FAMILY (FREE TOPIC)

 In the context of human society, a family is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth), affinity (by marriage or other relationship), or co-residence (as implied by the etymology of the English word "family")[citation needed] or some combination of these.[citation needed] Members of the immediate family may include spouses, parents, brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters.[citation needed] Members of the extended family may include grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews, nieces, and siblings-in-law.[citation needed] Sometimes these are also considered members of the immediate family, depending on an individual's specific relationship with them.[citation needed]

In most societies, the family is the principal institution for the socialization of children. As the basic unit for raising children, anthropologists generally classify most family organizations as matrifocal (a mother and her children); conjugal (a wife, her husband, and children, also called the nuclear family); avuncular (for example, a grandparent, a brother, his sister, and her children); or extended (parents and children co-reside with other members of one parent's family). Sexual relations among the members are regulated by rules concerning incest such as the incest taboo.

The word "family" can be used metaphorically to create more inclusive categories such as community, nationhood, global village, and humanism.

The field of genealogy aims to trace family lineages through history.

The family is also an important economic unit studied in family economics