CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
The basic social unit of every group is the family. The family is a universal institution bounded together by social and biological ties. Family is the logical outcome of marriage consisting of a man, his wife, wives, child or, children. It is characterized by common residence, economic cooperation, cum-maintenance, reproduction, and a unit for primary socialization. It is also characterized by a sense of family identification and loyalty, social placement and control, mutual assistance among members of the family unit (Aldons, 2005). According to Anih (2008), it is a community which is regarded as the earliest and most social institution in the context of which the character of the children are moulded.
The author also opined that the family has its being in the context of a wider grouping of kindred, wide neighborhood and in a wider and more complicated society. The most important primary group of society which gradually introduces the child to the complicated secondary groups of society is the family (Unachukwu & Igbogbor, 1990). The family is a system organized around the support, regulations, nurturance, and socialization of its members. It is a small system made up of individuals who are related to each other sharing strong reciprocal affections and loyalties.It also comprises of house-hold that persists over years (Anih, 2008). Members enter the family through birth, adoption, marriage or by ways of foster placement and nobody chooses which family to be born into (Umeano, 1999).
