From 2002 to 2005, UCLA researchers videotaped 32 dual-income, multiple-child, middle-class American families for a week. They also noted the family members’ locations in the house and measured their stress levels with routine saliva tests.
The research team, which represented a range of disciplines, spent the next five years pouring over the resulting 1,540 hours of video, coding and categorizing the amount of time parents spend on different activities, including childcare, cleaning and housework, children’s homework, meal preparation, and leisure activities. They hoped to understand dual-income earning families better at the end of it, since their number is on the rise – from 36% in 1975 to 46% today.
Here are some of their findings:
- Mothers usually returned home from work first.
- Mothers spent 27% of their time on housework; fathers spent 18%; children spent 3 %.
- Mothers spent 35% of their time one-on-one with their kids; fathers spent 25%
- Mothers were more likely to watch TV during their one-on-one time with the kids; fathers were more likely to play in the backyard.
- Mothers spent 19% of their time talking to family members or on the phone and 11% occupied in leisure activities.
- Fathers spent 20% of their time talking to family members or on the phone and 23% occupied in leisure activities.
- Husbands and wives were together alone in the house about 10% of the time.
- The entire family gathered in one room about 14% of the time.
- Families spent very little time in their backyards.
- Mothers’ stress levels plummeted when talking to their husbands at the end of the day; fathers’ stress levels tapered much more slowly.
In a New York Times article about the study, Benedict Carey writes:
After more than $9 million and untold thousands of hours of video watching, they have found that, well, life in these trenches is exactly what it looks like: a fire shower of stress, multitasking and mutual nitpicking.
Carey quoted one of the researchers, post-doctoral fellow Anthony Graesch, as saying that the study was “The purest form of birth control ever devised. Ever.” (Graesch has two children.)
I found the study intriguing, although it’s hard to imagine that 32 families could represent 46% of American families in a country as diverse as the United States. And, although the researchers insist people got used to the cameras, it’s hard to imagine my own family acting as usual with cameras rigged all over our house and teams of researchers trolling around noting our locations and collecting saliva.
On the other hand, the findings don’t surprise me. My husband and I both worked outside the home for the first year of our son’s life, and it was definitely the most stressful period of our lives to date. (Of course working at home has its own share of challenges, but our lives are more sane now in many ways.)
One thing I came away with was how important it is to explicitly divide household labor and childcare duties in a household. The researchers noted that stress levels were much lower in families who agreed upon their divisions of labor than those who took a more casual approach and tried to figure it out as they went.
What do you think of this study? Do the results surprise you?
The results of this study are similar to what I would have guessed. I totally agree that it is helpful to have a division of labor laid out. When we have set nights to cook dinner/do dishes it goes much more smoothly. Now we just need to divide everything else up! The leisure time numbers seems about right to me, also. Do you think men tend to prioritize hobbies more?
Thanks for commenting, Rose! Unfortunately in our house, neither of us have much time for hobbies, at least during the school year. But we’ve started designating a half hour of alone time a day for each of us, and that’s been a good thing.
We’re definitely learning to be more deliberate about dividing the labor. I’m also a huge fan of after-dinner nightly clean-ups where we turn on music and everyone cleans together for a half hour or 45 minutes. The house stays so much cleaner, and it’s a fun, bonding experience.
I totally agree about the importance of dividing labor. It doesn’t matter how it’s done (Ie: who does what) but it must be shared.
We are a very “traditional” family with some twists. And over the years have evolved a system of shared household labor that works really well for us. Part of our success is our level of communication and mutual willingness to bend to each other and help each other meet our goals.
My husband has always earned the income and I have raised kids but we consider that money equally ours. I have never felt he is in any more way entitled to spend it (neither has he) because he’s earned it. I earned it to. I manage our home, ensure our families health with good food and take care of his children so he can have a job that pays our bills.
I am the homemaker but I am not the longsuffering, work more hours than anyone else homemaker. We all contribute to this household in different ways and now that the kids are growing and able to really help out it shares the load ever more. Which is necessary since I homeschool them also.
That was long and didn’t answer your question but I’m in a talkative mood this am.
Thanks for sharing your experience, Renee. One thing about the study that caught my eye was that kids are only doing 3% of the housework in so many families. That seems so low! I think it’s so important for kids to recognize how important their work is to the household and to see the results of their labors in the house.
I love reading about your family. You seem to be so good about moving toward your goals together intentionally, which is quite inspiring.
This was so interesting. I agree with these other comments as well. Clearly dividing the labor helps and it is so important for all to recognize the contributions the stay-at-home-parent makes. When our daughter was born, we went through a period of confusion and stress trying to learn to manage everything. And it did cause me some distress because I imagined that leaving my full-time job would enable me to do it all. I couldn’t believe that I was at home with no external obligations yet couldn’t manage to keep up with the housework. And dinner was an enormous challenge! After lots of experience, we have really figured it all out and things run so symbiotically now. It’s wonderful. I totally agree with Renee that communication really helps. From the start, I have felt that Greg works outside the home and while he’s there, I work in the home but then when he returns, we both work in the home together. This was not how I imagined it- I truly thought I could finish everything before he got home and was perhaps one of the bigger surprises for me to come to terms with. But the amount of work requires both of us to contribute if we want to enjoy any leisure time.
I love the idea of a 30-minute break. We sometimes give each other breaks on a weekend for a couple of hours; one of us will go see a movie and then the other one will go the next day. That is nice. Even nicer is a short overnight trip away. It is invaluable to have a little time to yourself to think. But after a short time, you miss your husband, baby, home, and life so much that you really can’t wait to get back to them. It also gives dads a realistic sense of all that daily life with a baby entails.
Oh, one more thing- I feel deeply sad for stay-at-home moms of the past who really did have to do it all. Many of my aunts and certainly both of my grandmothers had this experience- doing all the housework, shopping, cooking, bathing, laundry, childrearing, etc. with their husbands bringing home the paycheck. I just cannot imagine how overwhelmed and alone I would feel if my husband didn’t do all he does and knowing that countless women have experienced this is quite sad.