Does Fathers’ Involvement in Childcare and Housework Affect Couples’ Relationship Stability?*

Abstract

Objective Building on previous analysis conducted by Schober (2012), we explore how paternal involvement in different childcare and housework tasks affects the probability of relationship breakdown between parents. Methods We use logistic regression on the U.K. Millennium Cohort Study to predict parental relationship breakdown from nine months to seven years post‐childbirth. Paternal involvement in four childcare and three housework tasks during the first year of parenthood, are used as explanatory variables. Results The amount of time the father spends alone, caring for the baby during the first year of parenthood, is associated with the stability of the parental relationship but the effect of involvement in other tasks is moderated by ethnicity and the mother's employment status. Conclusion These nonlinear relationships suggest further research is needed to explore the different associations between paternal involvement in childcare and housework and relationship breakdown, which are complex and variable according to different characteristics.

Paternity Leave and Fathers' Responsibility: Evidence From a Natural Experiment in Canada

“…Solo time is "qualitatively different" from time mediated by the presence of the mother (Wilson & Prior, 2010): It requires that fathers take on heightened responsibility for anticipating and attending to children's needs as the primary parent, if only temporarily (Craig, 2006;Lamb, 2000;Raley et al, 2012). Fathers' increased solo care is associated with increased spousal relationship stability between spouses (Norman et al, 2018) and stronger father-child bonds (Brandth & Kvande, 2018;Craig, 2006;Wilson & Prior, 2010). Furthermore, this aspect of parental responsibility time is potentially transformative for undoing gendered patterns of parenting: Responsibility remains a fundamental feature of motherhood (Christopher, 2012), and the largest gender gap in caregiving for children across countries is in solo care time (Craig & Mullan, 2011).…”

“…Although I do not find any direct effect on engagement or accessibility, the policy resulted in eligible fathers spending about 2.2 hours more per week in solo care, where they were available to or supervising their children without the mother present. The implications of this shift are vital: Fathers' solo caregiving not only strengthens father–child bonds (Craig, ; Wilson & Prior, ) and spousal relationships (Norman et al, ) but also may alleviate gender inequality outside the home by providing more support for mothers to take on paid work (Raley et al, ) and inside the home by shifting the division of child care from a manager‐helper to a coparent dynamic (Rehel, ). Ultimately, these findings not only strengthen previous evidence on father involvement and leave‐taking but also highlight the transformative potential of generous, state‐supported family policy for gendered identities and practices of earning and caring.…”

“…Caring solo develops a "care competence" for men wherein they feel more confident in their caregiving practices (Brandth & Kvande, 2018) and may help to facilitate a shift from a helper-manager dynamic to coparenting (Brandth & Kvande, 2018;Craig, 2006;Rehel, 2014). In addition to fathers' own identities and practices, this type of responsibility has crucial positive impacts on family well-being, such as increased spousal relationship stability (Norman et al, 2018) and a stronger father-child relationship (Brandth & Kvande, 2018;Craig, 2006;Wilson & Prior, 2010). Finally, previous empirical research argues that fathers' solo parenting has important consequences for the gendered division of labor.…”

“…Although fathers may have increased the time they interact with and are accessible to children, responsibility remains a fundamental feature of motherhood (Christopher, 2012;Craig, 2006;Doucet, 2006). As such, previous empirical research finds that fathers' increased responsibility has wide-ranging consequences for their own gender and parenting identities and practices (Brandth & Kvande, 2018;Rehel, 2014); for family well-being, including spousal relationships (Norman, Elliot, & Fagan, 2018) and father-child relationships (Brandth & Kvande, 2018;Craig, 2006;Wilson & Prior, 2010); and for the gendered division of paid and unpaid labor (Craig, 2006;Doucet, 2006;Raley et al, 2012). Several key studies do find that fathers' leave-taking is associated with their increased responsibility (Haas & Hwang, 2008;Hosking et al, 2010;Knoester, Petts, & Pragg, 2019).…”

Out-of-place: the lack of engagement with parent networks of caregiving fathers of young children

“…Brandth and Kvande, 2018;Doucet, 2006a;Merla 2008), our work takes a somewhat broader angle, by exploring the experiences and practices of fathers who are primary carers alongside those who are sharing parenting responsibilities equally with their partners. Our UK focus is also important, tying in with other emerging work on caregiving fathers in the country (Banister and Kerrane, 2018;Norman et al, 2018;O'Brien and Twamley, 2017), amidst a body of previous research that has largely been conducted in other national contexts, including Norway (Brandth and Kvande, 2018), Belgium (Merla, 2008), Canada (Doucet, 2006a;Ranson, 2010) and the US (Chelsey, 2011;Solomon 2017).…”