The topic of family, a group of people connected by blood, marriage, adoption, or agreed-upon relationship, has been in the news a lot recently. Whether it be the question of social distancing in a multigenerational home, having the “talk” with kids about race, racism, and the police, or the issue of homeschooling in the fall because of concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic, the family is the pivoting point for many of our life experiences. Sociologists often research families from one of two directions. Either we study someone’s family of orientation, the family in which you are raised and socialized as a result of birth, adoption, or a blended family, or their family of procreation, the family you choose to create through marriage, agreed-upon relationship, or the birth or adoption of children. A wealth of information can be found in analyzing the family you come from or the one you choose to create.
Let’s take a moment to dive deeper into the family of procreation by answering the following question: Who does most of the childcare in a family? Mom? Dad? Both? Not surprisingly, the answer twenty years ago would have overwhelmingly been Mom. More recent studies have yielded what, on the surface, appear to be contradictory findings. On the one hand, the Fatherhood Institute found that men’s childcare during the pandemic lockdown is up 58%. On the other hand, The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) found that during the pandemic, working mothers are doing more chores and childcare than their working male partners, even though they are locked down in the same household. Diving deeper into the first study, researchers found that because men are working from home and thus commuting on average 1 hour and 37 minutes less per day, they are spending that time engaged with their children. That increase of 58% is really an additional 1 hour and 37 minutes per day. Mothers, on the other hand, are still doing the bulk of childcare. As the IFS study found, during the pandemic lockdown, mothers can accomplish only one hour of uninterrupted professional work compared to three hours for fathers, even though they both work from home. Interestingly, women continue to do most of the childcare even if both parents are unemployed. The IFS research speaks to the fact that men and women often experience family differently.
A range of other variables affects the differences men and women experience in the family. Does the society practice patrilocal residence, a living pattern in which a couple resides with or near the husband’s parents? Or is matrilocal, a living pattern in which a couple resides with or near the wife’s parents, or neolocal, a living pattern in which a couple establishes residence independent of their parents, the norm? Does society allow divorce and support the creation of blended families, a family in which one or both spouses have children from previous relationships? How are couples who choose to be childfree — individuals who choose not to have children — viewed in society? The answers to these questions and many more illustrate that families are not only about the relationships between groups of people; they are also socially constructed and historically changing. In the broadest sense, families are relative to time, place, and culture.
Thompson is a co-owner of UITAC Publishing. UITAC’s mission is to provide high-quality, affordable, and socially responsible online course materials.
