What is the sociological definition of a family?

Human infants are born with sensory capabilities, not innate reflexes

Question: What is the sociological definition of a family?
Position1 of 6›: Family is the setting for socializing children
Argument1 of 2›: Human infants are born with sensory capabilities, not innate reflexes

Humans are born without innate reflexes, indicating that parental guidance is far more important in human development than in the development and evolution of other species.

The argument

Without any instinctual reflexes, human infants rely on their parents to teach them how to do many of the basic tasks required for survival. Therefore, rather than being born with innate reflexes, humans are born with a wealth of sensory capabilities. This would suggest that the biological role of the family is to socialize children and that a child’s survival has depended more on its ability to learn from those around them, than the innate abilities they were born with.

Context

Unlike many animals in the animal kingdom, human infants are born with almost no innate reflexes.

Premises

[P1]Human infants are born without the instinctual reflexes needed to survive and instead possess a wealth of sensory capabilities for learning. [P2] They therefore depend on their parents to teach them the basic tasks of survival, so a child's survival rests more on its ability to learn from those around it than on innate abilities. [C] Because children survive by being taught, the biological role of the family is to socialize children — family is the setting for socializing children.

Counter-arguments

This argument confuses biological development with sociological constructs. Human infants' capacity for learning and lack of innate reflexes indicates that guidance and education are important in our cognitive and behavioural development, but it does not mean that our parents have to provide that education, or even that the family unit has to. The expression "it takes a village to raise a child" reflects the reality that often it is not the family unit that provides their education and guidance, but their community.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P3] This guidance does not have to come from parents or even from within a "family".