We live in a time when the idea of the father figure that works, is emotionally distant and is often absent, seems to be part of the past. During the last decades, we have gone from seeing how the main concern of the father was to win the bread to have to "Get involved", "be active" or "commit" to the care of children.
These changes are due in part to the incorporation of many women into the labor market and to the increase of families with two salaries, but there has also been a change in expectations and now a “good” father plays an active role in the family at the time from share responsibilities in childcare and decision making. The benefits of good parenthood for the well-being of children are widely demonstrated.
But despite this change, there is still evidence that the image of the traditional mother as the primary caregiver is still a common reference in all aspects of parent education and in books about it. In fact, policies to reconcile work and family life continue to reflect the gender duality of women and men who work and are parents.
In recent years, more attention has been given to the ways in which the conditions of men in families can be improved. For example, two weeks' paid parental leave was introduced in the United Kingdom in April 2003 and in April 2015 it has been improved with the introduction of the shared parental leave, which means that when the mother ends her maternity leave and Upon returning to work, the parent or his partner may use a remaining time of up to 52 weeks.
In practice, reports suggest that the acceptance of a parental leave shared by both parents has been very low, for reasons ranging from lack of awareness about the system to the fact that for many families it is not profitable to reduce the salary in comparison with the free time available and only receive about 700 euros per month.
The cost of being parents
It is a fact that the United Kingdom is far behind other countries in terms of policies that support paternity: in Sweden and Norway there is a maternity leave, reaching a high percentage of the salary that becomes 100% the first 10 weeks in the case of Norway.
The shared discharge in the United Kingdom has recently been introduced and that is why there is still little research in this regard. What has been confirmed is that there are more and more ways to understand masculinity and what it means to be a dad today (including changes in responsibilities when having children).
Parents are more open to the idea that they can be more involved in childcare, but those who decide to be full-time and stay at home remain a rarity.For more information we can look at parents who have adopted the role of primary caregivers in the family. These “Parents who stay at home” They were a rare thing until almost 10 years ago when the global economic crisis took place. The term was coined "Mancession" (a combination of the words "man" and "recession") to allude to the fact that many men assumed the role of "housewife" after losing their jobs because of the crisis. The National Statistics Institute of the United Kingdom reported in 2016 that there were 225,000 parents in the United Kingdom who could be classified as "economically inactive" due to family responsibilities.
Masculinity and housework
There is a little research on parents who don't work and stay at home. Starting with the work of Andrea Doucet in Canada, this line of research has been adopted by researchers in the United Kingdom. After examining the way in which these parents are represented in the media and collecting first-hand information, it is evident that masculinity in this case is determined by the way in which the media represent the parents who decide to stay at home.
For example, to explain the role of parents who stay at home, some authors name different models of masculinity, while others speak of warnings or even convey the idea that such parents are not by choice, but have seen forced to make that decision.
The desire to take care of their children full time became part of their personal identity and led them to better process the fact of applying their role as caregivers to the traditional idea of masculinity.Despite some of these negative comments, what was clear to me talking with some of these parents is that the desire to take care of their children full time became part of their personal identity and led them to better process the fact of applying their role as caregivers to the traditional idea of masculinity. This fits with some of the latest studies that suggest that there are several ideas about the meaning of masculinity and not a unique hegemonic ideal of masculinity based on working hard and earning bread for the family. It is something that is seen in the way in which parents combine paid work with family life.
It's true that every time parents they are more open to the idea that they can get more involved in childcare, but those who decide to be full-time and stay at home remain a rarity. Some reports such as the study that claimed that men "with smaller testicles were more likely to get involved in tasks such as changing diapers, feeding their children or bathing them" indicate that there is still much to do in terms of social concern about masculinity and childcare.
Author: Abigail Locke, Professor of Psychology at Bradford University
This article has originally been published in The Conversation. You can read the original article here.
Translated by Silvestre Urbón.
