Date of Award:
5-1983
Document Type:
Thesis
Degree Name:
Master of Science (MS)
Department:
Human Development and Family Studies
Department name when degree awarded
Family, Consumer, and Human Development
Committee Chair(s)
Jay D. Schvaneveldt
Committee
Jay D. Schvaneveldt
Committee
Brent C. Miller
Committee
George Ellsworth
Abstract
The primary purpose of this research was to gain insight into what childhood was like in turn-of-the-century Mormon polygamous families. This purpose was executed through two main avenues: basic empirical data and descriptive accounts. This type of research was crucial inasmuch as previous research and commentaries dealt with adult relations but little was known about children in this complex Mormon family structure.
In order to gain an understanding of childhood in Mormon polygamous families during this era, forty elderly individuals who were reared in plural marriages were interviewed in depth. A field type design was employed using a historical-cultural; in short, retrospective history taking. Questions focused on the general family life style, respondent-sibling interaction, respondent-parent interaction, and respondent-father's other families interaction. Children in Mormon polygamous families encountered the events of Western rural America, as would any children at the turn-of-the-century, including hard physical work, large families, home based entertainment, and traditional values. Looking back in time, respondents in this study saw their families as supportive, nurturant, and for the most part as "normal" within the cultural context of Mormon community. Stress, however, was manifest primarily in the avenues of degree of contact with their father's other families, the complexity of multiple households, and the self-imposed questions that generally existed in the society during a time of persecution as well as internal change of the Mormon church.
Checksum
39e7f932a5f00a0700e77b645208a999
Recommended Citation
Willey, Dorothy Geneve Young, "Childhood Experiences in Mormon Polygamous Families at the Turn of the Century" (1983). All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023. 2278.
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/2278
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