Equally Shared Parenting

Abstract

Conventional images of motherhood and fatherhood, social interactions, and genderbased job pressures push couples toward unequal parenting. Equally sharing parents resist those pressures, and construct equality through everyday negotiations and ongoing decisions about family and work. They do not believe that mothers are more responsible for children, or more suited to care for them, than fathers. They avoid gender-based decisions about jobs that reinforce a gender-based division of labor at home. Qualitative research is necessary to unravel the complex interactions between work and family arrangements, and to show how economic, social, and ideological factors constrain family arrangements, but are also transformed in their creation.

Father’s involvement and parenting styles in Portuguese families. The role of education and working hours

“…Only in Play activities were fathers and mothers equally involved. Thus, in this sample, families could still be characterized as more 'traditional' regarding gender role organization in child related activities, with fathers spending less time with their children and in a more supportive role, engaging primarily in enjoyable and fun experiences (e.g., Deutsch, 2001;Hwang & Lamb, 1997;Lewis & Lamb, 2003;Torres, Veríssimo, Monteiro, Santos, & Pessoa e Costa, 2013).…”

The organization of children's secure base behaviour in two-parent Portuguese families and father's participation in child-related activities

“…While contemporaneous women are taking responsibilities in both the domestic and the broader economic spheres, a new image of men emphasizing a caring father, who is actively engaged in the daily lives of his children and sharing responsibilities and tasks in a more egalitarian way across economic, domestic and child-care spheres, is emerging (e.g., Balancho, 2004;Cabrera, Tamis-LeMonda, Bradley, Hofferth, & Lamb, 2000;Deutsch, 2001;Lamb, Frodi, Hwang, & Frodi, 1983;Parke, 1996). Data suggest that although, at this point in history, some men are behaving differently from fathers in previous generations, and even from some of their peers, this change may be more modest than conveyed by the popular media (Lamb & Tamis-Lemonda, 2004;Parke, 1996;Pleck & Masciadrelli, 2004).…”

Envolvimento paterno e organização dos comportamentos de base segura das crianças em famílias portuguesas

“…Em vez da atribuição de papéis específicos e complementares, surge um novo ideal de co-parentalidade em que ambos os pais partilham responsabilidades e tarefas nos domínios financeiro, doméstico e nos cuidados das crianças de um modo mais igualitário, pelo que, a divisão baseada no género é diluída (Deutsch, 2001;Cabrera et al, 1999;Cabrera, Tamis-LeMonda, Bradley, Hofferth, & Lamb, 2000).…”

“…A imagem cultural da mulher como primeira prestadora de cuidados e do pai como figura substituta, ou apenas como companheiro de brincadeira parece ser, ainda, uma crença bastante enraizada na sociedade Ocidental (Deutsch, 2001;Parke, 1996;Rohner & Veneziano, 2001). Na realidade, até há aproximadamente uma década atrás, era visto como pouco masculino, para o homem, passar muito tempo envolvido nos cuidados das crianças, com excepção do apoio temporário à mãe (Rohner & Veneziano, 2001).…”