In the Grimms' first version of this story (before the children even had names - it was called "Brother and Sister"), the father and mother were both complicit in the abandonment of the children, and the "unnatural" mother had not yet been transformed into a stepmother.  The subsequent transformation from "mother" to "stepmother" reflects the brother's own psychological predilections – they were close siblings who revered their mother, felt abandoned by their father, and highly valued domestic security. The severing of the biological connection between children and mother and the father's unwillingness to sacrifice his children are later changes, as is the introduction of explicitly Christian elements (as when Gretel prays to God in the witch's house).  By the time the Grimms were finished, the story had become twice as long as it was in the first edition of their tales.
        Even in the final version, the mother is not introduced as a stepmother, but as the woodcutter's wife.  (But she is called a "stepmother" when the children overhear her.  The failure to press the point may reflect an effort to make as few changes as possible in the original story - although the extent of the other changes makes that seem unlikely - or simply inconsistency as the Grimms returned again and again to the tale.)  In common with other wicked women of fairy tales, she seeks to satisfy her own desires (to be the most beautiful, to eat the rampion, to promote her own children) over the interests of the children - the interests of humanity in preserving and continuing the species.  Here, in reference to Fischer's paradigm, is the social aspect of the story's preservation: to instill in community the valuing and protecting of children for their own sake, even at cost of personal desires.

         The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales notes several important motifs that appear in this story, including the wicked stepmother, the abandoned children, the trail of crumbs that is eaten, the edible house, and the tricking of the witch/ogre.  There is also a symbolic symmetry of children returning with pearls and gems in their pockets and apron - where the stones and the bread were carried on their journeys into the forest.

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