The differential impact of COVID‐19 on the work conditions of women and men academics during the lockdown

Abstract

That the COVID‐19 pandemic has affected the work conditions of large segments of the society is in no doubt. A growing body of journalistic accounts raised the possibility that the lockdown caused by the pandemic affects women and men in different ways, due mostly to the traditionally gendered division of labor in the society. We attempt to test this oft‐cited argument by conducting an original survey with nearly 200 academics. Specifically, we explore the extent to which the effect of the lockdown on child‐care, housework and home‐office environment varies across women and men. Our results show that a number of factors are associated with the effect of the lockdown on the work conditions of academics at home, including gender, having children, perceived threat from COVID‐19, and satisfaction with work environment. We also show that having children disproportionately affects women in terms of the amount of housework during the lockdown.

The influence of the global COVID‐19 pandemic on manuscript submissions and editor and reviewer performance at six ecology journals

“…In the current dataset (1 January 2019 to 1 October 2020), 82.0% of papers were submitted by the first author (averaged across journals). If time availability has been more greatly affected by the pandemic for women than for men (as suggested by survey data; Collins et al, 2020;Myers et al, 2020;Yildirim & Eslen-Ziya, 2020), we might observe that, although women continued to be authors of their research manuscripts, they are more likely to defer the submission process to their co-authors during the pandemic. However, there is no evidence that the proportion of either male or female first authors that serve as submitting author has declined during the pandemic (comparing pre-March 15 with post-March 15 in 2020; male: X 2 1 = 2.05, p = 0.15; female: X 2 1 = 0.03, p = 0.86), nor do we see any evidence that the proportion of men or women serving as submitting author declined from 2019 to 2020 (comparing 15 March 2019 to 1 October 2019 with the same period in 2020; male: X 2 1 = 3.83, p = 0.051; female: X 2 1 = 0.22, p = 0.64).…”

“…Most importantly, these institutions need to support early career researchers—our students and recent graduates—whose careers are most vulnerable to extended disruptions to their research and the resulting reduced scholarly productivity. Vincent‐Lamarre et al (2020) provide a list of suggestions for how best to support our vulnerable colleagues, many of which, we are pleased to see, have been adopted by leading universities.…”

“…shift to part‐time work) or leave science in response to childcare responsibilities (Cech & Blair‐Loy, 2019). Surveys conducted since March 2020 show that women, especially those with children, have reduced their work time more substantially than have men since the start of the pandemic (Collins et al., 2020; Myers et al., 2020; Yildirim & Eslen‐Ziya, 2020).…”

Longitudinal analyses of gender differences in first authorship publications related to COVID-19

“…It has been suggested that this might, at least in part, be due to an exacerbation of pre-existing work–family conflicts, especially for early-career mothers in academia. 12 With lockdown measures to prevent uncontrolled spread of the coronavirus came not only remote working, but also closures of childcare services like daycares and schools transferring teaching responsibilities often to mothers, without the possibility to involve family members in childcare that belong to the ageing population who are particularly vulnerable to severe illness from the coronavirus. 12–16 Evidence from Germany showed, for example, that women not only took over the physical load of increased childcare and household responsibilities, but also the mental load associated with taking care of the family during a pandemic.…”

“… 12 With lockdown measures to prevent uncontrolled spread of the coronavirus came not only remote working, but also closures of childcare services like daycares and schools transferring teaching responsibilities often to mothers, without the possibility to involve family members in childcare that belong to the ageing population who are particularly vulnerable to severe illness from the coronavirus. 12–16 Evidence from Germany showed, for example, that women not only took over the physical load of increased childcare and household responsibilities, but also the mental load associated with taking care of the family during a pandemic. 17 Even prior to the pandemic, research has shown that childrearing and household work were tasks largely taken care of by women, thereby impacting women’s academic careers more than men’s.…”