Abstract
Like their parents, children are productive members of their households and may contribute to housework. This study is the first to examine trends in children’s housework behavior in Germany. Using data from the German Time Use Study, 12–17-year-old boys’ and girls’ participation in and time use for housework activities are tracked between 1991 and 2013. The analytical focus is on the relation between the time spent on housework by parents and children and its development over time. It is shown that there is no change in children’s overall participation in housework, but that girls and boys spent fewer days on housework in 2012/2013 than 20 years ago. Furthermore, children’s average time spent on housework decreased in the observed timeframe, but remained constant on days on which children actually do housework. Moreover, children’s time use is positively related to parents’ time use, especially for same-sex parent-child-dyads. In conclusion, trends in children’s time use resemble developments in parental housework behavior, especially concerning the decline of total housework time and gender convergence.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Altintas, E., & Sullivan, O. (2016). Fifty years of change updated: Cross-national gender convergence in housework. Demographic Research, 35(16), 455–470.
Álvarez, B., & Miles-Touya, D. (2012). Exploring the relationship between parents’ and children’s housework time in Spain. Review of Economics of the Household, 10(2), 299–318.
Ben-Arieh, A., & Ofir, A. (2002). Time for (more) time-use studies: Studying the daily activities of children. Childhood, 9(2), 225–248.
Blair, S. L. (1992). Children’s participation in household labor: Child socialization versus the need for household labor. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 21(2), 241–258.
Bonke, J. (2010). Children’s housework – Are girls more active than boys? Electronic International Journal of Time Use Research, 7(1), 1–16.
Braun, M., & Scott, J. (2009). Changing public views of gender roles in seven nations, 1988–2002. In M. Haller, R. Jowell, & T. W. Smith (Eds.), The international social survey programme 1984–2009: Charting the globe (pp. 358–377). Oxford: Routledge. https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/242230; https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203880050
Coltrane, S. (2000). Research on household labor: Modeling and measuring the social embeddedness of routine family work. Journal of Marriage and Family, 62(4), 1208–1233.
Cordero-Coma, J., & Esping-Andersen, G. (2018). The intergenerational transmission of gender roles: Children’s contribution to housework in Germany. Journal of Marriage and Family, 80(4), 1005–1019.
Cunningham, M. (2001). Parental influences on the gendered division of housework. American Sociological Review, 66(2), 184–203.
Dotti Sani, G. M. (2016). Undoing gender in housework? Participation in domestic chores by Italian fathers and children of different ages. Sex Roles, 74(9), 411–421.
Ehling, M. (1999). The German time use survey – Methods and results. In J. Merz & M. Ehling (Eds.), Time use – Research, data and policy (pp. 89–105). Baden-Baden: Nomos.
Ehling, M., Holz, E., & Kahle, I. (2001). Erhebungsdesign der Zeitbudgeterhebung 2001/2002 [Design of the German Time use Study 2001/2001; in German]. Wirtschaft und Statistik, 6, 427–436.
European Institute for Gender Equality. (2017). Gender equality index 2017. Measuring gender equality in the European Union 2005–2015. http://eige.europa.eu/sites/default/files/documents/20177277_mh0517208enn_pdf. Accessed 5 July 2019.
Evertsson, M. (2006). The reproduction of gender: Housework and attitudes towards gender equality in the home among Swedish boys and girls. The British Journal of Sociology, 57(3), 415–436.
Gager, C. T., Cooney, T. M., & Call, K. T. (1999). The effects of family characteristics and time use on teenagers’ household labor. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 61(4), 982–994.
Gimenez-Nadal, J. I., Molina, J. A., & Ortega, R. (2017). Like my parents at home? Gender differences in children’s housework in Germany and Spain. Empirical Economics, 52(4), 1143–1179.
Gimenez-Nadal, J. I., Molina, J. A., & Zhu, Y. (2018). Intergenerational mobility of housework time in the United Kingdom. Review of Economics of the Household, 16(4), 911–937.
Gupta, S. (2006). The consequences of maternal employment during men’s childhood for their adult housework performance. Gender & Society, 20(1), 60–86.
Hofferth, S. (2009). Changes in American children’s time – 1997 to 2003. Electronic International Journal of Time Use Research, 6(1), 26–47.
Hofferth, S., & Sandberg, J. F. (2001). Changes in American children’s time, 1981–1997. Advances in Life Course Research, 6, 193–229.
Kamo, Y. (2000). “He said, she said”: Assessing discrepancies in husbands’ and wives’ reports on the division of household labor. Social Science Research, 29(4), 459–476.
Kan, M. Y., & Pudney, S. (2008). Measurement error in stylized and diary data on time use. Sociological Methodology, 38(1), 101–132.
Lee, Y.-S., Schneider, B., & Waite, L. J. (2003). Children and housework: Some unanswered questions. Sociological Studies of Children and Youths, 9, 105–125.
Leopold, T., Skopek, J., & Schulz, F. (2018). Gender convergence in housework time: A life course and cohort perspective. Sociological Science, 5, 281–303.
Lundberg, S. (2005). Sons, daughters, and parental behavior. Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 21(3), 340–356.
Maier, L. (2014). Methodik und Durchführung der Zeitverwendungserhebung 2012/2013 [Design of the German Time Use Study 2012/2013; in German]. Wirtschaft und Statistik, 11, 672–679.
Stockard, J. (1999). Gender socialization. In J. Saltzman-Chafetz (Ed.), Handbook of the sociology of gender (pp. 215–227). New York: Kluwer.
Sullivan, O., Gershuny, J., & Robinson, J. P. (2018). Stalled or uneven gender revolution? A long-term processual framework for understanding why change is so slow. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 10(1), 263–279.
Williams, R. (2012). Using the margins command to estimate and interpret adjusted predictions and marginal effects. The Stata Journal, 12(2), 308–331.
Wirth, H. (2017). Die Zeitverwendung von Kindern und Jugendlichen – Lernen am Modell? [time use of children and youths – A case of social learning? in German]. In Statistisches Bundesamt (Ed.), Wie die Zeit vergeht. Analysen zur Zeitverwendung in Deutschland (pp. 117–134). Wiesbaden.
Acknowledgments
The author declares no conflict of interest. This study was funded by the Bavarian State Ministry of Family, Labor and Social Affairs within the yearly working program of the State Institute for Family Research at the University of Bamberg in 2018 and 2019. The content of this article does not reflect the official opinion of the Bavarian State Ministry of Family, Labor and Social Affairs. Responsibility for the information and views expressed herein lies entirely with the author. Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the “Time use across the life course” meeting at the Maryland Population Research Center on June 19, 2018, in College Park, MD, USA, and at the Work and Family Researchers Network conference on June 21, 2018, in Washington, DC, USA. Replication files to this article will be made available by the author.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher’s Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Appendix
Appendix
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Schulz, F. Trends in Children’s Gendered Housework Performance. Time Use Evidence from Germany, 1991–2013. Child Ind Res 13, 1313–1334 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-019-09702-x
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-019-09702-x