Are couples becoming more equal?

Question 1

How do some sociologists support a march of progress view in regards to the family?

Answer 1

• More women going out to work is leading to a more equal division of labour at home
• Gershuny (1994): using time studies, women who worked did less domestic work than other women
• Sullivan (2000): analysed data collected in 1975, 1987 and 1997- she found a trend of women doing a smaller share of the domestic work and men doing more
• These trends also reflect the changes in attitudes to the traditional division of labour- BSA (2013): there was a fall in the number of people who think it’s the man’s job to earn money and the woman’s job to be a wife
• 1984 vs 2012: 45% of men and 41% of women agreed, compared to only 13% of men and 12% of women in 2012

Question 2

What is the feminist point of view?

Answer 2

• Using data from BSA (2013):
• Men on average did 8 hours of housework a week, whereas women did 13 hours
• Men spent 10 hours on care for family members, whereas women spent 23
• Women were much more likely to do the laundry, care for sick family members, do grocery shopping… whereas men were more likely to do small repairs

Question 3

What studies support Boulton’s view that although fathers may help by performing specific tasks, it’s ususally the mother who takes responsibility for the wellbeing of the child?

Answer 3

1. Ferri and Smith (1996): fathers took responsibility for childcare in fewer than 4% of families
2. Dex and Ward (2007): although fathers had quite high levels of involvement with the children, when it came to illness, only 1% of fathers took the main responsibility
3. Braun, Vincent and Ball (2011): in only 3 families out of 70 was the father the main carer. Most were ‘background fathers’: helping with childcare was more about their relationship with their partner. Most fathers had a ‘provider ideology’ that their role was a breadwinner and women felt that their role was the primary carer

Question 4

What do the terms ‘emotion work’ and the ‘triple shift’ mean?

Answer 4

• Hochschild’s term: emotion work
• Where women are responsible for managing the emotions and feelings of family members, while at the same time exercising control over their own emotions
• Duncombe and Marsden (1995): the triple shift is where women must perform housework, paid work and emotion work

Question 5

What does Southerton (2011) argue about the organisation of leisure/quality time?

Answer 5

• That the responsibility usually falls on mothers
• Due to today’s late modern society, with recent changes such as the emergence of the 24/7 society and flexible working patterns, organising this time has become more difficult
• Although men and women have similar amounts of leisure time, men are more likely to experience consolidated ‘blocks’ of uninterrupted leisure time, whereas women’s leisure is often punctuated by child care

Question 6

What 2 different explanations for the unequal division of labour are given by Crompton and Lyonette (2008)?

Answer 6

1. The cultural or 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 that is what society expects them to do and has socialised them to do
2. The material or economic explanation of inequality
   - The fact that 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

Question 7

What is the evidence for the cultural/ideological explanation of inequality?

Answer 7

• From this perspective, equality will be achieved only when norms about gender roles change
• Gershuny (1994): couples whose parents had a more equal relationship are more likely to share housework equally themselves, which suggests that parental role models are important
• Man Yee Khan (2001): younger men do more domestic work
• Future Foundation (2000): most men claimed to do more housework than their father and most women claimed to do less than their mother
• BSA (2013): less than 10% of under 35’s agreed with a traditional division of labour, as against 30% of the over 65’s
• Dunne (1999): lesbian couples had more symmetrical relationships because of the absence of traditional heterosexual ‘gender scripts’

Question 8

What is the evidence for the material/economic explanation of inequality?

Answer 8

• From this perspective, if women join the labour force and earn as much as their partners, the division of domestic labour will be much more equal
• Kan: for every £10,000 a year a woman earns, she does 2 hours less housework per week
• Arber and Ginn (1995): better paid women, m/c women were more able to buy products and services, such as ready meals, labour-saving devices…
• Ramos (2003): where the woman is the full-time breadwinner and the man is unemployed, he does as much domestic labour as she does
• HOWEVER: women continue to earn less than men- in 7/8 households, men earn more. This is partly due to women being more likely to work part time