VII. A Web of Interconnections  ↑

49. Family is the foundational paradigm.

We humans tend to form long-term bonds with mates, and such couples often have children and jointly take responsibility for raising them.

Families generally provide mutual aid to their members, and provide parenting for their offspring.

Family members generally feel strong bonds of love for each other.

Basic cultural elements, including values and stories, are generally passed down in these arrangements from parents to children.

Partners often exhibit some degree of specialization of roles within the family unit.

The broader culture often provides templates for family norms, including gender roles, and, while these templates can be valuable as starting points, they should not be considered as binding requirements, thus providing couples and families a valuable degree of autonomy.

Family members generally feel a primary loyalty to each other. Thus the axiom that “Blood is thicker than water.”

Parents are the primary source of education and nurturance for their children, and the quality and quantity of their parenting makes a huge difference in the traits acquired by their children.