Managing a Household During a Pandemic: Cognitive Labor and Parents’ Psychological Well-being

Petts, Richard J.; Carlson, Daniel L.

doi:10.1177/21568693231169521

Cited by 7 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 84 publications

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“…In response to the loss of domestic services and in-person schooling/childcare, partnered fathers appear to have to elevated their performance of domestic labor during the pandemic (Carlson et al 2021a;Carlson and Petts 2022b;Lyttelton et al 2022), which was somewhat protective of partnered mothers' jobs (Petts et al 2021). There is also evidence suggesting that partnered fathers taking on more of the household management during the pandemic may have psychologically benefitted both mothers and fathers (Petts and Carlson 2023). Nonetheless, the increase in fathers' shares of domestic labor was substantively small-approximately 4%-especially when considering not only men's stated desires to be more domestically engaged (Petts 2022), but also the number of men who began working from home, many exclusively (Brenan 2020;Brynjolfsson et al 2020).…”

Section: Equality At Homementioning

confidence: 99%

Remote Work, Gender Ideologies, and Fathers’ Participation in Childcare during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Carlson,

McPherson,

Petts

2024

Social Sciences

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During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, remote work became the new reality for many fathers. Though time availability theory suggests that this newfound flexibility should lead to more domestic labor on the part of fathers, many were skeptical that fathers would step up to shoulder the load at home. Indeed, the findings are decidedly mixed on the association of fathers’ remote work with their performance of housework and childcare. Nonetheless, research has yet to consider how contextual factors, such as fathers’ gender ideologies and mothers’ employment, may condition these associations. Using data from Wave 1 of the Study on U.S. Parents’ Divisions of Labor During COVID-19 (SPDLC), we examine how gender ideology moderates the association between fathers’ remote work and their performance and share of childcare during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic in both sole-earner and dual-earner families. The results show, for sole-earning fathers and dual-earner fathers with egalitarian gender attitudes, that the frequency of remote work was positively associated with fathers performing more, and a greater share of, childcare during the pandemic. Yet, only dual-earner fathers with egalitarian gender attitudes performed an equal share of childcare in their families. These findings suggest that the pandemic provided structural opportunities for fathers, particularly egalitarian-minded fathers, to be the equally engaged parents they desired.

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Section: Equality At Homementioning

confidence: 99%

Remote Work, Gender Ideologies, and Fathers’ Participation in Childcare during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Carlson,

McPherson,

Petts

2024

Social Sciences

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Cognitive household labor: gender disparities and consequences for maternal mental health and wellbeing

Aviv,

Waizman,

Kim

et al. 2024

Arch Womens Ment Health

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Purpose Although the division of unpaid household labor has been studied as a driver of global gender inequity, the cognitive dimension of household labor—planning, anticipating, and delegating household tasks—has received less empirical investigation. Cognitive household labor represents a form of invisible and often unacknowledged domestic work that has been challenging to measure. Methods Within 322 mothers of young children, we assessed the division of both cognitive (“planning”) and physical (“execution”) household labor within 30 common household tasks using a self-report measure. Results We found that while mothers did more of the overall domestic labor than their partners, the division of cognitive labor was particularly gendered, such that women’s share of cognitive labor was more disproportionate than physical household labor. We found that cognitive labor was associated with women’s depression, stress, burnout, overall mental health, and relationship functioning. Conclusions This study is one of the first to investigate cognitive labor quantitatively, and the first to investigate cognitive and physical dimensions within the same household tasks. Understanding how cognitive labor affects mothers’ mental wellbeing has important implications for both practice and policy.

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The gendered impact of Covid-19 on health behaviours and mental health: Evidence from the UK

Arulsamy,

McNamee,

Mendolia

2025

Social Science & Medicine

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Managing a Household During a Pandemic: Cognitive Labor and Parents’ Psychological Well-being

Cited by 7 publications

References 84 publications

Remote Work, Gender Ideologies, and Fathers’ Participation in Childcare during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Remote Work, Gender Ideologies, and Fathers’ Participation in Childcare during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Cognitive household labor: gender disparities and consequences for maternal mental health and wellbeing

The gendered impact of Covid-19 on health behaviours and mental health: Evidence from the UK

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