Understanding Gender Inequality in Household Labor

[该提案是EuroCORES HumVIB竞赛资助的CRP的一部分。这项研究促进了对夫妻之间家庭劳动分工不平等的理解。该项目是国际CRP合作项目“比较视角下的性别不平等”（EQUALITY）的美国组成部分，该项目响应欧洲科学基金会EUROCORES关于“人类价值观、制度和行为的跨国和多层次分析”（HumVIB）的倡议。为了解决维持男性和女性在社会中广泛参与的紧迫挑战，平等旨在了解欧洲和美国不同层面持续存在的性别不平等。关于劳动力性别差距、贫困、社会网络和家庭生活的项目分别由荷兰、匈牙利、德国和美国的科学家负责。这项合作为美国和欧洲生活的各个领域带来了关于宏观和微观层面性别不平等的共同理论框架，提供了对国家内部和国家之间性别差距的综合理解。这个个人项目的重点是家务劳动和家庭性别不平等。尽管性别角色发生了变化，但妇女，甚至是全职工人，仍然承担着不成比例的家务劳动负担。家庭劳动分工的不平等阻碍了生育，助长了婚姻的不稳定，并使女性感到沮丧。利用来自国际社会调查项目和欧洲社会调查的多层次建模和跨国数据，该项目追求三个目标。1)调查已婚和同居婚姻中家务劳动总量、女性和男性的跨国模式，特别强调与绝对家务工作量较高或较低有关的国家一级情况。2)测试国家经济、文化和政策对家庭劳动分工影响的多层次模型，这些模型将男性家务劳动参与的基于时间和性别类型的任务测量之间的区别理论化。3)将对家庭劳动的分析扩展到家庭管理活动的分配及其对不同国家背景下家庭责任分工的影响。该项目的知识价值在于它对性别不平等的决定因素和形式进行了系统的跨国分析。其更广泛的影响包括促进欧洲和美国研究人员之间富有成效的国际联盟。

[This proposal is part of a funded CRP from the EuroCORES HumVIB competition.]This research advances understanding of inequality in the division of household labor between husbands and wives. The project is the U.S. component of a recommended international CRP collaboration, "Gender Inequality in Comparative Perspective" (EQUALITY), that responds to the European Science Foundation EUROCORES initiative on "Cross-National and Multi-Level Analysis of Human Values, Institutions and Behaviour" (HumVIB). Addressing the pressing challenge of sustaining broad participation of both men and women in societies, EQUALITY aims to understand the persistent gender inequality at different levels in Europe and the US. Projects on gender gaps in the labor force, poverty, social networks, and domestic life are directed by scientists from the Netherlands, Hungary, Germany and the U.S., respectively. Bringing a shared theoretical framework on macro-level and micro-level gender inequality to bear on various spheres of life in the U.S. and Europe, the collaboration offers an integrated understanding of the gender gaps within and between countries.This individual project focuses on household labor and domestic gender inequalities. Despite changes in gender roles, women, even full-time workers, continue to bear a disproportionate burden for domestic labor. Inequality in the division of household labor discourages childbearing, fosters marital instability, and depresses women?s wages, Using multi-level modeling and cross-national data from the International Social Survey Program and the European Social Survey, this project pursues three objectives.1) To investigate cross-national patterns in the total, female, and male volume of housework in married and cohabiting unions, with particular emphasis on country-level conditions that are associated with higher or lower absolute domestic workloads.2) To test multi-level models of national economic, cultural, and policy influences on the division of household labor that theorize the distinction between hours-based and gender-typed task measures of male housework participation.3) To extend the analysis of household labor to the allocation of household management activities and their implications for the division of domestic responsibilities in different country contexts.The project's intellectual merit relates to its systematic cross-national analysis of determinants and forms of gender inequality. Its broader impacts include fostering productive international alliances between European and US researchers.