Do flexible hours and working from home allow parents to more equally share childcare tasks?
Do flexible hours and working from home allow parents to more equally share childcare tasks?
Objective: this study examines how the gendered division of childcare tasks varies by the specific type of childcare task; parental employment status; and flexible work arrangements.
Background: childcare encompasses a range of diverse tasks, yet is persistently gendered, with women doing more than men. Flexible working (i.e. working from home and flexible hours) has generally been found to exacerbate childcare inequalities among working couples, but less is known about how flexible working intersects with the tasks of childcare that directly interfere with the workday.
Method: The study used the UK Generations and Gender Survey (2022-23), a nationally representative dataset with detailed data on the division of individual childcare tasks and the working arrangements of respondents and their partners, focusing on heterosexual couples with children under the age of 12 (n=1,152). We used logistic regression to analyze the gender division of specific childcare tasks and associations with work patterns.
Results: childcare tasks that interfere with the workday are particularly gendered (i.e. staying home with ill children, getting children dressed, dropping children off at school or childcare). Fathers working from home or having access to flexible hours was associated with a higher likelihood of equally sharing these tasks; the same relationship was not found for mothers.
Conclusion: Fathers’ use of flexible working may help to address one persistent form of gender inequality.
Centre for Population Change
Kuang, Bernice
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Perelli-Harris, Brienna
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Berrington, Ann
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31 October 2024
Kuang, Bernice
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Perelli-Harris, Brienna
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Berrington, Ann
bd0fc093-310d-4236-8126-ca0c7eb9ddde
Kuang, Bernice, Perelli-Harris, Brienna and Berrington, Ann
(2024)
Do flexible hours and working from home allow parents to more equally share childcare tasks?
(ESRC Centre for Population Change and Connecting Generations Working Paper Series, 107)
Centre for Population Change
52pp.
Record type:
Monograph
(Working Paper)
Abstract
Objective: this study examines how the gendered division of childcare tasks varies by the specific type of childcare task; parental employment status; and flexible work arrangements.
Background: childcare encompasses a range of diverse tasks, yet is persistently gendered, with women doing more than men. Flexible working (i.e. working from home and flexible hours) has generally been found to exacerbate childcare inequalities among working couples, but less is known about how flexible working intersects with the tasks of childcare that directly interfere with the workday.
Method: The study used the UK Generations and Gender Survey (2022-23), a nationally representative dataset with detailed data on the division of individual childcare tasks and the working arrangements of respondents and their partners, focusing on heterosexual couples with children under the age of 12 (n=1,152). We used logistic regression to analyze the gender division of specific childcare tasks and associations with work patterns.
Results: childcare tasks that interfere with the workday are particularly gendered (i.e. staying home with ill children, getting children dressed, dropping children off at school or childcare). Fathers working from home or having access to flexible hours was associated with a higher likelihood of equally sharing these tasks; the same relationship was not found for mothers.
Conclusion: Fathers’ use of flexible working may help to address one persistent form of gender inequality.
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Published date: 31 October 2024
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Local EPrints ID: 495996
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/495996
PURE UUID: a21308c2-a4b3-452d-8cab-0f49ce7e0a8c
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Date deposited: 29 Nov 2024 16:02
Last modified: 12 Feb 2025 03:01
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Author:
Bernice Kuang
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