Department Seminar: Ten Thousand Family Networks. Nuclear, Extended, and Complex

Thomas Leopold is Professor of Methods of Empirical Social Research at the Institute of Sociology and Social Psychology at the University of Cologne. Leopold is internationally renowned for his research on social demography, family relations, and life course research. His work appears in American Sociological Review, Demography, and Sociological Science.  In his talk, Leopold will present the design and first results from his ERC-funded project, KINMATRIX.

What people regard as their family is usually a large network of immediate and extended kin. Current data and research are limited to a small segment of this network – often only the ‘nuclear family’ of parents and children. The EU-funded KINMATRIX project will study the family network in unprecedented scope and detail, collecting data on 10 000 families in 5 European countries, combined with genealogical sources and national registers. This data will show the family as a kinship matrix – a large, diverse and multigenerational web of relationships. Based on this view, the project will study how the family matters: as a safety net insuring against risks, as a social network protecting from isolation, and as a source of capital promoting education and careers.

All members of the department and research staff from across the faculty are invited to attend. Please navigate the calendar on the Department and Sociology's website to find upcoming Department Seminars.