Household Division of Labor

The following discussion of gender beliefs and the household
division of labor began with a request for sources but went on to
consider research assumptions and methods as well.  It appeared on
WMST-L in September 2002.  For additional WMST-L files now available
on the Web, see the WMST-L File Collection.

I came across a reference in Naomi Wolf's _Misconceptions_ to a
study showing that men who believed in gender equality did only
minutes more housework/childcare than men who did not. Her source
was a marriage guidance manual, and I'm wondering if anyone can
offer another source for similar statistics. (Or, alternatively, a
source which shows such claims to be wrong.)

Many thanks,

Jenny

Dr Jennifer M Saul
Director of Graduate Studies
Department of Philosophy
University of Sheffield
Sheffield, UK S10 2TN
[44]-(0)114-222-0578
j.saul  AT  sheffield.ac.uk 

A good review of past surveys of time use, and of sociologists'
interpretations of them is be found in Shelley Coverman, "Explaining
Husbands' Participation in Domestic Labor", Sociological Quarterly,
Spring 1985.Vol 26:81-97.. Most researchers have found little on no
positive effect for egalitarian attitudes. Coverman herself finds
that men with more egalitarian attitudes appear to do less when
other influences on their housework contribution are accounted for.
See also Joseph H. Pleck, "Husbands' Paid Work and Family Roles:
Current Research Issues", Research in the Interweave of Social
Roles: Jobs and Families, Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, Inc., 1983) Vol.
3, pp. 251-333.)

******************
Barbara R. Bergmann bbergman  AT  wam.umd.edu
Professor Emerita of Economics,
American University and University of Maryland
Tel 202-537-3036 Fax 202 686-3456
Mail to: 5430 41 Place NW, DC 20015
*******************

Another interesting book on this is: Thinking about the Baby: Gender
and Transitions into Parenthood by Susan Walzer Temple University
Press

Many new mothers and fathers are surprised at how they change as
individuals and as couples after a baby is born. Susan Walzer's
interviews explore the tendency for men and women to experience
their transitions into parenthood in different ways-a pattern that
has been linked to marital stress.

How do new mothers and fathers think about babies, and what is the
influence of parental consciousness in reproducing motherhood and
fatherhood as different experiences? The reports of new parents in
this book illustrate the power of gendered cultural imagery in how
women and men think about their roles and negotiate their parenting
arrangements.

New parents talk about what it means to them to be a "good" mother
or father and how this plays out in their working arrangements and
their everyday interactions over child care. The author carefully
unravels the effects of social norms, personal relationships, and
social institutions in channeling parents toward
gender-differentiated approaches to parenting.

********************************************************
Heather Laube, M.A.
Doctoral Candidate Department of Sociology
University at Albany hlaube  AT  nycap.rr.com

"Silence has never brought us anything of worth." Audre Lorde 

Sociologist Susan Maushart has written a study titled _Wifework_
where she cites stats about this and other aspects of masculine
optings-out from home maintenance.

--
Max Dashu <maxdashu  AT  LMI.net>
<http://www.suppressedhistories.net>
Global Women's Studies

Look at "Second Shift" by Arlie Hochschild, who describes several
two-income couples and concludes that those who espouse the best
feminist line (the upper-income couples) were LESS likely to really
share the chores than those who espoused traditional views
(working-class couples) but who couldn't afford to buy the labor of
another woman to do the household work.

Cynthia Harrison

Only recently, I came across an excellent review of the division of
household labor literature which includes a discussion of its
relationship to gender ideology. Not only do the authors offer an
overview of the findings, but they suggest WHY we might observe the
patterns that we do; not surprisingly, methodology and measurement
of division of housework and attitudes appear to be very important
factors.

Shelton, B.A., & John, D. (1996). The division of household labor.
Annual Review of Sociology, 22, 299-322.

Good luck, Chandra

Chandra Mason, M.A.
Social-Personality Psychology Doctoral Program
The Graduate School and University Center
The City University of New York

I've NEVER seen an article (or book) that looks at the association
between attitudes about gender equality and actual
housework/childcare behavior. The "Second Shift" was interesting and
provided valuable insights almost 15 years ago, but it was based on
a tiny qualitative study of middle- and upper-middle class couples
and can't be generalized to ANY population--including middle- and
upper-middle class couples.

You might look at Robinson and Godbey's "Time for Life..." (1999).
The authors point out that men's housework hours have increased from
about 5 hours in 1965 to about 9 hours in 1995--but primarily
because women's housework hours declined during the same period.

In addition, S. Gupta ("The Effects of Transitions in Marital Status
on Men's Performance of Housework," Journal of Marriage and the
Family, 61, August, 700-711) shows that when women get married,
their housework increases by more than three times as much as that
of men who get married.

In a qualitative study of 23 middle- and upper-middle class couples,
Karen Blaisure and Katherine Allen (Journal of Marriage and the
Family, Feb 1995) found that "feminist" husbands weren't very
egalitarian in participating in all domestic spheres despite their
ideology.

None of these studies look at the RELATIONSHIP between attitudes and
behavior--and not in terms of a random sample that can be
generalized to a larger population. Nonetheless, they offer data
that might be helpful in your analysis--especially in contrast to a
marriage guidance manual that may or may not cite data outside of a
handful of clinical case studies.

niki
**************************************************************************** *************
Nijole (Niki) Benokraitis,
Professor of Sociology
University of Baltimore,
1420 N. Charles St.,
Baltimore, MD 21201
Fax: 410-837-6051; Voicemail: 410-837-5294,
nbenokraitis  AT  ubmail.ubalt.edu
**************************************************************************** *************

--- Heather Laube <hlaube  AT  NYCAP.RR.COM> wrote:
> Another interesting book on this is:
> Thinking about the Baby: Gender and Transitions into Parenthood
> by Susan Walzer
> Temple University Press

This is another great source for my intimate relationships and
gender roles course. Intimacy includes more than the relationship
between two adults--it also is the relationship between children and
parents, adult children and their parents, etc. how does one do
intimacy? Thanks Susan, for this contribution!

I am writing regarding the thread on household division of labor
(reported behaviors and attitudes). However, my comments apply to
other research questions, as well. Note that my vehemance is not
directed to any of the posters to this thread, but about a related
problem

IF we believe that social life is dynamic, THEN we need to identify
evidence (more than ritualistically, via footnoting date of
publication) in the historical moment(s) during which it was
collected. In textbooks particularly, but often in other sites as
well, the results of a study that is OLD are narrated in the present
tense.

What OLD means depends on rates of social change - so, for example,
if it has to do with household arrangements for people receiving
"welfare" anything before the welfare "reform" could be considered
old, because of the profound changes in the non-household
obligations of recipients. I WOULD ARGUE that we could take
(arbitrarily, i admit) ten years as a cut off. And a study published
in 95, for example, may well be based on data collected in 92 or
earlier. NOTE WELL: i am not arguing against our making use of
research done in the past, merely stating that we must recognize it
as such, and problematize its generalization to the present.

Houehold arrangements negotiated by people in their 20s at this
moment in time are being negotiated by people who have been exposed
to different media representations and parental household
arrangements than the household arrangements negotiated by folks now
in their 40s and 50s.

Look carefully, also, at HOW we make comparisons across time - are
we comparing the absolute number of hours worked, or those hours as
a percentage of all hours worked toward household tasks by everyone
living in the household. As another poster pointed out (several good
postings, i forget which one - Barbara B, or Niki B possibly?) men's
absolute hours have increased slightly. Their PERCENTAGE has
increased more, because women's have declined.

Some of those reading this posting may be sighing or otherwise
thinking that my suggestion that things have changes is naive. I
actually am not arguing that things have changed in the gender
division of household labor. i am arguing that social scientists
should not presume that they HAVEN'T changed, and instead should be
very careful when using published reports to place them in the
historical moment during which they were created.

An aside, which may be of interest, and is meant to illustrate
rather than complete nail down the complexity of this subject: i
THINK the data suggest that the decline in women's hours of
housework reflects that more women are working more hours outside
the home, which has always predicted to a much lower number of hours
inside the home. This latter, of course, is to some extent a
reflection that the highest number of absolute hours is in families
with very young children, which are likely to be households where a
parent (almost always read mother) is not employed outside the home.
so it isn't the mother's nonemployment that leads her to do so much
work, but the presence of infants/toddlers that leads her to have
more hours of housework and has kept her from staying in or
re/entering the labor force.

Thanks to all for patience with this. This is a hot-button issue for
me as a teacher. I find when students read generalizations in the
present tense in a textbook copyright 2000 about (for example) the
social organization of the workplace in the 1970s, they become
dismissive of the generalizations in the text more broadly.

Blame my posting on Joan K. I believe she has created a cybersite
where a posting can actually be part of intellectual discourse that
has a potential impact on the participants. (at least it's allowed me
to vent!) I look forward to replies, private or public (if
appropriate)

laura kramer kramerl  AT  mail.montclair.edu 

Jacqueline Goodnow & Jennifer Bowes have written MEN, WOMEN and
HOUSEHOLD WORK (Oxford U Press, 1994) which relates gender
stereotypes about work to housework patterns.

Harriet

Harriet Hartman, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Sociology
Rowan University
201 Mullica Hill Road
Glassboro, NJ 08028
(856) 256-4500 x3787 Fax (856) 256-4918
hartman  AT  rowan.edu 

Excellent message, Laura -- When I was teaching I asked the students
in WS, Soc of Gender and Family classes to do a household division
of labor analysis of their own households, using an easy to handle
and not too lengthy check list. It wasn't sophisticated, but it sure
showed that the gender patterns were still prevalent. In one class
they had all insisted they were egalitarian in doing housework. It
was a fairly large class so I had numbers to work with. I was
surprised myself at the gender patterns. The next time the class
met, I didn't say anything about the findings, I just put them on
the board. The class began giggling, then laughed themselves at how
inegalitarian their own households were. I could never have
convinced them with textbook statistics. Judith

the invisibility of household work is one of the reasons that it has
always been difficult to discuss unless students (or other people)
do time budget studies, as were done in early "home economics"
studies of this topic.

judith's point is very important = getting specific rather than
general assertions of household arrangements is much more accurate.
students' own reports are compelling to them, too.

sometimes, though, our students are not a representative group of
our society- sometimes the text book is more accurate - or the web
site or the newspaper or journal article. That raises another
important pedagogical challenge. one way i start a discussion where
this arises is to ask students what kind of evidence they could
imagine that would make them change their mind (a query i got from
barbara chasin almost thirty years ago, and it still works).

I would love to see the checklist you [Judith Lorber] gave your
students if you'd be
willing to post it. I've been doing this more amorphously (as in,
'let's go around the room and each say' or 'write a description of')
but a list would obviously be better.

thanks, a very helpful thread ... --Meryl

At 11:38 AM 9/22/2002 -0400, Laura Kramer wrote:
>I am writing regarding the thread on household division of labor
>(reported behaviors and attitudes). However, my comments apply to other
>research questions, as well. Note that my vehemance is not directed to
>any of the posters to this thread, but about a related problem

>IF we believe that social life is dynamic, THEN we need to identify
>evidence (more than ritualistically, via footnoting date of publication)
>in the historical moment(s) during which it was collected. In textbooks
>particularly, but often in other sites as well, the results of a study
>that is OLD are narrated in the present tense.

...

Hi Laura,

This is such good advice! When I first read Arlie Hochschild's *The
Second Shift* a few years ago, I wasn't really thinking about
questions concerning the age of the data. (To tell the truth, I
wasn't really thinking about when the book was published.) Because
the conclusions "felt right" to me, I was uncritical in my
acceptance of them--and, worse, in my assumption that Hochschild's
book had proven them. I learned later, and a bit painfully, that
though Hochschild's book was published in 1989 (which wasn't ancient
when I read it), she was relying on data collected by a man names
Alexander Szalai in the mid 1960s. Those data are way too old to be
reliable about today's situation. There has, I think been enormous
change in work/home/family time mix since then. For one thing, many
more married women are not only working full time, but have
professional careers than did in the 1960s.

I guess there are other problems with *The Second Shift*, too.
Apparently Hochschild considered only housework and child care done
on weekdays--not including weekends and there are controversies over
what is to count as 'housework'. (Does yardwork count? Is mowing the
lawn as much a part of housework as vacuuming the carpet? How about
repairs? Is replacing the mechanism in the toilet housework like
cleaning the toilet? What about work on automobiles? Should changing
the oil and replacing the brakes count like emptying and reloading
the dishwasher?) But Laura's concern was with the date of the data.
And that's something we all need to be careful about.

I'm going to pass along a research reference I was given when I
learned that Hochschild's data (in *The Second Shift*) was very
dated. I haven't had a chance to read this article yet, but it is on
my list of things to read on this topic:

B. A. McBride and G. Mills, "A Comparison of Mother and Father
Involvement with Their Preschool-Age Children," *Early Childhood
Research Quarterly* 8 (1993), 457-477. (The article was published in
the early 90s and, so, subject to the Laura's warning about assuming
the results still apply. But the data, apparently, were compiled
much later than the data used for Hochschild's research in *The
Second Shift* and they suggest that even by the 80s, much had
changed.)

Yours,

Claire

Greetings:

My article, From Gender Vertigo to Gender Peace, summarizes research
by Pepper Schwartz, Scott Coltrane, Babara Risman, Francine Deutsch,
and Peggy Papp on housework and egalitarian-leaning marriages:

http://web2.airmail.net/ktrig246/out_of_cave/vertigo.html

It also contains perceptive comments by the authors of "The
Invisible Web" on the tendency of marriage counselors to unfairly
ridicule women who try to teach their husbands to competently manage
the household and take care of the children.

John Gottman, in "What Makes Marriages Succeed and Fail" and "The
Seven Principles of Successful Marriages," mentioned that "studies
have shown that feminist husbands don't do more housework than men
with macho attitudes." However, he never gave any citations.

Kathleen Trigiani ktrig246  AT  airmail.net

DOMESTIC DIVISION OF LABOR PROJECT

Judith Lorber

This is the project that I used with Brooklyn College, CUNY,
undergraduates, most of whom live at home with their parents or in
their own households as married or cohabiting adults. If your
students live in dorms, ask them to base their project on their
family households. It would make an interesting project for
shared-student households, especially if they were mixed-gender. It
would be illuminating to compare mixed-gender with single-gender
households, because then the students would see the effects of
gender overriding ability and willingness to do different kinds of
household labor.

ANALYSIS OF THE DIVISION OF LABOR IN A HOUSEHOLD

YOU MAY USE YOUR OWN HOUSEHOLD OR THAT OF SOMEONE YOU KNOW WELL. IF
YOU LIVE ALONE OR WITH NO OTHER PEOPLE WHO SHARE THE HOUSEWORK AND
CHILD CARE, PLEASE BASE THIS ASSIGNMENT ON A HOUSEHOLD THAT DOES. IF
THE HOUSEHOLD DOES NOT INCLUDE SMALL CHILDREN, OMIT THAT QUESTION.

1. Describe the members of your household -- gender, race-ethnicity,
social class, age.

2. What percentage of each person's time is spent on paid work?

3. What percentage of the household income is contributed by each
person who does paid work?

4. Who pays the bills? Who decides how the household's surplus or
discretionary income is spent?

5. Who does most of the following jobs? (If shared, about how many
times per week does each person do the job)?

child care -- feeding, bathing, dressing, putting to sleep, playing
with, taking to school or daycare

meal preparation, food shopping, washing dishes

personal laundry (clothing), household laundry (sheets, towels)

bedmaking

vacuuming/dusting

cleaning kitchen/bathroom

taking out garbage

mowing lawn, other yard work

car maintenance, getting gas

pet care, feeding

6. How were these chores allocated? By whom? Do they rotate?

Are there arguments about who does what? How are these resolved?

7. What is the relationship between the time spent in paid work and
the time spent in housework and the amount of income each person
brings into the household?

8. What is the "economy of gratitude" in this household? (This is
from Arlie Hochschild, The Second Shift. It refers to what is taken
for granted as the job that goes with the role as wife, husband,
mother, father, son, daughter, and what is extra, a "gift." She
says, "When couples struggle, it is seldom simply over who does
what. Far more often, it is over the giving and receiving of
gratitude." P. 18)

*******************************************************************
Judith Lorber, Ph.D.
319 East 24 Street, Apt. 27E
New York, NY 10010
PH/FAX 212-689-2155
Email judith.lorber  AT  verizon.net
******************************************************************* 

On Mon, 23 Sep 2002 07:06:54 -0700 Claire Hughes <hughescb  AT  HOTMAIL.COM>
wrote:

> (Does yardwork count?  Is mowing the lawn as much a part of housework
> as vacuuming the carpet?  How about repairs? Is replacing the
> mechanism in the toilet housework like cleaning the toilet?  What
> about work on automobiles?  Should changing the oil and replacing the
> brakes count like emptying and reloading the dishwasher?)
>

Hochschild does address questions like these in the book.  She says
that men are more likely to be in charge of the traditionally masculine
household jobs, such as changing the oil in the car.  But she notes,
importantly, that these are jobs that can be performed when the person
doing them is ready.  The day and time one mows the lawn, for example,
are rather flexible. Many of women's household jobs, by contrast, are
more time-bound: dinner has to be on the table at a certain time;
laundry has to be done routinely if household members are to dress;
failing to empty or load the dishwasher (if one has a dishwasher) on
time means that dirty dishes pile up or the family will run out of
clean dishes and cookware. Yes, what counts as housework is important,
but there is a qualitative difference between men's traditional
housework and women's.

For a funny but serious discussion, see Pat Mainardi's "The Politics of
Housework," a second-wave classic.

Cheers,
Maria
--

Maria Bevacqua, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Women's Studies
Minnesota State University
Mankato, Minn.  56001
ph (507) 389-5024
fax (507) 389-6377
maria.bevacqua  AT  mnsu.edu

>>  (Does yardwork count?  Is mowing the lawn as much a part of housework
>>  as vacuuming the carpet?  How about repairs? Is replacing the
>>  mechanism in the toilet housework like cleaning the toilet?  What
>>  about work on automobiles?  Should changing the oil and replacing the
>>  brakes count like emptying and reloading the dishwasher?)

No, because one group of tasks is done infrequently and the other,
for the most part, daily or several times a day. The invisibility of
this difference never ceases to astound me.
--
Max Dashu   <maxdashu  AT  LMI.net>
<http://www.suppressedhistories.net>
Global Women's Studies

Household maintenance seems not to appear on Lorber's outline:
repairs, electrical work, appliance maintenance, etc. I know one
feminist (former head of women's studies, in fact), who said: "My
mother didn't raise me to do basements!"
D.

---------------------------------
daphne.patai  AT  spanport.umass.edu

At 10:11 AM 9/23/2002 -0700, Max Dashu wrote:

>No, because one group of tasks is done infrequently and the other,
>for the most part, daily or several times a day. The invisibility of
>this difference never ceases to astound me.


Hi Max,

  I can certainly see why cleaning the gutters, changing the oil, or fixing
the toilet shouldn't count for any more hours than are involved in actually
doing the work.  I mean, you don't figure that spending an hour changing the
oil in a car every six months is equal to spending an hour cooking every
day.  (Though, I guess I vacuum the livingroom about as much as I mow the
lawn - less often in the summer but more often in the winter.  And I
actually feel as if I have more say about what day and time I vacuum the
livingroom than mow the lawn.  The lawn gets too long to mow easily if I let
it go even a few days too long.  And I can't do it at night or when it's
raining, so I'm constrained on when I do that.)  So, I wasn't suggesting
that this sort of equivalence should be set up.

  What I was asking is whether doing these sorts of jobs counted as
housework.  It seems to me that they should.  If the toilet is broken, I
have to fix it pretty much when it gets broken.  (This isn't the sort of
thing I can do whenever I please.  If I could, I would never do it - because
I certainly never "please" to fix the toilet.) It feels like work to me, and
work that is necessary to keep the house running - not to mention the
sewage.

  Given that, I don't understand your flat answer of "No" to my question and
I don't see how the frequency of repetition of a job bears on whether it is
housework.  I don't repaint rooms in my house frequently, but I'd be pretty
irritated if this weren't considered work.  I assure you it isn't fun.

  In light of my clarification of my questions, is there still some
distinction to which you think I'm being blind.

Cheers,

Claire

I second Laurie Kramer's post on contextualizing research findings and
suggest that it is probably applicable also to the thread on teaching
evaluations.  I reviewed the literature for a piece I am writing
concerning lessons to be learned from some difficult teaching experiences.
My own interpretation is that gender often affects evaluations but does so
in combination with a large number of other factors (surprise!), including
the culture of the institution, so that teasing out the gender effects
can be complicated.


*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*
Debbie Maranville,  Associate Professor
Director, Unemployment Law Clinic
U. of Washington, School of Law
4045 Brooklyn Ave N.E.    Box 354563     Seattle, WA  98105
PH  (206) 543-3434              FAX  (206) 685-2388

Internet:  <maran  AT  u.washington.edu>
*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=**=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*

Hi Claire and list,

I didn't mean that the assigned "male" tasks should not count at all,
because I agree they are part of home maintenance, but that they
don't count _in the same way_, which is what I understood from your
wording:

>  Should changing the oil and replacing the
>  brakes count like emptying and reloading the dishwasher?)

because many people do think that the (less frequently-performed)
"male" tasks are an equal contribution, disregarding the daily and
repetitive tasks that women perform in great disproportion to male
household labor. My point was that these are certainly not equivalent
investments of time and labor, as is often implied.

>  I can certainly see why cleaning the gutters, changing the oil, or fixing
>the toilet shouldn't count for any more hours than are involved in actually
>doing the work.  I mean, you don't figure that spending an hour changing the
>oil in a car every six months is equal to spending an hour cooking every
>day.

A lot of people do, or at least they manage to ignore the inequities.
The recent discussion about student's opinions about work-sharing
seems to indicate it's quite common.

To quote my mother on an analogous situation, "girls work in the
kitchen and boys take out the garbage." The fact that food prep and
dishwashing took over an hour and it took less than 20 seconds to
carry out the garbage was just too bad; that was the assigned
division of labor. Mowing the lawn and vacuuming are more analogous,
I agree, although in our house with five kids, there was still more
vacuuming than mowing, and that didn't count mopping floors, laundry,
ironing, bathroom-cleaning,  and a host of other tasks. The bottom
line is that females work longer hours even when you count
oil-changing and gutters.

all best,

--
Max Dashu   <maxdashu  AT  LMI.net>
<http://www.suppressedhistories.net>
Global Women's Studies