The Dispersion of Kinship Ties in Modern Society: Contemporary Data and Historical Speculation

摘要: This essay uses a 1977 survey of social networks to describe "modern" California kinship. Respondents' active relations with kin outside the household— involving existing or likely exchanges-tend be geographically dispersed and focused on immediate kin, especially parents adult children; extended ties are largely latent. The degree dispersion varies systematically respondent characteristics; notably, more educated respondents tended have most least dependent kin. Assuming that this pattern is indeed development, article examines alternative explanations for its appearance speculates it may been stimu lated by twentieth-century developments in space-transcending technologies.