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Couples are more likely to divorce if the husband does half the domestic chores
Submitted by Matt on Tue, 2012-10-02 01:36
Article here. I have my thoughts on this, too long for here, so it's in the first comment. Excerpt:
'Attention married men, here’s the perfect excuse to put your feet up – sharing housework can lead to divorce.
Research has suggested that the more chores a man does, the more likely the couple will split.
The survey of couples found that while most were happy to share childcare, the women still did the lion’s share of the housework most of the time.
And in 11 per cent of cases, the women did almost all of it.
When the man finally did do his bit, things seemed to go wrong.
The divorce rate among those who shared chores equally was about 50 per cent higher than among those where the woman did most of it, the study by the Norwegian government found.'
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Comments
Welcome to bizarre-o world
Puzzling, and counter-intuitive. Wonder what's happening here. It is so hard to generalize if you have a broad-based study (and I don't know if this is) that crosses boundaries of sub-societal groups. One thing to examine a couple who, for example, and are both "consciously progressive" as some term it, but then the next couple studied happens to be very conservative and also belong to a religion that has prescribed gender roles that both people were raised to live within. So really, how to interpret such things? Dunno. Just posting this because I frequently see feminists write about how women are so much happier when men do more "housework" (often ignoring all the contributions men actually make to home upkeep), but then I see stuff like this. I can only shake my head and wonder. Could it be that there are some women who just plain don't exactly like doing housework but feel comfortable in that role for whatever reason, but resent it too (like some men being in the traditional breadwinner role but resenting it being all on them, but feeling comfortable in it, so they continue in it) -- so the result is that they complain about it but keep at it anyway? I have met more than a few women (particularly those of a certain age and older...) who talk about how they do "all the cooking," but then when their daughter-in-law or husband tries to get into the kitchen even just to help a bit, she throws them out. It's a thing with some people. Some people (of both sexes) like to bitch about their burdens in life but don't seem ready to part with them.
Maybe this kind of study says more about human nature generally than divorces or what leads to them in particular. But it does lead to the next question-- why is is that when couples supposedly share more of the housework do they seem more likely to divorce? Maybe that is the real question that needs asking. I don't pretend to have the answer. Really, the older I get, the more illogical and downright bizarre the human race seems to be.
50% + 50% doesn't equal 100% sometimes
Hmm, A guy work 8-10 hours a day, comes home and does 50% of the chores, homework with the kids, then the kids do 50% of the chores because they have to do their part as well. So If dad is doing 50% of the housework, and the kids are doing the other 50% of the housework, just what is mom doing all day when the dad is working and the kids are in school?? Bitching about how bad she has it that she is a housewife and has to do all the stereotypical chores of a real woman. That same woman who is pulling her weight as a housewife would be the same woman who would pull her weight in the work force if she worked. It's the person, not the idea of splitting the house work that causes the divorce. That was my case. 9 hours of work, 3 hours of cooking, laundry, homework with kids...and now I have to romance her like an Italian Casanova with a special dinner and an hour or so of how great she is and all the great things she does for the family. Good greif.
I don't know what to make of
I don't know what to make of this survey. But I can say that in my family most women do 100% of the housework and when considering all my grandparents, great aunts and cousins, etc. we have an extremely low divorce rate. Not only that, but most of my adult family is sincerely happily married. My family is made up of mostly atheists and Catholics (though not very strongly practicing Catholics). One common thread I notice in my extended family is, wether the women do all the housework or not, each partner has a very defined aspect of the household that he/she has full control of based on what they value. So perhaps the problem the survey reveals lies in the sharing of chores especially if they are loosely defined. If you think about it, people can have different standards and priorities when it comes to household chores, so I can see how sharing this could lead to arguments if each spouse has a different value, yet expected to do a "fair share".
I have never understood peoples obsession with 50/50 split of everything in marriage because when you consider what roles people prefer or what they naturally have an ability towards and what they value, then very rarely would 50/50 of financial contribution, household chores, etc be an ideal situation.
I imagine the couples who divorced after sharing household chores did not place similar value on the chores. The men either hated doing the housework, or the women didn't appreciate it. That's why it's important to find out what people value before assuming 50/50 sharing of household chores is the right lifestyle for a marriage.
My take is this:
When men share in the housework, there is a greater chance for conflict, as the work is "never done to her expectations."
There is a difference in standards and how clean is clean. The man is more practical and gets the job done. The woman is typically obsessive about every mundane detail, particularly if the work is done by someone other than her. Note that she isn't as picky about what she does or doesn't do, she's picky about what others do or don't do.
Basically, the bottom line is: No matter what you do, it will never be good enough.
MAJ
Honestly I look at this in
Honestly I look at this in the same light as couples who cohabitate also having a higher divorce rate. A correlation is NOT a causation. A couple who abides by traditional gender roles is likely more traditional in general and therefore may also feel a greater need or societal pressure to stay married. That's good if it gets a couple over a rough spot in their marriage but it's bad if someone feels obliged to stay in a situation they're truly unhappy with, that contains emotional or physical abuse, or any number of other reasons.
women lose interest
The study does present a result that is exactly the opposite of what women (notably feminists) have been telling men for decades. We men have heard, again and again, that we must do half the housework. I see this demand as a shit test. If a man does 50% of the housework, in addition to all the other things he does (usually bringing in most of the money too), he demonstrates that he is easily manipulatable and controllable. Women then lose interest. They say to themselves "this guy's a wimp." Women need a challenge. A man who has strong limits, who doesn't care if he pisses his mate off by expressing his opinion (this does not mean he doesn't love her), a man who is willing to definitively and consistently say "no," is an interesting man with backbone and character -- a man worth staying with. I believe women feel that way, even if they don't get their way in terms of the man doing more housework.