Study suggests that men and women actually prefer not to split household and childcare tasks equally

研究表明，男性和女性实际上不喜欢平等地分担家务和照顾孩子的任务

A new study suggests that the unequal division of household and childcare tasks within partnerships may reflect men’s and women’s actual preferences. For example, the study found that women enjoyed childcare tasks more than men did and also reported a greater desire for responsibility for these tasks compared to men. The findings were published in Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences.

一项新的研究表明，夫妻关系中家务和育儿任务的不平等分配可能反映了男性和女性的实际偏好。例如，研究发现，女性比男性更喜欢照顾孩子的任务，而且与男性相比，女性更渴望承担这些任务。研究结果发表在《进化行为科学》杂志上。

While it is becoming increasingly accepted for mothers to work outside the home, the division of family roles among men and women still leans toward women taking on more of the childcare tasks. While most scholars presume that this gender disparity reflects deeply-rooted beliefs about gender, study authors April Bleske-Rechek and Michaela M. Gunseor propose that it may have more to do with male and female preferences for household responsibilities.

虽然母亲外出工作越来越被接受，但家庭角色在男性和女性之间的划分仍然倾向于女性承担更多的育儿任务。尽管大多数学者认为这种性别差异反映了根深蒂固的性别观念，研究报告的作者April Bleske-Rechek和Michaela M. Gunseor提出，这可能与男性和女性对家庭责任的偏好有关。

Bleske-Rechek and Gunseor say that one theory is that gender differences in preferred family roles were sexted through evolution. According to evolutionary theory, as child-bearers, women reinforced their reproductive success by investing in the health of offspring. Men, on the other hand, competed with other males over access to a limited number of reproductively valuable females. Men, therefore, benefited from traits that facilitated competition and physical strength, while females benefited from traits that promoted childrearing.

Bleske-Rechek和Gunseor说，有一种理论认为，家庭角色偏好中的性别差异是通过进化选择的。根据进化理论，作为生育孩子的人，妇女通过投资于后代的健康来加强她们的生育成功。另一方面，男性与其他男性争夺数量有限的有繁殖价值的女性。因此，男性受益于促进竞争和身体力量的特征，而女性受益于促进养育子女的特征。

The researchers say these gender differences in traits and values might impact how men and women prioritize certain household tasks. Remarkably, few studies have considered men’s and women’s attitudes toward household tasks.

研究人员表示，这些性格和价值观上的性别差异可能会影响男性和女性如何优先处理某些家务。值得注意的是，很少有研究考虑到男人和女人对家务的态度。

Bleske-Rechek and Gunseor sought to fill this gap, by systematically asking two samples of men and women about their preferences for housework and family care. The first sample was a group of 323 young adults between the ages of 18 and 23. The second sample involved 113 middle-aged adults between the ages of 31 and 46, the majority of whom were married or cohabitating with a partner (93%) and had at least one child (85%). Middle-age participants were asked to rate their enjoyment of a series of 40 childcare tasks and 58 household tasks, and young adults were asked to imagine how much they would enjoy these same tasks.

为了填补这一空白，Bleske-Rechek和Gunseor系统地询问了两个男性和女性的样本，关于他们对家务和家庭照顾的偏好。第一个样本是323名年龄在18到23岁之间的年轻人。第二个样本涉及了113名年龄在31岁到46岁之间的中年人，其中大多数已婚或与伴侣同居(93%)，有至少一个孩子(85%)。中年参与者被要求评价他们对一系列40项托幼任务和58项家务任务的享受程度，年轻人被要求想象他们会有多喜欢这些任务。

When totaling the ratings across the 40 childcare tasks, women’s overall enjoyment of these tasks was greater than men’s. Young women’s ratings of enjoyment were higher than men’s for 5 out of 10 childcare tasks. Middle-age women’s ratings of enjoyment were greater than men’s for 7 out of 10 childcare tasks. As the researchers emphasize, not one childcare task was rated more enjoyable by men than women.

当把40项育儿任务的评分加在一起时，女性在这些任务中的整体享受程度要高于男性。在10项照看孩子的任务中，有5项年轻女性的满意度高于男性。在照看孩子的任务中，中年女性的满意度比男性高得多。正如研究人员强调的那样，没有一项育儿任务会让男人感觉到更加开心

The researchers next examined whether the participants’ enjoyment of a task was related to their desired responsibility for the same task. “If men and women feel strongly about sharing all childcare tasks equally, then how much they enjoy a task should not be associated with how much responsibility they want for a task,” the researchers discuss. However, this association is exactly what the researchers found. “Within each sample as a whole and within each group of men and women, individuals tended to want more responsibility for childcare tasks they liked and less responsibility for those they did not like.”

研究人员接着检查了参与者对某项任务的喜爱程度是否与他们对同一项任务的期望责任有关。“如果男性和女性都强烈希望平等分担所有的育儿任务，那么他们对一项任务的喜爱程度不应该与他们希望承担多少责任联系在一起。” 研究人员讨论。然而，这种关联正是研究人员所发现的。“在每个样本中，在每一组男性和女性中，每个人倾向于在他们喜欢的育儿任务上承担更多的责任，在他们不喜欢的任务上承担更少的责任。”
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Gender differences were again revealed when it came to household tasks. Among both samples, men enjoyed tasks to do with outdoor labor and home maintenance more than women did. Women preferred cleaning, food prep, family scheduling, and home decorating. Moreover, this pattern mirrored the way the participants wanted these tasks to be divided — women tended to prefer men to take care of home maintenance tasks and men preferred women to take care of home decorating tasks.

在家务方面，性别差异再次被揭示出来。在两个样本中，男性比女性更喜欢户外劳动和家庭维护的任务。女性更喜欢清洁、准备食物、安排家庭生活和装饰家庭。此外，这个模式反映了参与者希望这些任务被划分的方式——女性更倾向于让男性来完成家庭维护的任务，而男性则倾向于让女性来完成家庭装饰布置的任务。

The participants were also asked to indicate along a scale whether they would prefer to be the breadwinner within a partnership, the homemaker, or to share these roles equally. Across both samples, although 56% of men and 56% of women chose the egalitarian option, 36% of women chose a response closer toward homemaker and 35% of men chose a response closer toward breadwinner.

参与者还被要求在一定尺度上表明，他们是愿意在一段婚姻中承担养家糊口的责任，还是愿意承担家庭主妇的责任，还是愿意平等地分担这些角色。在两个样本中，虽然56%的男性和56%的女性选择了平等分担的选项，但36%的女性选择了更倾向于家庭主妇的回答，35%的男性选择了更倾向于养家糊口的回答。

The researchers say that while the gender disparity in family roles is typically viewed as a burden on women, their study suggests that the situation is more nuanced than that. Unequal role sharing might not signal unfair treatment or cause resentment among couples. The authors suggest that future research should explore whether task preferences among couples match up to the way tasks are actually divided within partnerships.

研究人员表示，虽然家庭角色的性别差异通常被视为女性的负担，但他们的研究表明，情况比这更微妙。不平等的角色分担可能并不意味着不公平的待遇或导致夫妻之间的怨恨。作者建议，未来的研究应该探索夫妻之间的任务偏好是否与伴侣之间的任务分配方式相匹配。