A new study by sociologist Chloe E. Bird suggests that once married, women do about twice the amount of housework as their spouses, which increases the women's sense of anxiety, depression and worry
When wedding day arrives, a bride might improve her chances of a married life that is "for better" if her bridegroom vows to share in the housework from that day forth.
A new study by sociologist Chloe E. Bird suggests that once married, women do about twice the amount of housework as their spouses, which increases the women's sense of anxiety, depression and worry.
"Everybody benefits from sharing the housework," said Bird, assistant professor of sociology and community health. "You're best off if you're not carrying the work alone."
In her study of 1,256 people ages 18 through 65, published in this month's Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Bird found that instead of gaining a partner to share the household chores, women who marry gain substantially more hours of work - specifically, 14 hours per week. By comparison, their husbands gained only 90 minutes of work per week.
That is a marked difference from single life, when men and women report performing about the same amount of cooking, cleaning, laundry and other tasks. Because of the disparity in the number of hours of work gained in marriage, being part of a couple reduced the husband's share of housework and increased the wife's.
If working wives had their druthers, the share of housework that would minimize their distress would be 46 percent, with their husbands performing an equal share. (Presumably, the remaining 8 percent would have to be tended to by other family members, outside help, or go undone.) For women who are full-time homemakers, that share would be 80 percent, with their husbands making up the balance, according to the study.
Husbands, however, report performing 37 percent of the household labor whether their wives worked or not - a figure that is not quite up to the desired contribution sought by working wives. It's this disparity that tends to increase a wife's sense of distress.
Housework causes distress for several reasons, Bird said. Tasks such as grocery shopping and washing dishes are thankless and offer less fulfillment than paid work and less recognition from others.
For working wives, distress over household labor also stems from a sense of overload in trying to balance work and home. For homemakers, distress stems from the reality that they often are staying home temporarily - to raise children - and want to maintain a team approach to the marriage, Bird said.
"A shared division of labor is important even for women keeping house," said Bird. "If you decide to stay at home to raise the children, you don't want to become the scullery maid."
Although wives report depression when they do the majority of the housework, that doesn't mean husbands would become depressed if they did closer to half the housework, said Bird. In fact, she said, men would benefit psychologically. In Bird's study, the least distressed people - male or female - were those performing an equitable share of the housework.
Indeed, it is the sharing, not the number of hours, that makes the difference between feelings of psychological distress and well-being, according to the study.
The study was limited to information provided by one member of the couple. Ideally, a future study would include reports from both spouses, said Bird. It would also be interesting to remove all paid employment from the relationship, and study retired couples, she said.
Bird used data collected in 1990 and 1994 by the National Opinion Research Council under a grant from the Kaiser Family Foundation and the National Institute of Health. Although five years have elapsed since the data were collected, Bird doubts a 1999 survey would generate any different results. "The number of hours of household labor men contribute hasn't increased in decades," she said.