Linda Mckee and Colin Bell (1986) explored the effects of male unemployment on families. They found a strong resistance on the part of many of their respondents - both male and female - to the notion of a woman as the main 'breadwinner'. The men in the study did not feel obliged to undertake housework to any appreciable degree. In fact, this was an attitude that the women themselves reinforced, for fear that their husband's 'masculine identity' - already undermined by the stigma of unemployment - would be further challenged by enhanced domestic responsibilities.
