by sociologist Walter Lippmann. The author interpreted it as "a picture in our head."

Social installation includes 3 components:

• knowledge about the object (cognitive element);
• emotions and evaluation in relation to the object (affective component);
• willingness to act in a specific way (behavioral component).

Stereotype is a social attitude with a lack of a cognitive component (lack of knowledge, false information, outdated data). How the installation of a stereotype determines our behavior.

Stereotypical thinking is often limited. It is often guided by outdated, inaccurate, narrow, erroneous ideas about a person, a social phenomenon, a natural phenomenon and the features of interaction with it.

Stereotypes have their pros and cons:

• On the one hand, this limits, prevents disclosure, or simply harms where the object of the stereotype has changed (minus).
• But on the other hand, stereotypes allow you to save time and effort where objects, situations and actions in relation to them are simple and unchanged (plus).
• Stereotypes are dangerous because they can form one expectation, and a person will have to face a completely different reality (minus). Well, if the reality is better. On the contrary, the person runs the risk of being in a state of frustration and maladaptation.
• Stereotypes help save nervous energy, allowing you to act in similar situations by inertia (plus).

Each person has an internal hierarchy of stereotypes. For example, the popular stereotype that a woman should first of all be realized as a hostess, mother, wife, can be in first place for one person and fifth for another.

Stereotypes are formed and fixed at the level of the psyche. Cognitive circuits, or a complex of neural connections, arise in the brain, which provide the same response to repetitive situations. For example, the whole personality can be seen as a cognitive schema, a schema of our personality.

Most often, stereotypes arise in relation to some groups differentiated by gender, age, nation, status, role. For example, the well-known statement that all women are the weaker sex. But stereotypes can speak about the norms of behavior, development, life. Then they are intertwined with values.

Most stereotypes are formed in childhood. The influence is exerted by the environment, any significant people. That is, stereotypes are the consequences of learning in the course of the socialization of the individual. I am sure that you or your entourage will have a couple of statements about any nation with representatives of which you have not even communicated personally.

Stereotypes are both positive and negative, but very often they contain an erroneous generalization.

• For example, what do most people imagine when they hear a woman call herself a housewife? A plump lady with curlers on her head, in a greasy apron, with an exhausted look, not working. In fact, every woman can be called a housewife, and the era of the Internet allows many to work within the walls of the house.
• Or why many people associate the birth of a child with the inevitable collapse of the figure and "launching themselves." In fact, this is an individual choice for each woman.
• There is a popular opinion that old age = wisdom, mind. No, they are not synonyms. As well as respecting a person for one age is impossible. Old people, like teenagers, youth, adults are different. Among them, there are also unpleasant, selfish, asocial personalities.

It can be said that the prejudices of previous generations, the society in which the person was brought up, are collected in personal stereotypes.

Features of stereotypical perception

Thinking through stereotypes is characterized by the following features:

• The projection effect, the essence of which is that when communicating, we endow people with our shortcomings that are unpleasant to us, and with our advantages - pleasant ones.
• The mean error effect, which involves averaging out the pronounced features of another person.
• The effect of order, in which, when communicating with an unfamiliar person, we give more trust to primary information, and when communicating with an old acquaintance, to fresh data.
• The halo effect, or judgment of a person based on one of his actions (good or bad).
• The effect of stereotyping, or endowing a person with characteristic (stereotypical) features for a certain group, for example, focusing on a person's profession.

Types and forms of stereotypes

Stereotypes characterize both individual personality traits and external signs of people. For example, the stereotype about the emotionality of women and the rationality of men (individual-personal characteristics) is alive. There is also a popular stereotype that tattoos are applied only by disadvantaged or socially dangerous people, or frivolous (external stereotypes). Or the stereotype that black in clothes is a sign of depression and internal discord.

There is no single classification of stereotypes:

• In one, such types are distinguished (V.N. Panferov): anthropological, social, emotionally expressive.
• Domestic psychologist Artur Alexandrovich Rean singled out anthropological, ethno-national, social-status, social-role, expressive-aesthetic, verbal-behavioral stereotypes.
• O. G. Komarova identified 3 types of stereotypes: ethnic, professional, sex-role.

Thus, the phenomenon of stereotypes can be considered from several positions:

• content;
• adequacy (often based on a true fact);
• the origin of stereotypes (conditions and factors of occurrence);
• the role of stereotypes in human life, the perception of other people and the functioning of society.

Adequate, that is, truthful stereotypes are useful and necessary, since ours also needs to rest. But the influence of inadequate stereotypes should be limited. An adequate stereotype becomes inadequate when the truthful data becomes obsolete due to a change in the object of the stereotype.

How to get rid of stereotypes

We cannot control the process of stereotyping, but we can consciously reduce their influence on our behavior and perception of people. It is impossible to completely get rid of stereotypes.

Based on the fact that a stereotype is a stable and categorical, simplified idea, a judgment about something that is common in the environment of a person who adheres to it, it can be argued that correcting the influence of stereotypes will allow:

• change of environment;
• expansion of knowledge about the stereotype object.

With the first, everything is clear: to leave the country, make new friends, and so on. What about the second point?

Stereotypes are stamps, labels. How to get rid of them? Be critical and selective to incoming information. At a minimum, do not accept any fact until you personally encounter it. It is important not to succumb to the provocations of the media, the pressure of society (even parents and older comrades). Learn to double check information. It's a matter of practice. They heard some fact, doubted it, found several sources, if the information does not diverge, then you can believe it.

Find source

Afterword

Thus, stereotypes can be broken from two positions:

• other people's beliefs through personal example and actions, the search for inner harmony;
• their beliefs through the activity of cognition of the external world.

For example, at a young age there can also be poor health. If you accept this in yourself and others, then already minus one stereotype. On weekends, it is not necessary to run away from home to a cafe or club, you can enjoy the comfort of home. So the second stereotype is broken. There must be children in a marriage, but you have not yet reached your plans for self-realization, are you not ready to take care of children, although your marriage is strong and tested for years? So, no need to have children yet. Get to know yourself and create the appropriate conditions around.

Make a list of the most popular stereotypes for you and go to destruction. Check them out in person. Self-knowledge and knowledge is the basis for getting rid of stereotypes. In both cases, you will find yourself and be able to control stereotyped behavior and thinking, and not vice versa.

Stereotypes are something invisible, we do not feel them, but they build barriers in relationships between people.

Unfortunately, stereotypes are an integral part of our lives, and there are many of them.

All of us are periodically exposed to ideas about what a real woman and a real man should be like, how a child should behave, what a good mother should and should not do, etc.

For example:

• jealous means loves;
• a man shouldn't cry;
• men are afraid of beautiful and smart women;
• the main goal of every girl is to get married as soon as possible;
• men like stupid blondes;
• to be like everyone else, to stand out in nothing;
• the first step is always for a man;
• the girl must be married before the age of twenty-five, and so on.
• Such stereotypes in relationships, even in the most ideal couples, sometimes overshadow love and mutual understanding.

stereotypes in relationships

So, attitudes and stereotypes, features and relationships:

1. Be like everyone else, don't stand out

Most likely, this stereotype was formed back in those years when the same school uniform was introduced in schools. Previously, older people even said that if a girl dresses beautifully, standing out from the bulk, then nothing good will grow out of her.

2. The man must take the first step

Previously, every girl from childhood was taught by adults that she should be modest, quiet and passive. Even children's fairy tales and games oriented the little ones to the fact that they should be happy "with a husband." Well, boys must definitely grow up active, enterprising and take the first step when meeting a girl.

However, times have changed. More and more often, girls take the initiative into their own hands. Of course, you shouldn’t go too far, but it’s also too long to wait for the first step from a man. A girl should not behave obsessively, because a man should always remain a man, but it is possible to hint and push to the desired thought (action).

Very often, men - only at first glance, "hunters", they are also afraid of rejection, doubt, ponder. And if there is still a bad experience, how then? Then do not be afraid to take a step towards the meeting.

3. A girl must be married before the age of 25.

How many times in their lives do young girls hear the phrase: “Are you not married yet? You already… Aren't you afraid to be an old maid?”

This stereotype breeds fear that prevents unmarried girls who are already over 25 from living a normal life.

4. A real man shouldn't cry

Yes, but men also have emotions, and they should be shown.

5. Women have a place at the stove

Many men think so. They constantly repeat that a woman can do two things well: run a household and raise children. And it doesn’t matter what kind of education, experience the fair sex has.

Girls who are rapidly moving up the career ladder very often face such a stereotype.

6. Jealous means love

It is not always so. After all, the causes of jealousy can be different: children's fears, unsuccessful previous experience, low or high self-esteem, complexes.

Psychologists say that those men who change or think about this topic are most often jealous.

7. Men can't live without sex

This misconception about the male body has become the belief of many women. And they, in turn, do not refute it. It's so beneficial and convenient.

But if a man loves his chosen one, he will not rush her.

In general, summing up a little, I would like to note the following: in order to successfully build relationships with people, listen to yourself more and do not pay attention to stereotypes.