| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 教育研究所 === 101 === With decreasing gender inequality in educational attainment, female participation in the labor force has increased over the years. However, the traditional concept of men being “breadwinners” and women being “homemakers” remains. For working women, employment doesn’t mean less family responsibilities. It creates more pressure on the shoulders of women than on men and brings on problems with child care and family conflicts. The effects of working life of both wife and husband on family life cannot be ignored. This paper discusses the relationship between the type of maternal employment and the academic achievement of children from grades 7th to 9th in Taiwan. It attempts to understand the possibility of balancing decisions concerning their children’s learning and being employed among married women.
This paper used data of junior high students collected by the Taiwan Education Panel Survey (TEPS) in 2001 and 2003 and focuses on the sample of students with both parents. It further divided maternal employment situations into four types: mothers employed from grades 7th to 9th of their children , mothers employed only in grade 7th, mothers employed only in grade 9th, and mothers not employed from grades 7th to 9th. This paper used the method of propensity score matching to estimate the average treatment effects on the treated, that is, mothers' employment. In other words, the paper intended to find out what the average treatment effect of the employment on children's academic achievement would be if mothers employed in one of the three maternal employment situations had chosen not to be employed instead.
The results were as follows: First, the longer that mothers were employed during their children's junior high years, the more differences in family or personal backgrounds were found between employed mothers and non-employed mothers. The employed mothers whose employment status continued to be stable tended to have more advantageous family conditions and personal backgrounds. Secondly, in general, the maternal employment had negative impacts on children’s academic achievement. The negative effects, however, varied between 1 to 2 points (out of 100 points) only. Moreover, mothers continuously employed throughout children's junior years did not show any cumulative adverse effect on children's academic achievement, while the short-term maternal employment (mothers employed only at grade 7 or at grade 9 of their children) had larger negative effect than that of the long-term employment (mothers employed all the way from grade 7 to grade 9). Thirdly, depending on children's gender and family socioeconomic status, different types of maternal employment conditions had different impacts on their children’s academic achievement. In general, maternal employment had more adverse effects on boy’s academic achievement and the same was true for the children of middle and upper class families.
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