Topic 11: Roles and Relationships between Men and Women (Partners)

Question 1

Postmodernism: Giddens - reflexivity

Answer 1

-traditional norms and structures that constrained individuals to fit into certain structures and roles have started to dissolve. This can be seen most clearly in the role of women in society
limited women’s opportunities and dictated that married
women place was in the home have become less restricting.
They create their own life-scripts rather than following a script laid down by society based on their gender, social class or other characteristics.

Question 2

Anthony Giddens - Confluent love

Answer 2

In the past, husbands and wives often stayed together for
practical reasons; women needed men to support them financially, and men needed women
to run the home and look after children. Today these concerns are less important.
-confluent love is also far more fragile
as individuals only stay in relationships while their emotional needs are being fulfilled and
are likely to look for love elsewhere when they are no longer satisfied.

Question 3

Postmodernism: Stacey

Answer 3

Pam and Dotty and the Postmodern family

Question 4

Hakim

Answer 4

Home-centred: 20
adaptive 60
work cantered 20
in many developed countries feminism has truly
achieved its aims. She argues that gender roles in the family are
changing because women now have preferences and make
rational choices in terms of the type of work they do;

Question 5

Functionalism: Parsons and Bales

Answer 5

 The expressive role-performing the functions of socialising the children and stabilising adult personalities by offering emotional support to her husband.
 The instrumental role-more suited to men and involves providing an income for the family.
-He points out that as women bear children and nurse them as babies, it is natural that they should also play a bigger role in their socialisation.
-naturally suited.

Question 6

Delphy and Leonard

Answer 6

Familial Exploitation:

Question 7

Benston and fren Ansley link to evaluation

Answer 7

the roles and relationships in the family are not changing, as they keep continue to maintain patriarchy and capitalism.

Question 8

Research showing the domestic division of labour is
changing

Willmott &; Young: The Symmetrical Family

Answer 8

-a trend towards the breakdown of
segregated conjugal roles and a shift towards more joint roles.
1) Conjugal roles are joint
2) The family is nuclear: The focus of the family is on the relationship between husband, wife and children, and extended family ties have weakened.
3) The family is privatised: spend more time in the privacy of their home together.

Question 9

Time budget research (diaries)

Answer 9

-survey data is limited as it relies on participants estimating their daily or weekly domestic labour,
-instead people are writing down how much time they
spend (and on what) as they go.

Question 10

Gershuny: Lagged Adaptation

Answer 10

-compared data collected using time budget diaries
-women still did more than 60 per cent of domestic work but there had been a gradual increase in men’s participation.
-women had increased their participation in paid work over the same period, meaning that their overall time spent on all work had increased slightly.
-overall things are changing support the view of a symmetrical family

Question 11

Hakim: An alternative perspective on domestic labour

Answer 11

-criticised feminists for constantly complaining that men are not
doing their fair share of domestic work.
-She analysed data from time budget studies across Europe the reality is that most men already do more than their fair share.
-‘On average, women and men across Europe do the same total number of productive
work hours, once paid jobs and unpaid household work are added together’

Question 12

to Man Yee-Kan and Heather Laurie

Answer 12

-whilst, on average, British men do
less housework than women(6 hours per week), African-Caribbean men do more than white men.(more then 7 hours per week)

Question 13

Oakley: A Challenge to the Symmetrical Family

Answer 13

-research which found 72% of men “helped around the house”
Firstly, the word “help” implies that the full responsibility for housework belongs to someone else eg the woman.
- male respondents only had to answer one dedicated question on housework in their research questionnaire. Thismeant
the figure of 72% was achieved even if the male respondents only did «one » house chore task a week

Question 14

Key study: ‘Emotion work & the triple shift – Duncombe and Marsden

Answer 14

-Emotion work refers to people giving love, understanding, praise,
reassurance and attention, all of which are required to maintain successful relationships.
-interviewed 40 established white couples
-Having finished their shift of paid work, women come home to complete the housework and then have to undertake emotion work as well.
-

Question 15

Survey research

Answer 15

The early 2010s British Social Attitudes Survey suggested that men spend an average of
eight hours a week doing domestic labour, while women spend an average of thirteen hours.
-Similarly, the 2013 British Social Attitudes Survey compared the sexes on their views on their domestic labour contributions.
60% of women report doing more than their fair share, compared with just 10% ofmen.

Question 16

Susan Walzer

Answer 16

-the invisible part of domestic work interviews
-more of the intellectual, mental work of childcare and household maintenance.
-like researching paediatricians and professionals.
-They do more worrying (like wondering if their child is hitting his developmental milestones).

Question 17

Domestic violence: Men as victims

Answer 17

• Data from Home Office and the British
  Crime Survey (a victim survey which anonymously asks which crimes a person has been victim of) show that men made up about 40% of domestic violence victims each year between 2004-05 and 2008-09.
  -second-class victims

Question 18

Finances changing

Answer 18

-A 2014 study by Money magazine
-as wives’ economic contribution to the household grows—on average, women in dual-earner households now bring in about half of the family income
-far more active role in financial planning, getting
deeply involved in everything from budgeting to retirement planning.

Question 19

Decision-making within marriages
Hardhill et al

Answer 19

-19 out of 30 couples the man’s career came first, in five out of 30 the woman’s took
precedence, and in six neither career was given more importance.
-the female partner has to ‘juggle’ work and home, often by working part-time or taking a career break while she
has children.

Question 20

Family finances and money management
Pahl

Answer 20

-individualised finances can put women at a disadvantage
-men earn more, and therefore have more spending
power.
-If couples share the household expenses (with each partner paying 50%) then women are losing a greater proportion of their money than men, and men are likely to have more surplus income

Question 21

Domestic Violence
stats and key study

Answer 21

-ONS (2019) almost one in three UK women aged 16-59 will experience domestic abuse in her lifetime.
-Professor Stanko, snapshot survey phones calls to police forces together with referrals to organisations
- during the course of a single day
-Stankos data suggested that acts of domestic violence are committed every six seconds and 999 calls reporting attacks are made every minute.
-more than 80 per cent of victims were
women attacked by men.