How the type of working day affects work-life balance and mealtime balance

A study based on the time use survey

Datos Bibliográficos

ID4356071
AutoresÁngel Alonso-Domínguez (0000-0002-3482-4329, Universidad de Oviedo, autor de correspondencia), Javier Callejo (0000-0002-0856-5642, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia), Cecilia Díaz Méndez (0000-0003-3200-4922, Universidad de Oviedo), Cecilia Díaz-Méndez (Universidad de Oviedo)
Año2020
Volumen29
Número4
Páginas1082-1103
Fecha de publicación2020-11-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaTime & Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0961-463X • E-ISSN: 1461-7463
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0961463x20947531
OpenAlexW3049467171
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas4
Referencias citadas26

How people balance work and personal or family life has been widely examined, showing gender inequalities that put women at a disadvantage relative to men. However, although this is a question of time compatibility, there has been no research on whether the type of working day (continuous or split) has different effects on this balance for men and women. The Time Use Survey enables us to examine this balance in two areas that are key to understanding the difficulty of reconciling timetables. On the one hand, there is the relationship between the type of working day and housework or family care (balance between paid and unpaid work). On the other hand, there is the relationship between the type of working day and eating (mealtime balance). The data indicate that the type of working day affects the balance between paid and unpaid work less than might be expected, since in all cases, it is women who do more unpaid work, while men's involvement in housework changes little, whether they have a continuous or a split working day. However, the continuous working day is more favourable to balancing work and family life. In contrast, work-mealtime balance is a cultural feature that equalises both sexes in relation to an established habit that encourages sharing time outside work. We can thus speak of shared (non-work) time and unshared (unpaid) work

Balance (ability · Balance problems · Disadvantage · Economics · Labour economics · Paid work · Political science · Time-use survey · Unpaid work · Work (physics · Work–life balance · Working hours · Working time · Emotional Labor in Professions · Gender Studies and Social Issues · Psychology · Social Psychology · Work-Family Balance Challenges