Going Nuclear: The Downfall Of Joint Families In India

With technology, digitalisation, urbanisation and westernisation, there is also a huge change in the structure of families in India.

The big family love shown in Hum Aapke Hain Koun and Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gam presented the image of a large joint family which represented the reality for a lot of Indian households. With technology, digitalisation, urbanisation and westernisation, there is also a huge change in the structure of families in India.

This is not an overnight change, but a structural transformation.

Why Nuclear Families Are Replacing Joint Families

From the household having grandparents, parents and often two or more children, the norm now has changed to two working adults, one or no child, and outsourced help. The change is not based off simple feelings or impulse decisions, it’s sociology.

Nuclear family settings are small, comfortable, and have been working well in Western contexts since years. The idea of freedom that it sells, with fewer voices, compromises and power struggles, largely appeals to the often repressed youngsters in joint families. The oldest concern of younger individuals in joint families- privacy- is more in nuclear families, albeit differing from household to household. There is more space to regain autonomy on how the house is maintained, tasks and responsibilities are divided, behaviour, and overall structural and personal functioning of the families. Additionally, as the Indian shows and movies famously display the ‘saas-bahu’, this is an additional factor that no longer impacts nuclear families. There is scope for reduced daily conflict as there are fewer people involved and scope for clearer systems to be in place. For women especially, there is greater scope for living without constant surveillance, unpaid labour, rigid rules and instructions, and hierarchies.

However, this system only works as long as all members are employed, emotionally regulated and functioning well; as Indians we have adopted this system without having adopted the individual roles each part of this system plays.

The Other Side

In high stress societies, such as the one created by ever changing systems and ever rising prices in Indian metropolitan cities, a support system is not an option, but a need.

The informal welfare systems that joint family structures bring is one of the most important advantages that joint families offer. Having relatives and grandparents who live in the same household offers support while raising children, taking care of elderly family members and most importantly acts as a source of comfort, resilience, and support during times of illness, financial turmoils, and periods of unemployment or grief. Without having this kind of support, nuclear families often have to turn towards paid services or take on unpaid, invisible emotional labour which is usually, historically, borne by women.

In nuclear families, any kind of major life event becomes an emergency without a buffer. Support is often paid, or postponed. And in a country with weak public systems for care and support, joint families become the core support system. In India, joint family systems were a result of this disparity between needs and available service.

Joint Families: A Gold Standard?

Joint families teach you skills that no app or institution can. On the other side of a messy, loud, and uncomfortable situation lies a training ground. This training ground teaches you that you can love and be irritated by the same individual together. That adjustment is not the end of the world or a failure. That hierarchy exists and serves a real purpose. That not all conflicts need to end without closure and exit.

Growing up in a joint family includes growing up with three or more generations, each with a wealth of information and knowledge to pass on. There is scope for shared emotional labour, division of caregiving responsibilities, and joint brainstorming to manage crisis situations. In a crisis similar to the one brought by the 2019-20 pandemic, joint families were able to demonstrate higher levels of discipline, cooperation, caring, and conflict resolution, protecting each other from pandemic related stressors (Tiwari et al., 2022). Post the pandemic, emotional stability, social connectedness, and quality of relationships was often found to be higher in joint families, along with emotional resilience and adaptability (Pratima et al.,, 2025). Recent research continues to support this finding, with higher quality of life scores being recorded for middle aged individuals living in a joint family, with the finding being applicable to physical, psychological, and social domains (Oberoi & Singh, 2025).

In an increasingly digital world, social skill development is more important now more than ever. And that is one skill that can best be taught in joint families compared to nuclear families. The collectivistic values, that include shared resources and financial responsibilities, also include intergenerational bonds including those with extended family, leading to a wider, stronger social network. Furthermore, the settings also allow for skills to be shared across generations which not only includes life skills and physical skills, but also cognitive and coping strategies which can be used by all. The knowledge and skills related to cultural, spiritual and religious practices preserve cultural values and enable transmission to future generations.

Changing Realities

Along with the change in the structure of families, the institution of marriage as a whole is also undergoing changes. Studies from Morgan Stanley highlighted the broader changes in family formation, revealing that by 2030, nearly half of all women between 25 to 44 years of age would be single, without children (Das, 2025). The reason for the change is not whimsy, but rather structural changes including prioritisation of career, financial independence, changing gender norms, and the narrative economy. Women are now able to achieve economic autonomy, shifting the historical reliance on marriage for economic security. Furthermore, women and men in younger generations are reducing the importance placed on marriage as a forced importance, and are positioning it as an opportunity for seeking companionship. Additionally, social media discourse now poses relationships within the framework of gender wars rather than the previous representation of it as a sacred, meaningful bond between partners.

The familial structures and landscape in India is changing. This is not an abrupt cultural shift, or a whimsical change under the influence of global contexts, but rather a structural shift. As cohabitation and alternative relationships form, and as technology itself reshapes emotional intimacy, marriage as a whole is losing its structural role in Indian society. The future families are now becoming more autonomous and nuclear, but only time will tell if that means that we will also grow to be lonelier, more fragile, and unstable.

Authors: Muskan Shah, FLAME Alumna and Prof. Moitrayee Das, Faculty of Psychology, FLAME University.