Work-life balance and parental coping patterns during home schooling as a result of Covid-19 lockdowns: empirical evidence from Bulgaria

ABSTRACT The main focus of this article is to shed light on the challenges to the work-life balance (WLB) caused by school closures due to lockdowns in Bulgaria. Both paid and unpaid jobs occur intensively in the family environment due to anti-epidemic measures of physical distancing. School closures introduce a novel element of unpaid work: intensive parental participation in the educational process during distance schooling, which requires additional competencies, time and effort, as well as the need to reconcile work with these new obligations. The analysis is based on original CAWI pseudo-longitudinal surveys, conducted during the first (April-May 2020) and second lockdowns (November-December 2020) in Bulgaria, as well as data on changes in personal contacts with family and friends, help given and received, personal care given and received from SHARE Survey, Wave 8 COVID-19 Survey 1 (July-August 2020). Terminological distinction is made between online and distance learning, because the pressures on parents vary. A push-pull model is elaborated, which could influence coping patterns when children are in home schooling due to lockdowns. The main coping pattern observed is that families were better prepared for the second lockdown, because by this time they had grandparents living in the same household.