Are couples becoming more equal?

• Impact of paid work - Oakley:

  most of the women in Oakley's research in 1970's were full-time housewives, but today many more go out to work.
• Impact of paid work - raises 2 questions:

  • is it leading to a more equal division of domestic tasks, with a 'new man' taking responsibility and doing an equal share of the housework and childcare? This is a march of progress view
  • or does it simply mean that women now have to carry a 'dual burden' of paid work as well as domestic work? This is a feminist view
• The march of progress view:

  recent sociologists take an optimistic view. Argue women going out to work is leading to a more equal division of labour at home. Men are becoming more involved in housework and childcare just as women are becoming more involved in work outside of the home.
• The march of progress view - Gershuny:

  women working full-time is leading to a more equal division of labour in the home. Women working full-time did less domestic chores than those who did not
• The march of progress view - Sullivan:

  Analysis of nationally representative data collected in 1975, 1987 and 1997 found a trend towards women doing a smaller share of domestic work and men doing more. Showed an increase in the number of couples with an equal division of labour and that men were participating more in traditional 'womens tasks'
• The march of progress view:

  These trends reflect changes in attitudes to the traditional division of labour. There was a fall in the number of people who think it's the man's job to earn money and the women's job to look after the home and family. 1984, 45% of men and 41% of women agreed with this view, by 2012 only 13% of men and 12% of women agreed.
• The feminist view:

  Women going into paid work has not led to greater equality in the division of domestic labour. Still little sign of the 'new man' who does an equal share of the housework and childcare, while women who now carry a dual burden.
• The feminist view - How much do men do?

  In 2012 men on average did 8 hours of housework a week, whereas women did 13 hours a week. Men spent 10 hours on care for family members, whereas women spent 23 hours. Women did 2x as much as men. 60% of women felt this division was unjust because they were doing more than their fair share.
• The feminist view - who does what?

  Couples divide housework along traditional lines. Women did laundry and shopping, while men did small repairs around the house.
• The feminist view - Allan:

  women's tasks, like washing and cleaning, are less intrinsically satisfying.
• Taking responsibility for children:

  only focus on the quantifiable aspects such as who performs which tasks or how much time they spend doing them. Tells us nothing about about who takes responsibility for ensuring the tasks are done
• Taking responsibility for children - Boulton:

  although fathers may help performing specific childcare tasks, it is usually the mother who takes responsibility for the child's security and well-being.
• Taking responsibility for children - support for Boulton's view:

  • Ferri and Smith: fathers took responsibility for childcare in fewer than 4% of families.
  • Dex and Ward: although fathers had high levels of involvement with their children, only 1% took the main responsibility when the child is sick.
  • Braun, Vincent and Ball: 3 out of 70 families the father was the main caregiver. Most were 'background fathers'. Most fathers held a 'provider ideology' that there was a breadwinner. Underpinned by ideas of 'intensive mothering' in the media telling women how to be good mothers.
• Emotion work and the triple shift - Hochschild:

  Women are often required to perform emotion work, where they are responsible for managing the emotions and feelings of family members, ensuring everyone is kept happy, and so on, while exercising control over their emotions.
• emotion work and the triple shift - Duncombe and Marsden:

  women have to perform a 'triple shift' of housework, paid work and emotion work.
• Taking responsibility for 'quality time' - Southerton:

  Mother's are responsible for organizing the family's quality time. Become more difficult in late modern society with recent social changes like the emergence of the 24/7 society and flexible working times. Led to peoples peoples time's becoming more fragmented and 'de-routinised'. Being 'pushed for time' in this way does not show up in the quantitative measures that time studies.
• Taking responsibility for 'quality time' - Southerton:

  Although some studies now shows that men and women have more or less equal amounts of leisure time, they have different experiences of it. Women are more likely to multi-task than men. Indicates women carry around a dual burden in which they face an increased volume of activities to be managed.
• Explaining the gender division of labour - Crompton and Lyonette:

  2 explanations for the unequal division of labour
• Crompton and Lyonette - Cultural/ideological explanation of inequality:

  The division of labour is determined by patriarchal norms and values that shape the gender roles in our culture. Women perform more domestic labour simply because it is what society expects them to do and socialised them to do.
• Crompton and Lyonette - Material/economic explanation of inequality:

  Women generally earn less than men means it is economically rational for women to do more of the housework and childcare while men spend more of their time earning money.
• Evidence for the cultural explanation:

  Equality was be achieved only when norms about gender roles change. Involve changes in men and women's attitudes, value and expectations, role models and socialisation.
• Evidence for the cultural explanation - Gershuny:

  Couples whose parents had a more equal relationship are more likely to share housework equally themselves. Suggests parental role models are important. Social values are gradually adapting to the fact that women are now working full-time, establishing a new norm that men should do more domestic work.
• Evidence for the cultural explanation - Man Yee Kan:

  Younger men do more domestic work. According to the Future Foundation, most men claimed to do more housework than their father and most women claimed to do less than their mother. Generational shift in behaviour is occuring.
• Evidence for the cultural explanation - British Social Attitudes survey:

  less than 10% of under-35s agreed with a traditional division of labour, against 30% of over-65s. Indicates a long-term change in norms, values and attitudes, reflecting changes in the gender role socialisation of younger age groups in favour of more equal relationships.
• Evidence for the cultural explanation - Dunne:

  Lesbian couples had more symmetrical relationships because of the absence of traditional heterosexual 'gender scripts', that is, norms that set out the different gender roles men and women are expected to play.
• Evidence for the material explanation:

  If women join the labour force and earn as much as their partner, we should expect to see men and women doing more equal amounts of domestic work.
• Evidence for the material explanation - Kan:

  Every £10,000 a year more a women earns, she does 2 hours less housework per week
• Evidence for the material explanation - Arber and Ginn:

  Better-paid, m/c women were more able to buy in commercially produced products and services, such as labour-saving devices, domestic help and childcare, rather than having to spend time carrying out labour-intensive domestic tasks themselves.
• Evidence for the material explanation - Ramos:

  Where the women is the full-time breadwinner and the man is unemployed, he does as much domestic labour as she does.
• Evidence for the material explanation - Sullivan:

  Working full-time rather than part-time makes the biggest difference in terms of how much domestic work each partner does. Suggests that this may be because working full-time brings women's earning much closer to those of their partner.
• Evidence for material explanation:

  Women continue to earn less than men: 7 out of 8 households, men earn more. Women are more likely to work part-time.
• Evidence of material explanation - Crompton:

  There is no immediate prospect of a more equal division of labour if this depends on economic equality between the sexes.