The Groves Conference on Marriage and Family: History and Impact on Family Science

Sexuality

Knowledge about sexuality and family planning has long been a part of the Groves Conference. As early as 1938, accessibility and legality of contraception and abortion was discussed and debated (E. Groves, 1938). The conference program featured a presentation by Norman Himes on “Birth Control through the Ages.” A “Special Showing of Films on Sex Education” appeared in 1947 (G. Groves, 1947). Such films continued to be shown in 1948 when LeMon Clark spoke on the “Sex Life of the Middle Aged” (G. Groves & Peele, 1948). A highlight of the meeting was an open discussion of the pioneering Kinsey Report on male sexual behavior. “Problems of Climacteric in Men and Women” was presented in 1949 (G. Groves, 1949). Sex education expanded in 1951 to include “A Demonstration of a Reproduction Education Lesson with Children and Their Parents Present Using the Dickinson Model” (G. Groves & Page  224Hill, 1951). Research findings on sexual behavior had emerged by 1952 (G. Groves, Hill, & Himes, 1952a, 1952b). That year Winston Erhmann discussed the “Influence of Going Steady and Not Going Steady Upon Sexual Behavior of Boys and Girls.” Included in 1953 was Emily Mudd, among others, speaking on “Combining Research and Counseling in the Field of Sexual Behavior and Attitudes” and a general session on “Methodological Approaches to a Study of the Relationship between Non-Sexual and Sexual Behavior in Total Marriage Adjustment” (G. Groves, Hill, & Himes, 1953). Findings from the 1953 Kinsey Report on sexual behavior among females were discussed in 1954 by E. E. Le Masters with “The Implications of the Kinsey Research for Marriage Counselors” (Christensen, G. Groves, Hill, Himes, & Leslie, 1954). By 1955 sex had become a recurrent Groves theme as evidenced by Robert Blood and Robert Hamblin’s speech on “Pre-marital Intercourse and Marital Orgasm Capacity” (G. Groves, Hill & Himes, 1955). The distinguished discussant was Alfred Kinsey.

Future leaders in family science also presented their early findings in a Groves venue. In 1959, one such person was Ira Reiss and his conceptualizing of sexual standards and behavior. A seminar in 1960 directly addressed sexual responsiveness in women (G. Groves, Himes, Binkley, & Rutledge, 1960). It included “Background of Female Attitudes toward Sexuality,” “Psychologically Motivating Female Sexual Response,” and “Female Orgasm: A Question of Relatedness.” Perhaps most explicit was “Physiology of Vaginal Orgasm,” an address with moving pictures. Attention to this topic predates by four years the publication of Masters and Johnson’s classic work (1966). “Sex Needs and Sex Problems in Mature Marriages” was a seminar in 1962, led by Paul Vahanian (Kenkel, 1962).

In 1964 among several new organizations being founded was the Sex Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) whose leader, Mary Calderone, involved many family scholars including such Groves participants as Lester Kirkendall, Jessie Bernard, Ira Reiss, and Carlfred Broderick. This group was specifically formed to promote accurate and comprehensive sex education at developmentally appropriate times in children’s and adolescents’ lives. Training and outreach to parents and teachers Page  225was also a concern. Sexuality research had become more common since the Kinsey studies on male and female sexual behavior—which had caught the public’s attention despite push back from conservative groups and politics. Two Groves Conferences, in 1966 and 1988, were devoted to sexuality as defined by sexual activity, its consequences, and the social and cultural environment surrounding sexual behavior.

In 1966 Groves was held in Kansas City, Missouri, with the theme “Sex in Our Society: Symptoms and Prognosis” (Reiss, 1966). Ira Reiss, author of the groundbreaking book Premarital Sexual Standards in America (1960) was program chair. The conference brought together many recognized leaders and researchers in human sexuality. Among them were John Gagnon, Wardell Pomeroy, Robert Bell, Harold Christensen, Isadore Rubin, Mary Calderone, and Lester Kirkendall. Especially notable was the presence of William Masters chairing the seminar topic “Medical Sexology.” [I remember that Virginia Johnson was also at the meeting, although she did not appear on the program (B. H. Settles, 2012)]. This was the same year Masters’ pioneering work with Virginia Johnson Human Sexual Response (1966) would be published. Other conference topics included “Marital Sex and Social Class” led by Lee Rainwater, “Adulterous Sexual Behavior” with panelist Jessie Bernard, and “Marital Sex Over the Family Life Cycle” discussed by Harold Feldman.

In 1988 New Orleans was the setting for the conference titled “Sexuality: Politics, Privacy, and Personal Freedom,” chaired by Robert Ryder and Jeri Hepworth (1988). In 2008, Ryder reflected that,

The 1988 meeting was heavily formatted with workshops that were intensive and deliberately controversial small-group discussions. Titles included reproductive technologies, the interface between sex roles and sexuality, ethnicity and sexual permissiveness, the exploitation of AIDS, sex across the color line, and prostitution. Among the plenary speakers was Donald Mosher, President of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex, presenting on “Sexual Liberty: Love it or Lose it.” Tulane University Law Professor Ruth Colker spoke on “The Constitution and Sexuality.” She stated that there is no real definition of sexuality in the law and that the Constitution never refers to privacy, relying on amendments for interpretation.

Toward the close of the meeting, I gave the presidential address titled “The Sexually Schizophrenic Society,” attempting to capture the immense American societal delusion and confusion regarding sex (Rubin, 1988). Schizophrenia is generically defined as not being in touch with reality. I used the popular cultural understanding of the term schizophrenic, not the clinical definition. It meant contradictory, an oxymoron, saying one thing and doing another, a double-identity, a multiple-personality, or two-faced. The sexually schizophrenic society is a paradigm describing the negative consequences resulting when institutionally prescribed sexual behavior and beliefs differ from actual behavior. This incongruity contributes to extensive Page  227social, family, and personal problems. The term describes a nation in which human sexuality becomes too often a source of anxiety, guilt, and disturbance at many levels. Masters and Johnson (1970) were the first to scientifically and physiologically discover the psycho-social origins of most sexual dysfunctions. Many Americans behave sexually in ways which directly contradict the sexual beliefs and values promulgated by the socializing institutions of family, religion, education, law, and government. Their sexual behavior will be normatively at odds with these social forces. Perhaps the mixed messages of American society are best captured in these two often cited statements: Sex is beautiful, so don’t tell your children about it; Sex is filthy and dirty, so share it with someone you love.

Many factors converged in the 20th century to make us aware of these inconsistencies. The changing status of women is one. There were also wars; new knowledge in the human sciences; advances in technology, medicine, communication, and transportation; and the recognition that sexual responsiveness is a product of social events and interpersonal relationships as well as biological urges. Researchers began linking marital happiness with sexual adjustment and discovered the extent to which people violated society’s sexual rules. Alfred Kinsey and his associates (1948, 1953) exposed the sexually schizophrenic society through their pioneering sexual behavior findings.

I also explained that the concept of a sexually schizophrenic society is not new. In his social-historical study of the American family, Michael Gordon had used the term in discussing the sexual ambiguity and contradictions of 19th century America (Gordon, 1978). Groves member Robert Whitehurst had written that Americans lived in a sexually polarized society. He claimed the United States seemed sexually obsessed, giving direct and subtle sexual messages while simultaneously denying sex in terms of formal socialization. This, he claimed, is consistent with humanity’s historical polarization of sex. “Either it is suppressed or denied, with those activities which come to attention severely punished, or it is sanctified to the point where it cannot be discussed or dealt with realistically” (Whitehurst, 1972, p. 13). Margaret Mead contended that free sex and a desire for virginity can coexist. Critics claimed no human population could be so cognitively Page  228disoriented as to conduct their lives in such a schizophrenic way. In his book Sexual Bargaining (1982) John Scanzoni mentioned the frustration of social scientists in studying the lack of correspondence between stated preferences and actual behavior. Robert Francoeur, a frequent Groves contributor, believed that the formal values we have in thinking what is right or wrong is distinct from the informal values of what people actually do.

In an increasingly sexually explicit environment society’s failure to adequately prepare people to deal effectively with their own sexuality has become more evident. Examples of the sexually schizophrenic society and its effects abound. The epicenter of the debate is the belief that sex belongs only in the context of marriage. Evidence of the schizoid view can be found in our sexually descriptive terminology—or lack thereof. Premarital sex does not distinguish between unmarried teenagers and unmarried middle-aged adults; the abstinence standard is the same for both. The single, divorced, widowed, and separated person is publicly denied their sexual being. Historically, next to treason, rape, murder, and kidnapping, violation of American state sex laws carried the heaviest maximum sentences—although rarely enforced (Myricks & Rubin, 1977). What even defines a sexual act may be disputed. Did President Clinton “have sex with that woman?” Researchers often neglect to explain what sexual acts their subjects indulged in. Infidelity remains a cultural taboo, overtly displayed by some, but secretive and deceptive for most. Sexual silence among the generations in American families likely dominates, with incest being the worst consequence. There is no formal family or societal recognition or celebration of healthy sexual development among the young as a positive life experience. The origins and consequences of gay and lesbian sexuality remain controversial. The subject of autoeroticism is avoided. Marital rape discussion fades today, as date rape concerns increase. Disputes about the existence and/or content of sex education remain in a society that promotes education as a solution to social problems. Rates of teen pregnancies, unplanned and unwanted conceptions, nonmarital births, abortions, and sexually transmitted diseases are unacceptably high.

In 1988 when I gave this presidential address, The Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination, had just decided to stop distributing the Surgeon General’s Report on AIDS because it did not condemn all sex outside of marriage. Mass media advertising and programming seductively approves violating institutionally acceptable sexual values while limiting safe-sex references. Once regarded as the most schizophrenic of examples, the double-standard of sexual behavior for males and females has eroded. That is, sex is good for male identity but bad for female identity. This change may still hold social and psychological costs—especially for women—as they “act sexually more like men” while pursuing new sexual liberties. What to do about prostitution remains a permanent question. Is sexual harassment, lack of funding for sex research, and poor health planning more residue from the sexually schizophrenic society? Perhaps some optimism can be drawn from Whitehurst’s suggestion that society is “femiphobic” rather than “sexophobic.” If correct, he believed a byproduct of increasing equity between men and women may be the eroding of the sexually schizophrenic society—at least to the extent it is rooted in antifemale sentiments.

Gender

The social turmoil of the 1960s and 1970s created by the Vietnam War, political assassinations, and movements demanding greater civil rights for African Americans, farm workers, women, and gay people served as the crucible for a period of intense reexamination of interpersonal relationships, marriage, and family life. Fueled by rising divorce rates and a sexual revolution among women, challenging questions were raised about gender roles and sexuality. The themes of several significant Groves Conferences reflected these events and honored the objective of Groves to work on the leading edges of theory development and empirical research. As early as 1956 Groves conferees recognized the shifting roles of males and females. Titled “Changing Family Roles” and held in New York City, the conference emphasized democratic family patterns, companionship, and interpersonal competence in marriage and family relations (G. Groves, Hill, & Himes, 1956). Gender-role pioneer researcher Page  230Jessie Bernard spoke on “Recent Changes in Familial Roles and Implications for Societal Stability.” Other participants were among the most prominent leaders in the family field at the time. Among them were Winston Ehrmann, Eugene Litwak, Bernice Neugarten, Alfred Baldwin, Harold Christensen, Lester Kirkendall, David Mace, Aaron Rutledge, Lester Dearborn, Ruth Shonle Cavan, Leonard Cottrell, Jr., Evelyn Duvall, Gerhard Neubeck, Orville Brim, Joseph Himes, Jr., Judson Landis, and Helen Mayer Hacker. The topics they pursued included factors associated with accepting or rejecting one’s sex role, conflicts in contemporary masculine roles, and husband-wife relations in middle age. Although not nearly as controversial as gender-role debates in later decades, the conference exposed needed areas of concern in maintaining healthy relations across genders.

Perhaps the most important feature of these early conferences was the recognition that male/female role change was occurring and the anticipation of greater changes to come. In 1961 the Detroit conference theme was “New Roles for Males and Females in Premarriage, Marriage, and Parenthood”(Groves, G. Himes, Binkley & Foote, 1961). Evident in the title are societal- recognized family gender-role stages. However, Eleanor Luckey led a seminar on the one-parent family and juggling mother and father parental roles resulting from divorce or death and preparing for remarriage and step-parenting. Other seminars focused on conflict and confusion in husbands’ and wives’ roles, what is the role of the male in today’s changing family, and functions and dysfunctions of premarital sex.

“Man’s Place in a Woman’s World,” the 1974 Hot Springs, Arkansas conference, illustrated how much had changed since 1961 (Osofsky & Osofsky, 1974). Robert Lewis in his edited book with Robert Salt Men in Families (1986) referred to this conference:

However, it is important to note that Joseph Pleck and others had organized sessions at these earlier meetings on women’s roles that did address changing male roles. Conference co-chairs Joy and Howard Osofsky acknowledged the changing role of women in society, especially the legal, occupational, and social changes. Less emphasis had been placed on the adaptations men must make to these changes. Thus, they designed three broad and far-reaching areas to be stressed in Hot Springs: (a) Intimacy: the changing experiences of men and women toward one another; (b) Parenting: legal, social, and emotional changes in parenting roles for men and women along with child-rearing and socialization practices; and (c) Work: changing perceptions of work and work-situation roles. The opening plenary session featured internationally recognized scholars Rhona and Robert Rapoport speaking on “Men, Women, and Equity.” However, the most prominent plenary national speakers were Betty Friedan and Warren Farrell, both media stars and prominent advocates for their genders. They spoke about the “new woman and the new man.” Other attendees participated in workshops on sex-role socialization of females and males, problems in teaching and research on changing sexual and family roles, male roles: Is brotherhood possible?, and gay men’s place in a modern world.

Among the most prominent and well-remembered Groves conferences was held in Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia (Sussman & First-Dilic, 1975). Formally titled “International Workshop on Changing Sex Roles in Family and Society,” it was Groves’ first attempt at leaving the United States, although two previous conferences had been held in Puerto Rico. Co-chaired by Marvin Sussman and his Yugoslavian counterpart Ruza First-Dilic with the prominent participation of Groves President Harold Feldman, it brought together for the first time scholars from Western democracies and communist nations to examine the relationships of men and women in their respective societies. The 1975 Groves Conference was co-sponsored by four other organizations: the Committee on Family Research, International Sociological Association; East European Page  232Family Sociological Group; Family Research Section of the Yugoslav Sociological Association; and the International Union of Family Organizations. Nearly 300 people attended, representing 35 countries. Among the participants were Amitai Etzioni, Helena Lopata, John Mogey, Pepper Schwartz, Rose Coser, Maximiliane Szinovacz, Rosabeth Kanter, Bernard Murstein, Robert and Anna Francoeur, Shirley Zimmerman, Constance Ahrons, Mollie and Russell Smart, Lillian Troll, and Pauline Bart. A summation of this historic meeting can be found in the July 20, 1975, issue of The Marriage, Divorce, and the Family Newsletter. The following is a synopsis of that report.

Family historian Tamara Hareven gave the opening plenary session. She stated, “In 1850, for the first time in history, motherhood became glorified as a full time occupation - for the first time a clear conflict was articulated between motherhood, women’s tasks, and work outside the home” (p. 1). Marvin Sussman addressed the growing popularity of individuals writing their own legally nonbinding marriage contracts. Ruza First-Dilic spoke about the defunctionalization of the family and its relationship to other institutions in a socialistic society. Olivera Buric, a Yugoslavian scholar, shared her insights about the burden of women’s multiple roles and subordination in their own families. Katja Boh of the University of Ljublana noted the progress in women’s rights in Yugoslavia through legislation protecting unmarried mothers, a constitutional right to family planning, the equating of illegitimate with legitimate children, and the providing of special facilities for women and children. Among the goals of the plenary sessions were to understand changing sex roles and the consequences for family and society: How do individuals become psychologically prepared to assume gender role equality? What discrepancies exist between national policies and legal statutes and common law? What theoretical and empirical research issues arise within a country and cross-culturally when studying gender roles? Fifteen workshops provided reports on a wide range of issues. Ellen Peck, a leader in the nonparent movement, reported on alternatives to the procreative role of women. According to James Ramey, who led a training workshop, human service practitioners, agency employees, and legislators need to eliminate their biases toward nontraditional family lifestyles and recognize the pressures among women in achieving gender-role equality. Graham Spanier’s Page  233workshop on sex roles in different cultures in cohabitation and other alternative family forms predicted a significant increase in future cohabitation. Catherine Chilman presented on policies and programs for the era of gender-role equality and how these would be administered. The roles of older women were the focus of Rose Somerville’s workshop. Other workshops dealt with achieving gender-role equality, improving communication skills, women and work, nonreproductive sex, changes in legal and regulatory environments, and speculations about gender-role equality by the year 2000.

In 1982 the Groves Conference again turned its attention to gender roles. “Men’s studies finally ‘arrived’ when the central theme of the 1982 Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family was ‘Men’s Changing Roles and Relationships’ “ (Lewis & Salt, 1986, p. 18). Held in Ocean City, Maryland, it was chaired by Robert Lewis. His quest was to generate relevant and timely research questions and discussions about men in families, their changing roles, and the meaning of being male in current times. Lewis described the 1980s as a decade likely to explore men’s issues—a counterpart to the interest in women’s issues during the 1960s and 1970s. He recognized an already significant increase in fatherhood research, exploring men’s critical life transitions, examining the sex role socialization of males, and efforts to break out of traditional masculine roles. Lewis cited the 1974 Groves Conference in Hot Springs and the 1975 conference in Yugoslavia. Both conferences featured workshops on men. These were possibly the first professional workshops responding to a growing interest in men’s roles.

In Ocean City, Joseph Pleck, author of Men and Masculinity (1975), The American Man (1980), and The Myth of Masculinity (1983), gave the opening keynote address “Men’s Changing Roles and Relationships with Women.” Later, James Levine presented “Men’s Changing Roles and Relationships with Children” and Andrew Mattison discussed “Stages of Relationships in Gay Male Couples,” continuing Groves’ inclusion of same-sex couple relationships. Issues generated by the topics of men’s relationships with women, children, and gay and other men provided the foundation for lengthy workshops and roundtable sessions. Among the prominent participants were Page  234Harold Lief, Frank Furstenberg, Cecelia Sudia, Jack Balswick, Arthur Shostak, and John Scanzoni.

Throughout these conferences the terms sex roles and gender roles were used interchangeably. Although scholars were examining what was happening to the family within the context of sexual equality, confusion between the morphology of being male or female versus the learning of masculine and feminine roles remained. More recently gender roles has emerged as the more acceptable term as we learn more about the complexities of sexual identity.

Family Diversity

In the book Contemporary Families and Alternative Lifestyles: Handbook on Research and Theory, a product of the 1981 Groves Conference, Macklin and Rubin (1983) used the term alternative lifestyles in documenting and synthesizing research on a wide range of emerging family forms and relationships. Although I continued to use the term in two subsequent publications (Rubin, 2001; Rubin, 2004), Coleman and Ganong (2001) recognized that the term alternative lifestyles had segued into family diversity as some pejoratively viewed relationship forms became more socially acceptable.

In 1965 “The One-Parent Family in the United States” was the theme for the Groves Conference in Philadelphia (Bell, 1965). This conference was an early recognition by Groves of major shifts in family composition. Chaired by Robert Bell, the conference covered such topics as the scope and significance of the one-parent family, matriarchy and lower-class families, child-rearing, and cross-cultural views. Benjamin Schlesinger, Hyman Rodman, Emily Mudd, Lee Rainwater, and Carlfred Broderick were among the participants. The genesis of interest among Groves members in studying family diversity is referred to in Sussman’s 1972 special issue publication for the National Council on Family Relations. Titled Nontraditional Family Forms in the 1970s its contributors described the increasing pluralism in family structures and the implications for social policy, laws, human services, and bureaucracies (Sussman, 1972a). The Groves Conferences in 1971 and 1972 served as the bases for Page  235Sussman’s edited work, and the 1973 conference continued the theme. In 1971 the Groves Conference was held in San Juan, Puerto Rico (Chilman, 1971). Titled “The Future of Marriage and Parenthood,” it was perhaps the first organized attempt by family scholars to begin cataloging the sweeping changes surrounding late-20th-century American family life. As Eleanor Macklin (2009) described, “....the conference was generated by papers that documented the evolving sexual mores and living patterns resulting from the massive societal changes of the 60s.” The need was apparent to 1971 attendee Robert Whitehurst, who pointed out that we did not have good terminology and that there existed a shortage of data on almost everything related to alternative lifestyles. Discussions included whether “the family” had a viable future, what future parenthood would look like, and—perhaps most significantly—an attempt to identify new interpersonal relations. Seminars included topics such as same-sex relationships, college student cohabitation, the affiliative family, androgyny, mate swapping, group marriage, and communal living. Intellectual debate was capped by presentations from some of the foremost family scholars of the time. Jessie Bernard distinguished marriage from lifestyle by emphasizing the specific socially framed parameters of marriage versus the greater freedom of establishment of any other forms of household arrangements.

Rustum Roy elaborated on the book he had written with his wife Della, Honest Sex: A Revolutionary New Sex Guide for the Now Generation of Christians (1969). In that book, Roy and Roy argued that traditional monogamy was obsolete and that loving one’s neighbors should be taken literally because traditional monogamy isolates individuals and families and does not facilitate the development of meaningful personal relationships. Not only did they challenge so-called biblical rules and treat the idea of one exclusive sex partner as an absurdity when universally applied but they even urged the legalization of bigamy. Duane Denfield and Michael Gordon, who had coined the expression “the family that swings together clings together” in a 1970 article, described the more positive aspects of mate swapping while recognizing that studies of dropouts from swinging had not yet been conducted (Gordon, 1978). The limited ability of architects to understand social and behavioral research and design living spaces conducive to communal lifestyles was criticized Page  236by George Trieschman, who condemned the lack of a humanistic architecture. Robert Ryder commented that the term commune was almost meaningless, as the variety of communal arrangements made them almost impossible to operationally define. Ryder raised the concern that communes and marriage might suffer from the same idealization, the belief that there was an institutional guarantee of success and happiness. He argued that communes require energy, resources such as money, and charismatic leaders to maintain them; those based primarily on loving will not last. Ethel Vatter and Sylvia Clavan raised awareness regarding the importance of older people in communes and of older single women adopting families to exchange emotional and material resources. They called this the affiliative family. Androgyny was introduced into the Groves discussion by Joy and Howard Osofsky, who defined it as a lifestyle with no sexual differentiation in roles. A plea for longitudinal studies of families came from Margaret Feldman. Eleanor Macklin led a pioneering discussion of a pilot study of cohabiting college students. Finally, among the issues and questions raised regarding this new area of research was a concern about American society’s responses to alternative lifestyles. Would there be a reactionary crackdown from legal and government sources, outright condemnation from religious authorities, and a consensus among unsympathetic counselors, therapists, and human service professionals that the practitioners of alternative lifestyles were ill? Catherine Chilman, David Olson, Marvin Sussman, Carlfred Broderick, Harold Feldman, Gladys Groves, Robert Harper, Lester Kirkendall, David and Vera Mace, Marie Peters, Gerhard Neubeck, James Ramey, Nena O’Neill, Rose Somerville, Roger Rubin and many other attendees would make contributions over the next 40 years examining the shifting parameters of American family life.

The 1972 Groves conference in Dallas, Texas, “Societal Planning for Family Pluralism,” continued justifying the study of alternative lifestyles (Sussman, 1972b). Presenter James Ramey, researcher and writer on group marriages and communes, extolled the practical advantages of communal living, particularly the pooling of resources. For example, fewer automobiles are needed when others can transport you; housing facilities may be of better quality than individuals and separate families could afford; caregiving Page  237for children and the elderly, the disabled, and other dependents increases with more adults present; children have additional adult role models; and collaborative financial investment strategies improve economic circumstances. Ramey described one commune composed of professionals with $51 million in assets that labeled itself an investment club. Their large housing complex provided day care and a communal dining area. On the downside, Ramey reported the fragility of group ventures that sometimes faltered due to the effect of career and personal problems that were related to demands from the greater society. The efficacy of group experiences for adults and children was questioned by other conference participants, including Nena and George O’Neill, coauthors of the best-selling book Open Marriage (1972). They expressed concern about rearing children age 5 and younger in group situations. They even criticized their own ideas by saying that the major weakness in opening the boundaries of permanent monogamous relationships was the inability of individuals to analyze and understand their own relationships. People carried role expectations, especially based on their parent’s marriages, into their own marriages, and these expectations were difficult to expel. In an open marriage, marriage should always be the primary relationship, and if extramarital sex did occur, it should be viewed as something feeding into the relationship and not threatening it. In other words extramarital sex was acceptable only when it filtered back positively into the marriage. Eleanor Macklin continued her leadership role in studying the dramatic increase in cohabitation by facilitating cooperation among those researchers interested in this topic. Two issues of a cohabitation newsletter were distributed to these individuals during 1972. Finally, the 1972 conference produced a number of predictions regarding the future course of American family life. Most of these were based on a perceived need for increased intimacy as mass culture grows and becomes more impersonal.

The 1973 Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Groves Conference maintained the previous two years’ momentum by examining changes in family living. However, it was subsumed under the broader topic of ideology and was titled “Letting Many Flowers Bloom: Implications of Ideology for Research and the Profession” (Ryder, 1973). The only plenary session was presented by Philip Page  238Slater, author of the influential book The Pursuit of Loneliness (1976). Small group meetings were established around “Family Forms,” “Research and Teaching,” and “Services and Public Policy.” The “Family Forms” groups discussed adult single living, strengths of the nuclear family, diversity among Black families, middle and older years, and nonmarital cohabitation. The latter was chaired by Eleanor Macklin who continued her seminal pursuit to advance research on this emerging lifestyle. The group sought to define cohabitation, determine its prevalence, describe cohabitants, explain why people cohabit, discover characteristics of the relationship, identify problems experienced, explore the effects of cohabitation, and make recommendations for policy and position statements. Reflecting back on chairing the conference, Robert Ryder wrote,

By 1979 Groves turned its attention to “The Well-Being of the Child in Various Family Forms” (Sussman & Marciano, 1979). This Washington, D.C. conference was chaired by Marvin Sussman and his associate Teresa Marciano. The location brought numerous federal government specialists to the meeting. They represented the Administration for Children, Youth, and Families; Project Head Start; the Senate Committee on Labor and Human Services; National Institute on Drug Abuse; Bureau of the Census; the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development; the National Institute of Mental Health; the National Center on Child Abuse and Page  239Neglect, and the U.S. National Commission of the International Year of the Child. Intervention to improve children’s lives became the primary focus, rather than the structural arrangements of alternative lifestyles. However, Larry and Joan Constantine did present on “The Impact of Various Family Forms and Life Styles on Children,” and Harold Feldman and Donna Dempster discussed “Androgyny and Children: Prospects in a Sexist Society.”

Not until 1981 did alternative lifestyles again become the dominant theme of a Groves conference. The meeting at Mt. Pocono, Pennsylvania was titled “The Pursuit of Happiness: Progress and Prospects,” chaired by Eleanor Macklin (1981). She explicitly sought to build on the 1971 conference. The central question was what had we learned about alternative lifestyles over the ten year period and what were the possible implications for the future. Why is there a search for alternatives? What really is a new lifestyle? What was the present and predicted prevalence of a given lifestyle? What were the costs and benefits to individuals and society? What adaptations appear necessary for success? The conference again brought together some of the leading scholars associated with the study of alternative lifestyles: Nena O’Neill (open marriage), James Ramey (intimate friendships), Larry and Joan Constantine (group marriage), Roger Libby and Lonny Myers (extramarital sexuality), David Weis (multiple relationships), Bram Buunk (international alternative lifestyles), Charles Cole and Charles Hennon (nonmarital cohabitation), Peter Stein and Sharon Price (never-married singles), Naomi Gerstel and Harriet Gross (dual-career/worker marriages), Emily Brown (divorce), David Baptiste (stepfamilies), Patricia Gongla and Edward Thompson (single-parent families), Robyn Zeiger (same-sex intimate relationships), Harriette McAdoo and Marie Peters (alternative lifestyles in minority communities), Paula Dressel and Beth Hess (alternatives for the elderly), Gerry Brudenell (affiliated families and communities), Catherine Chilman (remarriage), Jean Veevers and Judith Fischer (child-free relationships), and many other leaders, including Robert Francoeur, Ira Reiss, Anthony Jurich, Mary Hicks, Sally Hansen, and Robert Whitehurst. Additional topics explored children and alternative lifestyles, engineered environments, and relationship contracts. Emily Mudd discussed the traditional nuclear family. Issues surrounding religious reactions Page  240to alternative lifestyles as well as implications for teaching, the law, clinical work, and international perspectives were included.

Many participants were not Groves members at the time. They were specifically invited to the conference to provide a rich opportunity for learning and discussion. In 2009 Macklin reflected back on the 1981 conference:

Mt. Pocono would be the last major family studies conference on alternative lifestyles until 2000 when the Groves Conference in Asheville, North Carolina, was chaired by Marilyn Coleman and Lawrence Ganong (2000). Asking what has happened to families in the last 30 years, they created the theme “Considering the Past and Contemplating the Future: Family Diversity in the New Millenium.” The conference reconnected with the Groves meetings of 1971, 1972, 1973, and 1981. For the field of family science, the 2000 conference reestablished the importance of studying a topic which with society may be least comfortable: The past, current, and future state of the American family was examined. Why have some alternative family lifestyles become almost mainstream? Were families and professionals aided by scholarship to adapt to the enormity of societal changes? Are extant theories and current research methods helping to learn and understand family diversity? Where is family scholarship heading? Professional, historical, and personal perspectives addressing these questions was presented by a panel of distinguished senior family scholars led by Marvin Sussman, Catherine Chilman, Margaret Feldman, Harriette McAdoo, Roger Rubin, and Robert Ryder. Another panel of doctoral students and Page  241new professionals shared their prognostications for family diversity over the next few decades. Among their concerns were the influence of the Internet and social media on relationships, implications of family and lifestyle instability, recognizing diversity among ethnic families, and the role of feminism. They asked if there are universal family values, how to reconcile conflicting values, what are the limits to tolerance, and how do we manage the information explosion? Finally, by the 2000 Asheville conference, considerable progress could be reported in discussing once controversial topics, such as homosexuality. A plenary session was presented by Lawrence Kurdek based upon his research comparing heterosexual married couples and cohabiting gay male and lesbian couples. His conclusions were that there were far more similarities than differences between heterosexual and same-sex couples and that “a couple is a couple is a couple.” Regardless of sexual orientation, couples deal with many of the same issues. The 2000 Groves conference produced two special issues of the Journal of Family Issues (September and October, 2001). A more comprehensive publication culminated in Coleman and Ganong’s edited book Handbook of Contemporary Families: Considering the Past, Contemplating the Future (2004). The editors purposely chose chapter topics traceable to previous decades to capture the evolution of family scholarship over time.

Conclusion

The attention paid to sexuality, gender, and family diversity has been both explicit and implicit in many Groves conferences. The study of these subjects often unfolds and exposes the most personal and intimate details and characteristics of its members. Such an examination is a difficult challenge and, at times, a painful process. Issues of privacy exploitation, morality, ethics, legality, personal belief, and self-judgment are among the obstacles to be overcome. By providing focus, direction, and colleagial support for research on these emotionally taut topics, the Groves Conference has given greater substance and legitimacy to their study in family science.

References

• Bell, R. (1965, April 26-30). The one-parent family in the United States. Thirty-first annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Philadelphia, PA. [Program]. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota, SW 299, Social Welfare Archives.
• Chilman, C. (1971, May 5-8). Future of marriage and parenthood. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, San Juan, Puerto Rico. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Christensen, H. T., Groves, G., Himes, J., Jr., Hill, R., & Leslie, G. (1954, April 28-30). Seventeenth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Lafayette, IN. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Coleman, M., & Ganong, L. H. (2000, June 14-18). The past and contemplating the future: Family diversity in the next millenium. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Ashville, NC. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Coleman, M., & Ganong, L. H. (2001). Considering the past, con-templating the future. Journal of Family Issues, 22, 683-687. doi:10.1177/019251301022006001
• Coleman, M., & Ganong, L. H. (Eds.) (2004). Handbook of contemporary families: Considering the past, contemplating the future. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
• Gordon, M. (1978). The American family in social-historical perspective (2nd ed.) New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press.
• Groves, E. (1938, April 12-15). Fourth annual Conference on Conservation of Marriage and the Family, Chapel Hill, NC. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G. (1947, April 8-10). Tenth Conference on Conservation of Marriage and the Family, Chapel Hill, NC. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
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• Groves, G. (1949, April 7-9). Twelfth annual Groves Conference on Conservation of Marriage and the Family, Chapel Hill, NC. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., Binkley, O., Himes, J., Jr., & Rutledge, A. (1959, April 6-8). Twenty-fifth anniversary Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family: Extending the functional approach, Chapel Hill, NC. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., & Hill, R. (1951, April 23-25). Fourteenth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Chapel Hill, NC. [Program].Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., Hill, R., & Himes, J., Jr. (1952a, April). Preliminary notice to members and friends. [Announcement]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., Hill, R., & Himes, J., Jr. (1952b, April 21-23). Fifteenth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Durham, NC. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., Hill, R., & Himes, J., Jr. (1953, April 20-22). Sixteenth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Columbus, OH. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., Hill, R., & Himes, J., Jr. (1955, April 20-22). Eighteenth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Philadelphia, PA. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., Hill, R., & Himes, J., Jr. (1956, March 12-14). Nineteenth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, New York, NY. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
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• Groves, G., Himes, J., Jr., Binkley, O., & Foote, N. (1961, April 10-12). New roles for males and females in premarriage, marriage and parenthood. Twenty-seventh annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Detroit, MI. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., Himes, J., Jr., Binkley, O., & Rutledge, A. (1960, April 4-6). 1960: Theory, research, and practice. Twenty-sixth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Columbus, OH. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Groves, G., & Peele, C. (1948, May 10-12). Eleventh Groves Conference on Conservation of Marriage and the Family, Chapel Hill, NC. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Kenkel, W., Ehrmann, W., Sussman, M., Foote, N., & Bernard, J. (1962, April 9-11). Twenty-eighth annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family: Marriage in Maturity, Baltimore, MD. [Program]. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University, Ernest R. and Gladys Groves Papers, MS 169, Institute of Regional Studies.
• Kinsey, A. C., Pomeroy, W. B., & Martin, C. E. (1948). Sexual behavior in the human male. Philadelphia, PA: W. B. Saunders.
• Kinsey, A. C., Pomeroy, W. B., Martin, C. E., & Gebhard, P. H. (1953). Sexual behavior in the human female. Philadelphia, PA: W. B. Saunders.
• Lewis, R. (1982, May 30-June 4) Men’s changing roles and relationships: Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Ocean City, MD. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Lewis, R. A., & Salt, R. E. (Eds.). (1986). Men in families. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
• Macklin, E. (1981, May 27-30). The pursuit of happiness: Progress and prospects. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Mt. Pocono, PA. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Macklin, E. (2009). Personal correspondence.
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• Macklin, E., & Rubin, R. H. (Eds.) (1983). Contemporary families and alternative life styles: Handbook of research and theory. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
• Marriage, Divorce, and the Family Newsletter. (1975, July 20). Volume 1, Number 7, 1. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Masters, W., & Johnson, V. (1966). Human sexual response. Boston, MA: Little, Brown.
• Masters, W., & Johnson, V. (1970). Human sexual inadequacy. Boston. MA: Little, Brown.
• Myrick, N., & Rubin, R. (1977). Sex laws and alternative life styles. The Family Coordinator, 26, 357-360. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/581756
• O’Neill, N., & O ‘Neill, G. (1972). Open marriage: A new life style for couples. New York, NY: M. Evans.
• Osofsky, J., & Osofsky, H. (1974, April 25-28). Man’s place in a woman’s world. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Hot Springs, AK. {Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Pleck, E. H., & Pleck, J. H. (1980). The American man. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
• Pleck, J. H., & Sawyer, J. (1975). Men and masculinity. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
• Pleck, J. H. (1983). The myth of masculinity. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
• Reiss, I. (1960). Premarital sexual standards in America. Glencoe, IL: The Free Press.
• Reiss, I.. (1966, April). Sex in our society: Symptoms and prognosis. Thirty-second annual Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Kansas City, MO. [Program]. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota, SW 299, Social Welfare Archives.
• Roy, R., & Roy, D.. (1969). Honest sex: A revolutionary new sex guide for a new generation of Christians. New York, NY: Signet.
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• Rubin, R. H. (1988). The sexually schizophrenic society. [Presidential address]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Rubin, R. H. (2001). Alternative lifestyles revisited or whatever happened to swingers, group marriages, and communes? Journal of Family Issues 22, 711-726. doi:10.1177/019251301022006003
• Rubin, R. H. (2004). Alternative lifestyles today: Off the family studies screen. In M. Coleman & L. H. Ganong (Eds.), Handbook of contemporary families (pp. 23-35). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
• Ryder, R. (2008, May 14). Personal correspondence.
• Ryder, R. (1973, May 10-13). Letting many flowers bloom: Implications of ideology for research and the professional. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Myrtle Beach, NC. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Ryder, R., & Hepworth, J. (1988, May 3-8). Sexuality: Politics, privacy and personal freedom. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, New Orleans, LA. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Scanzoni, J. (1982). Sexual bargaining (2nd ed.) Chicago, IL: University of Chicago.
• Settles, B. H. (2012). [Notes]. Copies in possession of B. H. Settles.
• Slater, P. E. (1970). The pursuit of loneliness: American culture at a breaking point. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
• Sussman, M. B. (Ed.). (1972a). Nontraditional family forms in the 1970s. Minneapolis, MN: National Council on Family Relations.
• Sussman, M. B. (1972b, May 5-8). Societal planning for family pluralism. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Dallas, TX. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Sussman, M. B., & First-Dilic, R. (1975, June 16-21). Changing sex roles in family and society. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Dubrovnick, Yugoslavia. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
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• Sussman, M. B., & Marciano, T. (1979, April 26-28). The well-being of the child in today’s families: The International Year of the Child. Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, Washington, DC. [Program]. Copy in possession of R. H. Rubin.
• Whitehurst, R. N. (1972). American sexophobia. In L. A. Kirkendall & R. N. Whitehurst (Eds.). The new sexual revolution. New York, NY: D. W. Brown.