The Psychology of Gender 4th Edition

412 Chapter 11

15 hours a week longer than men, including

paid employment, household chores, and child

care. Over the course of a year, she remarked

this extra time added up to a full month.

Household labor includes preparing

meals, cleaning, yard work, household re-

pairs, grocery shopping, washing clothes,

paying bills, automobile maintenance, and

running errands. A 2007 Gallop Poll revealed

that women do more household chores than

men, with the exception of the stereotypi-

cal masculine chores, such as car mainte-

nance and yard work (Newport, 2008).

Household chores are shown in Figure 11.8.

as general psychological distress. I examine

the literature on who does what in the family

and show how the division of labor is associ-

ated with marital satisfaction and well-being.

Who Does What?

“A man may work from sun to sun, but a

woman’s work is never done.” Is there any

truth to this old adage? According to Hoch-

schild (1989), there is. She refers to employed

women’s work at home as “the second shift”:

Women work one shift at work and a second

shift at home. Hochschild interviewed 50 cou-

ples and found that women worked on average

0

Clean the house

Caring for children

Do laundry

Prepare meals

Do grocery shopping

Wash dishes

Pay bills

Make decisions about money

Do yard work

Keep the car in good condition

20 40 60 80 100

% wife says she does chore

% husband says he does chore

FIGURE 11.8 Women perform more of most household tasks compared to men,

although both women and men estimate that they do more than their partner credits them.

Source: Adapted from Newport (2008).

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