The Possibility of Gender Convergence on Work-lifestyle: A Preliminary Study of College Students'' Attitude towards Househusband

• Main Authors: Wen-hsin Liu, 劉雯馨
• Other Authors: Ching-li Yang
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/fma9zw

碩士 === 南華大學 === 社會學研究所 === 95 === 　　As the innovation of contraceptive, progress of egalitarian movement and the rise of female labor force participation rate, today’s women have varied choices between family and labor market. Women’s participation in labor market is the turning point of traditional gender role in which men are breadwinners and women are housekeepers. Actually, women have struggled and shifted between family and labor force market for a long time. The process is always dynamic. Some women could be struggling for entering the labor market, some eagerly want to redeem their home duties, and the others are in the middle and haven’t made their final decision. 　　 　　According to today’s female diversified lifestyle preference, Hakim(2000) put women in developed countries in the 21st century into three groups: adaptive women, worked-centered women and home-centered women. First of all, the adaptive group consists of women who want to combine family and employment together (for example: a teacher). They have no definite idea about which one is their most favor. They make investment in occupation usually just for avoiding joblessness. Secondly, the work-centered women usually don’t have children, but they may be married or unmarried. They are minority, but the number of this kind of women has increased gradually. Just like male, they have high labor force participation rate and pay much attention to market competition and public affairs. They invest in occupation are not for avoiding joblessness, but for the development of professional career. Finally, housewife is the representative of home-centered women. They are also minority and the number of this kind of women is decreasing. They have the lowest labor force participation rate, prefer not to work, want to stay at home, and give priority to children and family life throughout their life. Their education levels are not necessary lower than the other two kinds of women’s, but their qualified education is for marrying men with higher social and economic statuses. 　　 　　Today’s women have had diversified work-lifestyle preference already, but today’s men still have only one choice – breadwinners. In this paper, we quest that when more women are moving from housework to market work; will men have the possibility of moving from market work to housework? Is it possible that the gender division of house/market works will be replaced by a professional division? That is, is it possible that there will be a gender convergence on work-lifestyle? 　　 　　Following the Hakim’s idea (Hakim, 2000), I designed a work-lifestyle questionnaire to collect college students’ attitudes on househusband and their preferences on house/market work. A nation-wide sample of third grade college students by a Proportional Probability Sampling (PPP) procedure is created. Result firstly show that most men accept wives entering labor market, but still want wives charging in housework. Secondly, men and women’s attitude toward doing housework are similar, but men extremely emphasize they want to be breadwinners. Thirdly, most men and women want to work, but the main reason for men is being a breadwinner and the main reason for women is being economic independence. Fourthly, the proportion of accepting a househusband for women is lower than the proportion for men. Finally men accept others being a househusband, but not themselves. These results indicate that the appearance of househusband is possible in Taiwan, but it could not be popular because most women reject the exchange of gender role. 　　 　　Since both men and women want to participate labor force market, in terms of employment, there will be a gender convergence on work-lifestyle. But since most men and women reject a househusband, in terms of diversified lifestyle, there will be not a gender convergence on work-lifestyle, at least in the near future.