• Domestic division of labour - how the jobs in the household are divided between people in the household.

• Instrumental role - this is geared towards the husband and achieving success at work so that he can provide for the family financially. The husband is the breadwinner.

• Expressive role - geared towards the wife and her primary socialisation of the children and meeting the family’s emotional needs. The wife is the homemaker - full time housewife.

• Segregated conjugal roles - couple has separated roles - the man has his jobs to do and the woman has her jobs to do. Leisure activities also tend to be separate.

• Joint conjugal roles - couples share the household work and tasks between each other and share child care. They will also tend to share their leisure activities.

• March of progress - refers to how things in domestic life had shifted to being more equal with couples sharing tasks.

• March of progress and symmetrical family coined by - Young and Wilmott.

• Symmetrical family - there is more equality in what the husband and wife does in the home. Husband may do tasks that are traditionally feminine and the wife may do tasks that are traditionally masculine.

• Criticism of Young and Wilmott - Anne Oakley: she argues that the findings that Young and Wilmott had were exaggerated. Young and Wilmott had interviewed husbands and most of them stated that they do ‘help’ their wives with domestic work and tasks. However, this could simply include taking the children on a walk or taking the trash out. For Oakley, this is not enough evidence for symmetry in the household. Oakley had done her own research and found that only 15% of husbands had high levels of participation in housework, and only 25% of the 15% had high participation in childcare. This meant for Oakley, that there was not enough evidence for symmetry in the household as it was still the woman who was doing the majority of the work.

Taking responsibility for children

• Ferri and Smith (1996) - found that fathers took responsibility for childcare in fewer than 4% of families.

• Dex and Ward (2007) - Found that although fathers had high levels of involvement with their 3 year old child, such as playing with them, when the child became sick, only 1% of father took responsibility.

Taking responsibility for quality time

• Southerton (2011) - says that taking responsibility of organising family quality time falls to the mother to organise. Argues that organising family time is difficult due to the demands from work and also trying to manage personal leisure and family quality time. Also states that leisure time between the husband and the wife is different. The mother may take personal leisure time however this time may be interrupted with having to take care of the children, however a mans leisure time is likely to not be interrupted.

Explain the gender division of labour - Crompton and Lynoette

• Cultural explanation - division of labour is determined by patriarchal norms and values in our culture. Society expects women to perform domestic labour and are socialised into this norm at a young age.

• Material explanation - women earn less money than men which means that it is more economically beneficial for them to do the childcare and housework while the man as the ‘breadwinner’ brings in the larger portion of the money.

• Gershuny (1994) - couples whose parents had a more equal relationship are likely to share housework equally also.

• Man Yee Kan (2001) - younger men do more housework. Most claim to do more housework than their fathers. More women claim to do less housework than their mothers.

• British Social Attitudes survey (2013) - less than 10% of under 35s agree with traditional division of labour compared to 30% of over 65s.

• Man Yee Kan - every £10,000 a year more a woman earns, she does 2 hours less housework per week.

• Xavier Ramos (2003 - where the woman is the full time breadwinner in the household and the man is unemployed, she still does the same amount of housework as the man does.

Same sex couples and gender scripts

• Dunne - lesbian couples are more likely to describe their relationship as equal as they share housework and child care equally. They are also more likely to give importance to each others careers.

• Difference between lesbian and heterosexual couples - heterosexuals are under pressure to conform to either masculine or feminine ‘gender scripts’ whereas lesbians are not under this pressure as tasks aren’t linked to gender scripts.

Resources and making decisions in households

• Barrett and McIntosh - men gain more from women domestic work than they give back in financial support. Financial support from men often comes with strings attached. Men are usually the ones that make the decision on spending on important items.

• Pahl and Vogler (Feminist sociologists) found two main types of control over family income:

• Allowance system - men give their wives an allowance out of which she needs to budget to meet the families needs with the man retaining surplus income.

• Pooling - both partners have access to income and have joint responsibility for its expenditure e.g. joint bank accounts.

Domestic violence

• Domestic violence - any pattern or pattern of incidents of controlling, coercive or threatening behaviour, violence or abuse done by those ages 16 and over who have been intimate partners or family members, regardless of gender or sexuality.

• Why domestic violence has more social causes than psychological causes - domestic violence is too widespread to simply be the work of a few mentally challenged individuals. Domestic violence accounts for between a sixth and a quarter of all reported violent crime. Domestic violence does not occur randomly but follows particular social patterns and these patterns have social causes.

• Dobash and Dobash - marriage legitimates domestic violence against women by conferring power and authority on husbands and dependency on the wives.

• Jonathon Allen (2004) - women are much more likely to be victims of multiple incidents of abuse and sexual violence.

• Aniyah Dar (2013) - points out that it can be difficult to count separate domestic violence incidents as victims may not be able to reliably recall all of the incidents.

Official statistics and domestic violence

• Official statistics understate the true extent of the problem for many reasons

• Domestic violence crimes appear on the official statistics if they have been reported. Victims may be unwilling to report a case of domestic violence.

• Police and prosecutors may be reluctant to record investigate and prosecute cases that have been reported.

Sociological explanations for domestic violence

• Radical feminist view - men are seen as the enemy and they see marriage as the key institution in patriarchal society and the main source of women’s oppression. See that men dominate women through violence or the threat of violence.

• Materialistic view - inequality means that some families have fewer resources than others others. Those on low incomes or living in cramped accomodation are likely ton experience higher levels of stress. This reduces their chances of maintaining a functional healthy relationships and increased res of conflict. Lack of money reduces the social circle and reduces social support for those in under stress.

• Those that are likely to experience domestic violence are younger women or those living in deprived areas, people who have suffered the loss of a father figure.