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Research on emotional work
Jan. 4th, 2006 12:53 pm...which leads me to believe that running off to a psych grad program in Australia may not have been such a bad idea after all.
Acts of love (and work): Gender imbalance in emotional work and women's psychological distress by Drs. Lyndall Strazdins and Dorothy H. Broom (opens a .pdf)
It's a draft copy, with author notes all the tables at the end, but it's still fascinating. The hypotheses draw on prior research which argues that unequal distribution of domestic/unpaid work can be harmful to women's health, and builds on that research by attempting to quantify "emotional work," discover who is doing more, and what effects may be correlated with that emotional work. It's a cross-sectional study, so it doesn't draw any conclusions about causation. This study really diverges and becomes interesting when the authors point out: "No one suggested that there might be temporary distribution of emotional work. Women did not anticipate that an increase in paid work involvement would, or should, result in a shift in emotional work. Neither men nor women mentioned better earning capacity to justify the gender distribution of emotional work, nor did women mention choosing to do more. Instead everyone cited personal attributes of themselves or their partners: needs, capacities, personalities, upbringing, and gender socialization."
Also: "A consequence of these sorts of explanations [factors beyond personal choice] is that the gender imbalance is embedded into family life and becomes non-negotiable. Women find that they continue to do the work of relationships if they want to achieve and maintain the closeness that they value, while they have less access to emotional resources in the family, and bear the costs of caring."
Authors point out the dilemma of trying to change this imbalance: women risk shifting the relationship to exchange or quid pro quo, further degrading their perception of being cared for, and that while men also want mutuality in emotional work, they are hamstrung because all the explanations given (by men and women) for this imbalance imply that the work is "symbolic of gender differene and beyond men's personal choice". In other words, there does not seem to be an end in sight, unless/until we are able to detach emotional work from interpretations of gender.
It's important to note that this study focused on families with young children, and entirely on hetero married couples. Things I'd like to see in further studies: cohabitation vs. marriage, childless couples or those with older children, role of adult children in extended family relationships (by gender), and same-sex LTRs. Where does one get access to these articles, I wonder, when not a student at a university? Do you think they'd let me breeze in and start browsing the psych journals?
As I summarize, this begins to sound like a depressing article; to a research geek, however, it's thrilling to see a subject of vague and formless distress named, with a vocabulary and methods of quantification beginning to build around it. I am eager (and a little afraid) to see what Twisty makes of this piece, though the reasons to "blame the patriarchy" here seem rather transparent, and her chemo sounds strong this week, so we may have to take the job on ourselves.
Comments on this post will be screened.
ETA: How could I forget? Link, of course, via Bitch. Ph. D.
Acts of love (and work): Gender imbalance in emotional work and women's psychological distress by Drs. Lyndall Strazdins and Dorothy H. Broom (opens a .pdf)
It's a draft copy, with author notes all the tables at the end, but it's still fascinating. The hypotheses draw on prior research which argues that unequal distribution of domestic/unpaid work can be harmful to women's health, and builds on that research by attempting to quantify "emotional work," discover who is doing more, and what effects may be correlated with that emotional work. It's a cross-sectional study, so it doesn't draw any conclusions about causation. This study really diverges and becomes interesting when the authors point out: "No one suggested that there might be temporary distribution of emotional work. Women did not anticipate that an increase in paid work involvement would, or should, result in a shift in emotional work. Neither men nor women mentioned better earning capacity to justify the gender distribution of emotional work, nor did women mention choosing to do more. Instead everyone cited personal attributes of themselves or their partners: needs, capacities, personalities, upbringing, and gender socialization."
Also: "A consequence of these sorts of explanations [factors beyond personal choice] is that the gender imbalance is embedded into family life and becomes non-negotiable. Women find that they continue to do the work of relationships if they want to achieve and maintain the closeness that they value, while they have less access to emotional resources in the family, and bear the costs of caring."
Authors point out the dilemma of trying to change this imbalance: women risk shifting the relationship to exchange or quid pro quo, further degrading their perception of being cared for, and that while men also want mutuality in emotional work, they are hamstrung because all the explanations given (by men and women) for this imbalance imply that the work is "symbolic of gender differene and beyond men's personal choice". In other words, there does not seem to be an end in sight, unless/until we are able to detach emotional work from interpretations of gender.
It's important to note that this study focused on families with young children, and entirely on hetero married couples. Things I'd like to see in further studies: cohabitation vs. marriage, childless couples or those with older children, role of adult children in extended family relationships (by gender), and same-sex LTRs. Where does one get access to these articles, I wonder, when not a student at a university? Do you think they'd let me breeze in and start browsing the psych journals?
As I summarize, this begins to sound like a depressing article; to a research geek, however, it's thrilling to see a subject of vague and formless distress named, with a vocabulary and methods of quantification beginning to build around it. I am eager (and a little afraid) to see what Twisty makes of this piece, though the reasons to "blame the patriarchy" here seem rather transparent, and her chemo sounds strong this week, so we may have to take the job on ourselves.
Comments on this post will be screened.
ETA: How could I forget? Link, of course, via Bitch. Ph. D.
