The Perception of the African American Family Structure and How it Affects Individual

Upbringing

Kala Stokes, Alexus Johnson-Mobley, Sierra Dixon, and Jazmyné Nero

North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University

 Introduction

In every race there are different family structures and parenting methods. In the African-

American community, family structure has been a popular topic that has been examined by experts

and mass media. It has even become a topic of discussion in public policy debates. The family

structure of African-Americans has also been surrounded by stereotypes of a “standard” family

life. One of the biggest studies recently is the amount of black children that come from a one parent

home. According to the U.S. Census Bureau only 38.7 percent of African-Americans live with

both of their parents. This is due to a number of factors, the most common place occurrence being

parental separation.

A stable family structure is an essential part in a child’s developmental phase. Take

Maslow’s Hierarchy of human needs into consideration; the essential idea behind this systemic

structure is to achieve the ultimate goal of self fulfilment. To further advance on the scale of self

fulfilment, basic human needs must be met. Meeting these needs in the African-American family

structure can be crucial to ensuring a child is reaching their full potential. The lower three levels

of the pyramid all include factors that should be included in any family structure. The physiological

needs of food, water, warmth and rest stem from the household and the parent/guardians who

would be the provider. The next level addresses the need for safety and security. At the third level,

the hierarchy states that belongingness and love needs are important in building a child’s socialness

and having meaningful relationships. Children need consistency, security, affection, and the basics

for survival to be a foundation in their home life to help build a strong emotional state. The family

structure of the African-American community should not work any differently than any other, each

household needs those needs met according to the hierarchy to reach a level of fulfillment. The

basis for a child’s upbringing is based around the family structure; the African-American family
structure has shaped generations of young black children’s future and their worldly views. Through

research, and student based surveys the effects of the african-american family structure will be

examined.

Literature Review

Comparing other races family structure is imperative in the analysis of discovering how

the African American family structure differs and its impact on the children involved. To

understand the black family structure today we have to understand the history of the black family

structure. Slavery ultimately resulted in disorginization and instability within the African

American family structure (DuBois, 1899). The byproduct of slavery was the dismantlement of

the black family, slavemasters would often separate men from women, married or not and women

from their own children, This would, in turn, impact the child in a negative way by taking away

their sense of security and safety. History has a major impact on the perception of the black family

structure in the 21st century drastically.

From 1880 through 1960, black children were two to three times more likely to reside

without one or both parents than were white children. In recent years, the race differential in

parental absence has grown. Also, blacks have had a consistently higher percentage of extended

households than whites, (ASA ,1994) extended family is classified as “Living with family that

goes beyond your nuclear family” ,such as growing up in a household with a single parent and

other relatives. From the 1800s to about 30% of black children ages 0-14 years old resided without

one or both parents. By contrast, only 10% of white children between those ages resided without

one or both parents. Specifically from 1960-1980 parentlessness and single parenthood rose

sharply among both blacks and white households. (U.S Bureau of Census, 1980) However, Black
households steadily continue to have a higher rate of single parent households than whites even

with the sharp rise during that time period.

Children's upbringing within different family structures plays a vital role in how they

perceive themselves and their behavior patterns. Living in an African American single parent

household has been associated with delinquency, alcohol and substance use, lower self esteem,

psychiatric problems, earlier sexual activity and dropping out of school, due to lack of authority

within the family structure. (Steinberg, 1987). As opposed to living in a two parent African

American household. Living in a single parent household or stepparent families, children have a

greater risk of factor for drug and alcohol use for both African American and White youth.

(Cooper, 1995).

Economic structure plays a more important role than family structure in the lives of African

American families. A single parent household has the lowest level of income, compared to married

individuals with great financial stability, yet multigenerational and two-parent families were not

statistically better than single-parent families. (Williams, 2000). (Salem et al, 1998) used a

MANOVA to investigate differences in family structure connected to relationship to father, family

process variables, and psychosocial outcomes. Overall, the results of this study supported the idea

that family structure is not as critical to psychosocial outcomes as quality time and support for

adolescents. Salem et al. found that when spending quality time with their father, children are less

likely to experience depression, low self-esteem, and anxiety and instead experienced greater life

satisfaction.

Whether or not an African American child stays in a two-parent household or not can

contribute to how they grow up, especially if they live in low-income areas where they see a lot of

crime, poverty and various other things. There are these things called neighborhood effect theories
that imply “children who live in impoverished neighborhoods are at risk of dropping out of school,

ultimately ending up doing delinquent things “ (Jarret, 1997) Jarret also did studies where there

were parenting and family strategies involved guiding them away from the inner-city struggles.

Kids that had those skills ended up completing highschool. There are a lot of African American

children are without fathers, in fact, according to the Huffington Post in 2017 “70% of the African

American community is raised by single women.” 1.7 million children live without their fathers

and there are 2.5 million children that live with their fathers.

The role of a parent is very important to young African Americans, whether its the mother

or the father each specific role plays a huge part in raising a child. Proverbs 22:6 says “Train up a

child in the way he should go and when he is old, he shall not depart from it” if a father is out of

a child's life the mom can and will most likely step pup to the plate as much as she can but there

are some things that she won't be able to teach her children that a man can teach them and vice

versa for a man if the female is missing out of the child's life. There are some fathers that want to

be in their child's life but cannot do that due to certain circumstances like child support.

Fathers who want to be there for their children desire to teach them about different ways

to handle a situation that could happen in an urban neighborhood. A lot of low-income urban

parents more specifically fathers want to be good responsible fathers but they feel like they can't

due to the limitations and structural challenges they face when trying to do so. Given these facts,

I don’t think that absent African American parents want to be absent from their child's life on

purpose. I believe that some parents (mostly fathers) have no idea how to be parents or not knowing

how to handle the responsibilities of having a child because they never had a true parent to learn

from themselves ultimately ending in them running from their responsibilities.

 Slavery has a historic link to the dismantling of black families in America. Black families

have been subjected to different methods of separation since times of slavery. Slave owners

purposely separated mothers from the children and fathers from their sons during the slave trade

in order to reak down the family structure of slaves. It has also been observed that black families

are typically apart of extended households. For example, the families are not always direct and

sometimes you see individuals living with distant family members because of financial needs and

other circumstances. Single parented ness rose in both white and black families during the time

period between the 1960s and the 1980s but single parented ness has always risen at a steady and

much higher rate amongst black families. These single parent homes are also mainly associated

with delinquency, substance and alcohol abuse, low self esteem, and other negative ailments. All

of these factors contribute to the unstable structure of the african american family.

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