{"title":"Fathers Combining Work and Care: Flexible Work Arrangements and Paternal Involvement Across Financial Situations","authors":"Carla Brega, Mara A. Yerkes, Marc Grau-Grau","doi":"10.1177/09500170251386322","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Flexible work arrangements significantly impact childcare divisions among dual-earner parents, yet few studies address their impact on fathers as primary caregivers. This article explores the relationship between fathers’ ability to work flexibly and their share of childcare responsibility across financial situations. A capabilities perspective is applied to better understand why fathers’ childcare aspirations may not align with what they are capable of in practice. Using 2021 survey data on fathers ( <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">n</jats:italic> = 493) and mothers ( <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">n</jats:italic> = 472) of young children in different-sex partnerships from four European countries, multinomial logistic regressions are estimated to predict childcare responsibility. Findings suggest fathers’ spatial flexibility (working from home) increases their likelihood of being the person primarily responsible for childcare, whereas temporal flexibility (varying the start/end times of the working day) does not. Economic conditions influence these dynamics, with financially strained fathers benefiting most from spatial flexibility.","PeriodicalId":48187,"journal":{"name":"Work Employment and Society","volume":"29 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.9000,"publicationDate":"2026-01-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Work Employment and Society","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09500170251386322","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ECONOMICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Flexible work arrangements significantly impact childcare divisions among dual-earner parents, yet few studies address their impact on fathers as primary caregivers. This article explores the relationship between fathers’ ability to work flexibly and their share of childcare responsibility across financial situations. A capabilities perspective is applied to better understand why fathers’ childcare aspirations may not align with what they are capable of in practice. Using 2021 survey data on fathers ( n = 493) and mothers ( n = 472) of young children in different-sex partnerships from four European countries, multinomial logistic regressions are estimated to predict childcare responsibility. Findings suggest fathers’ spatial flexibility (working from home) increases their likelihood of being the person primarily responsible for childcare, whereas temporal flexibility (varying the start/end times of the working day) does not. Economic conditions influence these dynamics, with financially strained fathers benefiting most from spatial flexibility.
期刊介绍:
Work, Employment and Society (WES) is a leading international peer reviewed journal of the British Sociological Association which publishes theoretically informed and original research on the sociology of work. Work, Employment and Society covers all aspects of work, employment and unemployment and their connections with wider social processes and social structures. The journal is sociologically orientated but welcomes contributions from other disciplines which addresses the issues in a way that informs less debated aspects of the journal"s remit, such as unpaid labour and the informal economy.