Yesterday, we talked about parental involvement with children of adolescent age (and a little younger). That study used time diaries (Panel Study of Income Dynamics, Child Development Supplement) kept by parents on a 24 hour basis.
Today, we will look at the study published by Drs. Amy Hsin (Queens College/CUNY) and Christina Felfe (Universdity of St. Gallen, Switzerland) in the journal, Demography. When Does Time Matter? Maternal Employment, Children’s Time With Parents, and Child Development was published about 6 months ago. It used the same sort of diaries, but this study focused on moms of kids under 6 years of age.
The goal of their study was to determine if moms taking jobs when kids are little truly harms or hurts the kids’ development. There were two components to the research- does employment reduce the amount of time kids and parents interact- and whether those interactions yield positive or negative outcomes.
Hsin and Felfe found that working moms seem to manage to find the right medium between quantity and quality. Like the study we discussed yesterday with older kids, mom’s work activities, while they change the potential maximum time with their kids, do not affect those activities that yield positive results. More to the point, the potential detrimental activities- where moms and kids have “quantity” time- are reduced, so the potential damage is attenuated.
But, all is not wine and roses. Not surprisingly, lower educated moms have harder times balancing work and childcare. While fathers may step up to the plate fostering child development, high-school educated moms don’t seem to balance work and childcare well. That’s not because of who they are, but because less educated moms have worse jobs that well-educated moms. But, working in bad jobs (assemblers, checkers, cleaners, nurse’s aides) are correlated with negative outcomes regardless of the mom’s education.
These researchers also amplified the findings we discussed yesterday by Milkie et. al. Reading, eating together (no phones), having discussions, or attending events together- these augmented the cognitive development and behavioral aspects of the younger kids, as well as the older ones.
And, when there is more time (when moms don’t work), that quantity of time is often spent on “bad” actitivites. Unstructured activities- vegging out watching tv “together” or playing video games- these are the activities that are associated with negative outcomes for the kids. These negative actions can actually negate the effects of educational and structured activities for the younger children!
So, it seems we have guidelines… but not absolute answers.
Let’s keep doing our best. Our kids- and our kids’ futures- depend on us.
I did the best I could at the time. Even stay-at-home working moms get stuff wrong from the research you cited. And I had some college, but obviously the information I had back then was different from what you described. At any rate I failed. We had one-to-one time. We didn’t eat dinner together. I let them roam free. I didn’t overload them. And they all went in different directions away from their parents.
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Ann:
EVERY PARENT gets it wrong. We all wish to be perfect. And, obsess over our first; realize by the second that every rule is not a rule and things have to be fluid. By five, we are old hat.
I’m not sure that going in different directions than the parents is all that bad- are we trying to raise clones? Or cogent, caring humans?
I opt for the latter. Sure, I would have loved ONE of the tribe to join me in my adventures (they had to when they were younger), but I understand the need for them to pursue their dreams and their loved.