Most of the people I surveyed compared their family to the sitcom Family Matters or Home Improvement. Those who chose Family Matters felt that they had a strong family that helped each other in need. I discovered that majority, if not all, which chose this answer, were of strong religious belief. This could suggest that religion in the family bonds them together making them a strong functional family unit. On the other hand, those who chose Home Improvement, felt that even though their father was the head of the household (male breadwinner), their mother was actually the one who kept the family in order. When they had to rate on a scale of 1 to 10, how functional they thought their family was the majority chose a 6 out of 10. This is moderately functional, but it leans towards a dysfunctional sense. Those who chose a 6 and above, usually had both parents employed, while being employed themselves. If we look at the political economic perspective, we can see the influence of the economy and having to earn a decent living by having dual-income earners. This suggests that majority of the parents and teenagers, who work, are spending little time at home with the family. Most of these parents and especially teenagers (who are also in school) are under extreme stress from work or school. This can have an impact on the family, if they decide to take out stress on each other by either arguing, physically, emotionally, or verbally abusing each other, or turning to legal or illegal substances. Partners in a marriage could take their stress out on their spouse, which could lead to separation, or even divorce. Therefore, this constitutes what society sees as a dysfunctional family .
In conclusion, I have found in my findings, that there was an equalization of what society sees as a healthy functional family and a dysfunctional family. Some healthy families possessed some dysfunctional traits, while some dysfunctional families possessed functional traits. Therefore, some form of dysfunction in a family could be seen as the norm in families because that family could also possess healthy traits that society sees as a functional family.