Sociology Plus
Domestic Division of Labor Definition
The domestic division of labor is the division of household and child-care tasks among the members of a family, particularly between the adult male and female partners.
Prediction versus Practice
Willmott and Young predicted that families would become progressively more “symmetrical,” with an increasingly equitable division of domestic labor between men and women, and the arrival of the “new man” was widely proclaimed. Research suggests otherwise: although attitudes toward sharing domestic tasks have shifted, in practice women still perform a disproportionate share of housework and child care.