Article Abstract 2

Family environment can be described as the collective physical, emotional and social conditions within a household. It encompasses the relationship, interactions and dynamics among family members that significantly shape an individual’s personality, cognitive growth and behavioral aspects. Different components of family environment include family type, SES level, attitude of male and female members and so on. Decision making power is the ultimate driving force behind personal, professional and collective success. It is the cognitive process of selecting a path of action from multiple alternatives. Decision making power is a core of women empowerment. It is the ability to influence choices, affecting one’s life from household finance to public policy. When women are integrated into decision making process it leads to tangible positive transformations. In the present study an attempt is made to collect response from 50 working and 50 home maker women in West Bengal from various family patterns on their power of decision making. A detailed tool was prepared with the selected items from Family Environment scale. It has been found that a majority of working women show higher and more favorable family environment score compared to non-working women. Further majority of working women display higher decision making power than their counter part (non-working women).
Keywords: Educated non-working & Working Women, Decision making power, Family environment