anacweeks.bsky.social
Senior Lecturer in Comparative Politics, University of Bath, author of Making Gender Salient: From Gender Quota Laws to Policy bit.ly/3wzcTGM. Editor, LSQ. gender quotas, parties, gender & far right, mental load #academicmama https://anacweeks.github.io/
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Congrats Jelle and team! Super interesting work.
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We manipulate the salience of individual mental load by asking respondents to think carefully about it, writing a list of mental tasks they are mostly responsible for & asking their feelings about it.
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❤️❤️❤️
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Thanks Mirya! Would love to know what you guys find… sounds relevant for a new project @annanhelgoy.bsky.social & I are working on. Let’s catch up at epsa !
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Thank you for sharing, and I’m glad it resonated with you. We have some interesting answers from open-ended responses in the paper that speak to this impact too! My favorite was “I wish for a clone to be a wife for me.”
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We find little evidence for significant gender differences within the experimental effect. Yet, in reality the mental load is highly gendered. So long as women continue to be mostly responsible for invisible hh labor, the mental load may indeed be a contributor to the stalled gender revolution. 9/9
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Interestingly, in response to the mental load prime fathers but not mothers prefer reduced working hours for their partner. Our findings thus suggest that fathers consider compensating for this cogntive burden at the expense of their spouse’s working time. 8/9
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The experimental results show a negative impact of mental load priming on political interest, likelihood of public forms of political participation, vote intention, and interest in opportunities to advance at work. It also negatively impacts preferred working hours. 7/9
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Mothers are also less likely to believe that the division of mental work in their household is fair, and more likely to express negative emotions such as stress or unhappiness about it. 6/9
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Our descriptive data provides confirmation from a new case (the UK) that gender gaps in the mental load are large, and associated with stress and negative emotions for mothers but not fathers. Mothers say they do 78% of the mental load in their households, while fathers report doing 57%. 5/9
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To test our argument, we rely on original experimental data from employed UK parents w children. We manipulate the salience of individual mental load by asking respondents to think carefully about it, writing a list of mental tasks they are mostly responsible for & asking their feelings about it 4/9
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Unlike physical household labor, the mental load is boundaryless and diffuse. We argue that by taking up significant cognitive space and energy, the mental
load may reduce political and work engagement through a crowding-out mechanism. This could operate via cognitive overload or stress. 3/9
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In both politics and the labor market, substantial gender gaps in participation and leadership stubbornly persist.
We argue that gender differences in the mental load can help explain why the gender revolution remains stalled. 2/9
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done !
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@rosieshorrocks.bsky.social
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Thanks so much Cas! I hope it was a good discussion.
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We are delighted to be joined by Prof. Zoe Lefkofridi (PUSH*BACK*LASH) for the opening event of this series
📆 Wednesday 29 January
🕰️ 3-4pm (UK)
📍 Online
For further details and registration: events.teams.microsoft.com/event/1c80a7...
@profrosiecamp.bsky.social @profsarahchilds.bsky.social
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Looks great! I’m unfortunately teaching then :(
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Excited to join you all & hear your thoughts! Here’s a blog about the paper www.genderontheballot.org/gender-quota... and link to working draft. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers..... See you soon!
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❤️ ❤️❤️
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Thanks so much Kirsten! And adding my brilliant co-author @leahruppanner.bsky.social
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Go Jess ! 😍
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And now one of our directors @jess-smith.bsky.social on a paper on motherhood penalties and fatherhood bonuses in running for office (with @anacweeks.bsky.social and Susan Franceschet)
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This made me curious to look at the interaction... it's not significant. There's no difference between older Dem vs younger Dem dads within our sample. Over-time data could tell a different story, though.
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This is a nice way of putting it! I'm glad it tracks with your experiences. My own interest in this research coincidentally ;) ramped up when i was pregnant with my third.
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Thanks! We are writing this paper about determinants among mothers and fathers now. Age does not matter among fathers, but partisanship actually does. We have voted for Trump vs Biden in 2020. Among fathers, voting for Biden is linked to carrying more mental load. Doesn't matter for mothers.
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Thanks Brendan — I am a fan of your work with Leah on this too!
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right back at you !! 🦄🌈
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Thanks so much, I am so happy to hear that you liked it! Would love to get a virtual coffee soon and hear more about your work :)