Gender Roles in the Family

The domestic division of labour

In the past, in the traditional nuclear family husbands and wives had segregated conjugal roles where men played an instrumental role as a breadwinner and women played an expressive role by doing housework and childcare. Parsons argues that this division of labour is beneficial as it is based on biological differences between men and women.

These segregated conjugal roles are favoured by the new right as it maintains the status quo.

Young and Willmott – There is now a march of progress, arguing that segregated conjugal roles are declining and there is now a rise in joint conjugal roles where couples share tasks, leading to more symmetrical families.

For instance, they found that women were undertaking more paid work, perhaps due to changes in women's position in society and men were helping with housework and childcare, perhaps due to new technology being introduced that facilitates housework, such as microwaves and vacuum cleaners.

Material conditions (eg of children in lone-parent families and dual-earner families) impacting childhood

Evaluation:

Feminists: Anne-Oakley – The extent of progress is being over-exaggerated as women still do most of the housework, and the domestic labour men do tend to involve more rewarding aspects.

The impact of paid work

There has been a change in women's position in society as they are no longer confined to the private sphere, as a result, there are now more women in paid work.

Gershuny – Found that men are becoming more involved in housework and childcare just as women are becoming more involved in paid work

This suggests that women being in paid work leads to more equality in the division of labour

Evaluation:

Feminists – Women going into paid work has not led to greater equality in the division of labour.

This is because women are still expected to take on the majority of housework and childcare, despite being in paid work as it still appears to be part of their gender domain, leading to women experiencing a dual burden, or even a triple shift due to also undertaking emotion work and managing the emotions of her family.

Therefore, the extent of this equality is limited as women still continue to take on the majority of the housework and therefore experience a dual burden

Resources

There are inequalities in how family resources are shared between men and women. For instance, research shows that in low-income families, many women deny their own needs such as skipping meals in order to make ends meet.

Decision making

Family income can affect decision-making.

There is now a rise of pooling where both partners have access to income e.g. a joint bank account.

Although pooling is common, research has shown that men still make more major financial decisions regarding finances, children and holidays.

This may be because men are still earning more than women in the workplace

Evaluation:

Feminists – Inequalities in decision-making are due to gender role socialisation instilling the view that men are primary decision-makers

Domestic violence

• Around 1.2 million women suffered from domestic violence in 2012
• Nearly one in 4 women has been assaulted by a partner at some time in their life Reasons:

1. Marxists: Domestic violence is caused by capitalism. This is because men being exploited at work leads to them taking their anger and frustration out on their wives Evaluation:

Marxists fail to explain female domestic violence against men

Though, there are now more women in paid work so they may be experiencing the same frustrations caused by exploitation as men

2. Wilkinson and Pickett - Domestic violence is caused by stress in the family caused by inequalities. For instance, low-income families are likely to have fewer resources which may mean they experience high levels of stress, which increases the risk of conflict which may lead to domestic violence Evaluation:

Feminists - It's not just stress in the family that causes domestic violence, but it is marriage as a whole

Radical feminists: Marriage is a key institution in patriarchal society as it allows men to dominate women through domestic violence or the threat of it. For instance, Dobash and Dobash found that domestic violence could be set off by what a husband saw as a challenge to his authority.

This serves to preserve the power that men have over women.