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First published in 1982, this title started as a study of clients with marital problems and how they came to seek help. Using a sociological approach to marriage, the authors compare the medical and non-medical settings the clients attended and looks at their social networks to see how people view and conduct their marital relationships.
List of contents
Acknowledgements. New Preface for the Reissue. Introduction. 1. The Research Focus: Concepts and Ideas 2. The Project: Research Design, Methods, and Characteristics of the Group Studied 3. Attitudes to the Disclosure of Personal and Marital Problems 4. Marital Problems: The Ways They Were Defined and Attributed 5. The Context of the Help-Seeking Process: Critical Events and Problems 6. The Marriages and Their Social Networks 7. Informal Consulting and Social Networks 8. Formal Help-Seeking: Social Networks, Approaches, and Pathways 9. The Agencies: Perceptions, Expectations, and Initial Impact 10. Prescriptions for Counselling: Assumptions, Meanings, and Approaches 11. Perceptions of the Ideal Situations for Disclosure 12. Postscript. References. Index of Couples. Name Index. Subject Index.
About the author
Julia Brannen and Jean Collard
Summary
In the early 1980s it was fashionable to suggest that marriage as an institution was in trouble, but there were widely differing views as to whether or not this was really so. Originally published in 1982, this title started as a small-scale exploratory study of clients with marital problems and how they came to seek help. Using a sociological approach to marriage, the authors compare the medical and non-medical settings the clients attended and looks at their social networks as a way to see how people view and conduct their marital relationships. It also looks at the broader concept of marriage and how it came to be seen as problematic in our society and became part of wider public discourse at the time. Today, reissued with a new preface, it can be read in its historical context.
