When it comes to making your relationship work, one good way to go about it is to divvy up household chores fairly, according to a Swedish study…!If household chores aren’t divided evenly, it’s women who suffer the emotional strain, noted the researchers – and the equality problem goes beyond who tackles the chore list, with women feeling they aren’t on equal footing with their opposite sex partner.
At age 21, both men and women reported roughly the same level of psychological distress, such as anxiety, restlessness, and concentration problems. Yet by age 42, that shifted, with women’s level of distress rising while the men’s stayed the same, according to the findings.
The key contributor for women’s distress was the unequal distribution of domestic chores. But the most distressed women not only performed more household work but felt a greater sense of gender inequality in the relationship. Researchers also noted that if a woman felt on equal ground with her partner, the distress dissipated, even if they pulled more weight around the house.
“The results of this study indicate that it is not only a matter of whether the responsibility for domestic work is equal or not, but also the relational context in which the responsibilities are divided within the couple relationship,” the authors wrote in the study.
“It is not the work per se,” said American psychologist Jill Weber in an interview with WebMD. “It’s the feeling that the woman is not getting support from her partner. Inequality often translates as a lack of emotional support.”
Family psychiatrist Alan Manevitz, MD, also told WebMD that the distress results not so much from an unequal division of household chores but from feeling a lack of respect or appreciation in the relationship.
“One partner’s unhappiness will lead to stress in the whole family,” he added. “What matters most is that couples agree and have the same vision about how to divide things up, and that that vision evolves and has flexibility.
Plus a man doing his fair share around the house may even boost his female partner’s sex drive. According to Ian Kerner, PhD, sex therapist and New York Times best-selling author of She Comes First, the best foreplay for women is “choreplay,” or when a man does household chores without being asked.
Does it make a difference in your world, when the chores are split fairly? How do you decide who does what?
1 Comment User Comments
Add a commentRainbowRay
June 22, 2012
11:46 am
I read somewhere that in terms of doing chores or maintaining the household, in terms of earning potential, the male earns $21, 000 annually whereas the woman (the sole housekeeper) earns over $60 000 annually (based on surveys, opinions from households and I bet the above blog in some way as well). That means women (if it were a real job in terms of being paid a salary would earn more then three times as much as the male. I wonder why?).
I agree that lack of “respect and emotional support” is part of the problem. Many famlies go by the adage, “the man is the breadwinner” (these demographics are also changing based on changing times and the economy, upgrading education and so on) and the woman the house and family caretaker. I think today based on what I’ve read, the times are changing where families are being forced to “cooperate” with each other in terms of “sharing the chores” or else let the relationship fall apart.
You would think men living on their own before they got married would know this because they were forced to look after themselves which also means, Vacuuming for yourself, cooking for yourself, doing laundry for yourself, right? Remembering these times of youth, they would bring that experience to the marriage
relationship and apply what they learned in that relationship (should, but not always). IF that’s the case (not always), then why did they ever get married?
“Love, respect, cooperation, attitude” and BEING AWARE of changing trends with families would also help. I take my own and RainbowRay’s Advice–I read and that is why I know about what has been happening with the changing family unit–I READ and EDUCATE myself so when I have a family one day (DREAM) I can apply what I”ve read and followed in the media, etc. Pays to plan ahead, despite the LONG CLIMB to the top!
My father could never get my mother to help around the house, I wonder why?
LOVE
RainbowRay