In rural areas of Afghanistan, traditional life centered on the kala, a walled compound within which lived the landowner and his extended family – parents, wife (or wives since Islam allows men up to four wives, though most male Afghans cannot afford more than one), young children, grown sons and their families, and unmarried female relatives. Wealthier families had facilities for guests in their kalas, and were equipped to shelter and entertain anyone who came by. Travelers were welcomed for the news they brought and the opportunity for fresh conversation.

Even in the cities, to a certain extent, people live in extended family units. The women of the households form a single work group and care for and discipline the children. The senior active male member, typically the grandfather, controls all expenditures, and the grandmother oversees all domestic work assignments.

Adults work very hard but also do extensive visiting or entertaining during weekends and sometimes on weekday nights as well. Women with small children may remain at home, and they are also very busy with household responsibilities and entertaining relatives and friends. Hospitality, one of the most important Afghan values, requires elaborate food preparation and a very clean house.

An Afghan's family is sacrosanct and a matter of great privacy. It is considered a breach of manners among liberal Afghans, and an act requiring revenge among conservatives, for a man to express interest of any sort in another man's female relatives. It is this cultural sense of privacy that probably was reinterpreted by the Taliban into an insistence that women be covered from head to foot when in public: A woman belongs to her family and should not be available, in any sense, to outsiders.

In the United States, family life is still the core of Afghan culture and psychological well-being, even though Afghan culture in the United States is in transition, with families ranging from traditional to cosmopolitan, based on their background and personal choice. Afghans tend to socialize almost exclusively with extended family members, and this intense family focus can cause culture conflict in the United States. Extended family obligations, especially to parents and older siblings, often supersede other responsibilities, including allegiance to one's spouse, one's job, and certainly to one's own needs.

Afghan traditional views on what constitutes proper family relationships are often at odds with American values and can lead to difficulties with the legal and social service systems. For example, polygyny is commonplace in Afghanistan, as long as the husband is able to support each wife equally. Polygamy is a crime in the United States, and U.S. INS restrictions, which recognize American mainstream cultural values, have caused the disruption of Afghan families.

In most Afghan American families, traditional role relationships have been disturbed. Although traditional Islamic cultures view the woman's proper place as in the home, many Afghan women must work outside the home to contribute to the family income. Afghan women have adapted to the United States better than have men, who have had difficulty finding a middle road between a traditional and an American lifestyle. Husbands whose wives earn salaries and have economic freedom suffer a loss of paternal leadership as the family’s sole breadwinner. The traditional husband’s power and role as head of the family is further damaged when children learn English more quickly than the parents do and become their parents’ translators and spokespersons.

While Afghan communities in the United States have made tremendous concessions to Western life, there is often tension in families as the children bring their school-learned American sensibilities into homes with traditional Afghan values. Schools teach children independence and assertiveness, which contradict cultural values of family interdependence and strict obedience to elder family members, particularly to the father's authority. Families are concerned that children will pick up immodest behavior from their non-Muslim classmates, as well as from school itself, as in sex education, being served pork, and teen drinking. However, because young Afghan Americans must walk a very narrow line, most of them learn to do so with grace and are a great credit to their families. Even young people who appear to be completely American in their speech and activities still maintain an Islamic outlook.

Children are expected to work hard in school and to come home after school to do homework; strict parents do not allow their children to engage in after-school activities. Some children and teens resort to truancy to spend time with their friends when parents do not allow them to go out with friends or visit them at their homes. Boys, however, have much more freedom than girls do. Teenage boys commonly rebel against their parents up until high school when they begin to assume young adult responsibilities.

Dating is a perpetual issue in Afghan families, and current American sexual mores (that permit, for example, unmarried couples to live together) are a source of dismay. In Afghanistan, families arrange marriages, although there is a great deal of variation in how much input the principals are allowed to have. In rural areas, the groom frequently does not see the bride until the two are engaged or even until they are married. In the United States, most young adults meet each other through school or work. Some secretly date to get to know each other before deciding to get married. They normally become engaged, however, only after the parents have approved of the match. Some wait to marry until they have finished college, but most marry by their early 20s. Divorce is rare but becoming more common with acculturation.

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