Do Women in Highly Qualified Positions Face Higher Work-to-Family Conflicts in Germany than Men?
Autor/in:
Busch-Heizmann, Anne; Holst, Elke
Quelle: Deutsches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW); Berlin (Discussion Paper, 1658), 2017. 34 S
Inhalt: Changing employment conditions lead to new chances, but also new risks for employees. In the literature, increasing permeability between occupational and private life is discussed as one special outcome of this development that employees must face, especially those in highly qualified positions. Drawing on existing research, we investigate in how far women and men in those positions differ in their perceived work-to-family conflicts (WFC), considering the mediating role of gender specific job opportunities. Referring conflicting theoretical arguments, we hypothesize that in Germany - as a conservative welfare state - women, especially those with family responsibilities, will perceive higher WFC than men in those positions. Our analysis is based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP). Using the Siegrist instrument on effort-reward imbalance we find that women in highly qualified positions perceive higher WFC than men. This association is explained by women’s lower willingness to take risks, and also party explained by lower job rewards women receive. It gets visible even more strongly if women’s lower time-based burdens in the job are controlled for. Mixed results are observed concerning associations between family responsibilities and WFC, which is in line with ambivalent results in the literature.
Quelle: Deutsches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW); Berlin (Discussion Paper, 1567), 2017. 29 S
Inhalt: Social norms and attitudes towards gender roles have been shown to have a large effect on economic outcomes of men and women. Many countries have introduced policies that aim at changing gender stereotypes, for example fathers’ quota in parental leave schemes. In this paper, we analyze whether the introduction of the fathers’ quota in Germany in 2007, that caused a sharp increase in the take-up of parental leave by fathers, has changed the attitudes towards gender roles in the grandparents’ generation. To this end, we exploit the quasi-experimental setting of the 2007 reform and compare grandparents whose son had a child born before the 2007 reform to grandparents whose son had a child born after it. Our results suggest that such policy programs not only induce direct behavioral responses by the target group but also have indirect effects on non-treated individuals through social interaction and can thus change attitudes towards gender roles in a society as a whole.
Schlagwörter:Elternzeit; Evaluation; Geschlechterstereotyp; Normen; Politikevaluation; Soziale Interaktion; Vater
CEWS Kategorie:Arbeitswelt und Arbeitsmarkt, Vereinbarkeit Familie-Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis
Partnerschaftliche Rollenteillung - Ein Erfolgsmodell
Autor/in:
Bürgisser, Margret
Quelle: Bern: hep, 2017. 254 Seiten
Inhalt: Viele junge Paare möchten Gelderwerb, Kinderbetreuung und Hausarbeit teilen, wagen es aber aus Angst vor Nachteilen oder wegen traditioneller Rollenvorstellungen nicht. Dabei bietet das egalitäre Modell mit beiderseitiger Teilzeitarbeit für Eltern wie Kinder vielerlei Chancen. Die Sozialforscherin Margret Bürgisser hat 28 Elternpaare mit partnerschaftlicher Rollenteilung in Abständen von zehn Jahren dreimal über ihr Modell interviewt und 2016 auch deren Kinder befragt. Die Ergebnisse der Studien sind beeindruckend: Nicht nur auf kurze Dauer, sondern auch im Zeitverlauf sind egalitär organisierte Paare mit ihrem Rollenmodell großmehrheitlich zufrieden. Fast alle würden es wieder wählen und auch die Kinder bevorzugen dieses Modell für ihre Zukunft. Dieses Buch vermittelt einen Überblick über die Erfahrungen und Beurteilungen der »Rollenteilungs-Pioniere«. Es dokumentiert die Vielfalt an interessanten und berührenden Aussagen aus dem Paar- und Familienalltag. Weiter zeigt es auf, wie die erwachsenen Kinder die im Elternhaus erlebte Rollenteilung beurteilen und sich ihre eigene Zukunft vorstellen. Zehn Porträts von rollenteilenden Paaren und eine Literaturstudie runden die Publikation ab. Das vorliegende Werk richtet sich an junge Paare, die Familie und Beruf optimal vereinbaren wollen. Doch auch Vereinbarkeitsfachleute, Gleichstellungsbeauftragte, Fachleute in Eltern-, Berufs- und Laufbahnberatung, therapeutisch Tätige, Sozialarbeitende, Lehrpersonen, Dozierende und wissenschaftlich Forschende können neue Einsichten zum Thema Rollenteilung gewinnen.
CEWS Kategorie:Arbeitswelt und Arbeitsmarkt, Vereinbarkeit Familie-Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis
Dokumenttyp:Monographie
Neue Väter? : Rollenmodelle zwischen Anspruch und Wirklichkeit
Autor/in:
Bambey, Andrea; Gumbinger, Hans-Walter
Quelle: Frankfurt: Campus (Frankfurter Beiträge zur Soziologie und Sozialphilosophie, 24), 2017. 300 Seiten
Inhalt: Gegenwärtig entstehen neue Modelle elterlicher Rollengestaltung, die durch ein gestiegenes Engagement der Väter und eine emphatischere Vater-Kind-Beziehung gekennzeichnet sind. Dieses Buch zeigt das Nebeneinander unterschiedlicher Gestaltungsformen von Vaterschaft im Modernisierungsprozess anhand eines breiten Typenspektrums auf: Fallanalysen lassen verschiedene Lösungen für die komplexer werdenden Anforderungen an heutige Väter erkennen.
Schlagwörter:Elternschaft; neue Männlichkeit; Rollenverteilung
Should I stay or should I go? : The effects of precariousness on the gendered career aspirations of postdocs in Switzerland
Autor/in:
Bataille, Pierre; Le Feuvre, Nicky; Kradolfer Morales, Sabine
Quelle: European Educational Research Journal, 16 (2017) 2-3, S 313–331
Inhalt: The assumption that men are more likely to undertake and succeed in an academic career, because the requirements of professional success in this occupation are compatible with normative gender assumptions, particularly that of fulfilling a ‘male breadwinner’ or main household earner role, implying reduced domestic and care commitments, is discussed. It is suggested that Switzerland offers a particularly interesting case for this study, because of the combination of the specific structure of academic careers, the characteristics of the non-academic labour market and the dominant gender regime. It is shown that, in this particular context, the aspirations of postdocs to remain in academic employment or to look for non-academic jobs are directly related to their position within the domestic division of labour and to their personal and family circumstances. However, this does not necessarily lead to a clear-cut divide between work-committed men, who ‘succeed’ (and hence stay), and care-committed women who ‘fail’ to climb up the academic career ladder (and hence leave). The results suggest that the situation is more complex and requires a subtle distinction between different ideal-types of post-doctoral experiences that do not always cut neatly across gender lines.
‘Publish or perish’ : Family life and academic research productivity
Autor/in:
Callaghan, Chris W.
Quelle: SA j. hum. resour. manag. (SA Journal of Human Resource Management), 15 (2017) 2, 307 S
Inhalt: Research purpose: The influence of work-to-family and family-to-work spillovers is well documented in the human resources literature. However, little is known of the relationships between the pressures faced by academics to publish and the potential family life consequences of being a highly productive academic.
Research design, approach and method: This research sought to investigate these relationships within the context of a large South African university by testing associations between family life variables such as marriage and dependent children against measures of the following specific types of research publication: (1) South African Department of Higher Education and Training–accredited journal publications; (2) Thompson Reuters Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) and ProQuest’s International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS)– indexed journal article publications; (3) conference proceedings publications; (4) conference paper presentations; (5) book chapter publications; (6) book publications; and (7) gross research productivity, reflecting a volume or quantity measure of research publication.
Main findings: ISI and/or IBSS journal article publication is found to be negatively associated with dependent children, but only for male academics, and to be negatively associated with female gender over and above the effect of family life variables in testing.
Practical/managerial implications: Human resources managers in universities need to be cognisant of the specific pressures faced by staff that are required to produce ever more research publications, in order to help them achieve work–life balance.
Contribution: In a global context of increasing pressures for research publication, and for higher and higher numbers of publications, it is necessary to identify the potential costs involved for high-volume–producing academics, particularly in terms of family versus work.
Keywords: research productivity; family-work life balance
Schlagwörter:Familie; Forschungsproduktivität; Publikation; South Africa; Südafrika; Vereinbarkeit; work-life balance
CEWS Kategorie:Europa und Internationales, Vereinbarkeit Familie-Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis
Quelle: European Educational Research Journal, 16 (2017) 2-3, S 332–351
Inhalt: This paper addresses the topic of work–life interferences in academic contexts. More specifically, it focuses on early career researchers in the Italian university system. The total availability required from those who work in the research sector is leading to significant transformations of the temporalities of work, especially among the new generation of researchers, whose condition is characterized by a higher degree of instability and uncertainty. Which are the experiences of the early career researchers in an academic context constituted by a growing competition for permanent positions and, as a consequence, by a greatly increased pressure? Which are the main gender differences? In what elements do Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics disciplines differ from Social Sciences and Humanities? The collected narratives reveal how the ongoing process of precarization is affecting both the everyday working activities and the private and family lives of early career researchers, with important consequences also on their future prospects.
Quelle: European Educational Research Journal, 16 (2017) 2-3, S 277–297
Inhalt: This paper discusses results of a research project on equal opportunities between women and men in the postdoctoral phase in German universities. It illustrates how the funding system is organized and whether this contributes to more equal opportunities for men and women, especially concerning the work–life interference. Although the system loses women after the doctorial phase, equal opportunity is not a core issue in the promotion of postdoctoral researchers in Germany. Instead, it tends to be addressed indirectly via an array of different compensatory support programmes. One key finding is that certain programmes, such as ‘coaching’, ‘networking’, ‘mentoring’ or financial support, are not offered everywhere, and therefore many postdoctoral researchers do not have the opportunity to utilize them. Furthermore, we found evidence of a gender-specific demand for support programmes. Another finding was that work–life interferences in scientific careers are not addressed by support programmes. The organization of everyday life is not taken into account. Given the context of uncertain career paths in Germany and the unequal working conditions of women and men in academia in Germany, it becomes clear that equal opportunities cannot be realized by ignoring the informal and gendered handling of work-life-balance.
Academic Excellence and Gender Bias in the Practices and Perceptions of Scientists in Leadership and Decision-making Positions
Autor/in:
Linková, Marcela
Quelle: GV/GR (Gender a výzkum / Gender and Research), 18 (2017) 1, S 42–66
Inhalt: How to assess quality has become one of the central concerns for contemporary research, not least because of the proliferation of research assessment systems around the globe. Concomitant with this has been the growing attention to factors that compromise the credibility of assessment, especially gender, ethnic, racial and geopolitical bias. In this paper I analyse how lab leaders and research managers in the natural sciences specifically construct excellence and relatedly the demands of the research profession, and how gender bias plays out in these imaginaries. The material for the study comes primarily from two highly successful public research institutes of the Czech Academy of Sciences and specifically from individual and group interviews with lab leaders and research managers on topics of research governance, assessment, and quality. The focus is on the natural sciences because the discipline has driven the introduction of research assessment in the country as well as research and innovation reforms more broadly since the new millennium. Building on the distinction between the logic of choice and the logic of care developed by Annemarie Mol (2008), I explore the limits of individual choice for conceiving excellence and the gendered outcomes it produces.
Schlagwörter:care ceiling; excellence; Exzellenz; Frauen in der Wissenschaft; gender bias; gendered organization; glass ceiling; leadership; Maskulinität; maternal wall; Matilda-Effekt; Mutterschaft; research profession; Stereotyp
CEWS Kategorie:Vereinbarkeit Familie-Beruf, Wissenschaft als Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis
How do you take time? : Work–life balance policies versus neoliberal, social and cultural incentive mechanisms in Icelandic higher education
Autor/in:
Smidt, Thomas Brorsen; Pétursdóttir, Gyða Margrét; Einarsdóttir, Þorgerður
Quelle: European Educational Research Journal, 16 (2017) 2-3, S 123–140
Inhalt: It is suggested that the realization of work–life balance policies at the University of Iceland is compromised by an emphasis on neoliberal notions of growth and performance measurements in the form of new public management strategies. This is sustained by overt and covert incentive mechanisms, which in turn create a range of different gendered implications for academic staff. The results from semi-structured interviews suggest that while this tension field affects all academic staff, it is generally less favourable to women than to men. If women were granted time for the sake of family obligations, they risked a setback in their academic career due to decreased research activity. Women tended to view academic flexibility as an opportunity to engage in domestic responsibilities more so than men; and male interviewees tended to view the prioritization of family as a choice, while women tended to view it as a condition.
Schlagwörter:Gender; Geschlechterunterschied; Gleichstellungsmaßnahmen; incentive mechanisms; Island; neoliberal university; neoliberalism; new public management; Vereinbarkeit; wissenschaftliches Personal; work-life balance
CEWS Kategorie:Europa und Internationales, Vereinbarkeit Familie-Beruf, Wissenschaft als Beruf, Geschlechterverhältnis