- The purpose of this study was to determine the factors affecting the family Strengths and therewith, suggest some policy alternatives for the family Strengths and welfare. For this purpose, the researcher sampled 208 college students to survey them for their perceptions of family concept and functions as well as their efforts for family functions for family members and society.
- The results of this study can be summarized as follows;
- First, as a result of surveying the subjects for their perception of family concept, it was found that almost all of them (99.0%) perceived that ''a family consists of couple and their children'' (item 1). The other items about family concept chosen by the majority of subjects were ''couple and adopted child'' (item 3 and 17), ''remarried couple and their children'' (item 9), ''single parent and children'' (item 2), ''three-generation family: couple, widow daughter and grand daughter'' (item 4), ''three sisters'' (item 7), ''unmarried woman living with a son born from a sperm bank'' (item 19), ''separated couple with no child'' (item 13), ''cousins living together'' (item 11), ''divorced man and his girl friend with child'' (item 15) and ''homosexual family'' (item 8).
- Second, as a result of assessing subjects'' needs for family functions and their efforts for family Strengths, it was found that the family functions for family members scored higher than those for the society, and that subjects'' efforts for the family functions conducive to both their family members and society scored lower than their needs for the family functions. The family function desired most by subjects for their family members was ''affectionate and emotional support and solidarity'', followed by ''recess'', ''children''s education'', ''child rearing'', ''property protection'', ''amusement and recreation'', ''child bearing'', ''production'' and ''consumption'' in their order. On the other hand, the area of family functions for which the subjects were making most efforts was ''children''s education'', followed by ''protection of family members and properties'', ''consumption'', ''child rearing'', ''recess'' and ''production'' in their order.
- The family function perceived most important for the society was ''stabilization of the society'', followed by ''inter-generational transfer of culture'' and ''maintenance of the economic order''. And the family function for which the subjects were making most efforts for the society was ''stabilization of the society'', followed by ''preservation of mankind and supply of social members'' and ''inter-generational transfer of culture'' in their order.