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Mothers at Work: Leveraging Maternal Knowledge to Build Caring Workplace Cultures
Nicole Dillard, University of Minnesota; Taylor Cavallo, University of Minnesota; Ana Carolina Rodriguez, University of Minnesota; and Courtney Buchanan,
Accepted
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Recent scholarship has emphasized the transformative potential of adopting an ethics of care within organizational settings, particularly in fostering inclusive leadership and equitable workplace cultures (Rodriguez et al., 2025). Ethics of care (EoC) was defined by Tronto (2013) as a social practice enacted by individuals and institutions, aiming to maintain the world by attending to the needs of multiple and interdependent stakeholders in the best possible way. In organizational studies, EoC has been proposed as a moral guideline encouraging caring actions to promote mutual benefits and human flourishing (Freeman & Liedtka, 1991) and to address issues such as work intensification, heightened competition, and other social costs associated with an excessive focus on performance (Lemon & Boman, 2022). Empirical research has indicated that a caring approach may support the inclusion of employees with disabilities (Jammaers, 2023) and women’s careers (Elley-Brown & Pringle, 2021), and promote sustainable community development (Moriggi et al., 2020) and social transformation (Roumpi et al., 2020). Armitage (2018) defines an EoC in Human Resource Development (HRD) as a framework that centers “relationality, responsiveness, and responsibility,” offering a lens through which workplace dynamics can be reimagined to prioritize human dignity and well-being. While organizations are increasingly attentive to formal care structures, less is known about how workers themselves informally enact EoC—especially in contexts where care is undervalued or unsupported.
This study extends prior research on maternal knowledge and navigational capital (Dillard & Walker, 2022) by examining how working mothers operationalize EoC through everyday maternal practices in professional settings. Drawing on qualitative data from a larger, anonymous study of working mothers (n=212), we analyzed open-ended survey responses and brief, semi-structured interviews to explore how maternal knowledge—including maternal thinking (Ruddick, 1989) and othermothering (Collins, 2000)—emerges as embodied forms of relational care within the workplace. Maternal knowledge refers to the insights, relational skills, and caregiving strategies developed through lived experiences of nurturing, advocating, and problem-solving in the context of raising and supporting others (Ruddick, 1989; O’Reilly, 2021). In professional environments, these same skills often manifest through mentoring, advocating for equitable policies, building peer support networks, and modeling emotional resilience. Despite being frequently undervalued or rendered invisible in organizational contexts, maternal knowledge functions as a powerful resource that supports both individual success and communal well-being within workplaces (Dillard & Walker, 2022). While maternal knowledge has traditionally been studied in domestic or educational settings, its application within the workforce underscores its broader relevance to leadership, relational labor, and institutional navigation. The recognition of these caregiving-informed competencies challenges dominant workplace norms that prioritize individualism, detachment, and productivity over interdependence and care (Armitage, 2018). By naming and valuing maternal knowledge as a form of expertise, researchers and practitioners alike can begin to rethink workforce development policies in ways that better support working mothers across sectors.
Navigational capital, as defined by Yosso (2005), refers to the knowledge, skills, and strategies that individuals develop to successfully move through institutions not designed with their experiences or success in mind. For working mothers, this often includes navigating rigid organizational systems shaped by gendered expectations of caregiving and limited structural support (Anderson et al., 2018). When institutions fail to account for caregiving responsibilities—through inflexible policies, biased advancement structures, or lack of parental accommodations—working mothers must draw on accumulated personal and community knowledge to persist and succeed. This form of navigational capital is often deeply rooted in maternal practices, where resilience, advocacy, time management, and boundary-setting become survival strategies within inequitable professional environments (Dillard & Walker, 2022). While these strategies may be informal or unacknowledged within organizational policy, they constitute a critical mechanism through which working mothers maintain care-centered workplace participation. Recognizing maternal knowledge as a source of navigational capital allows HRD and organizational scholars to better understand how care-based practices function not only as personal coping mechanisms but also as tools for fostering institutional change, workplace equity, and inclusive organizational culture.
For the study, participants, who represent a demographically diverse sample across sectors, described how they and others perform care through mentoring, boundary-setting, emotional labor, and advocacy. These practices not only help navigate institutional barriers but also foster microcultures of care that exist alongside or in resistance to dominant workplace norms. Preliminary findings suggest that maternal knowledge, informed by an ethic of care, acts as navigational capital that enables both individual resilience and cultural transformation within organizations. By bridging HRD, feminist theory, and organizational studies, this research contributes to broader conversations on how informal care practices shape the future of inclusive and equitable work environments.
These findings hold significant implications for the fields of HRD and organizational sciences. They highlight the need to broaden traditional frameworks of leadership, learning, and professional development to include relational, care-based practices that have long been undervalued in organizational contexts. By recognizing maternal knowledge as a legitimate and impactful source of organizational insight, this research challenges dominant productivity-centered paradigms and invites more holistic, equity-driven approaches to workforce development. Incorporating EoC into HRD strategies can lead to more inclusive policies, supportive organizational climates, and sustainable pathways for employee well-being and advancement. Ultimately, this study contributes to the growing call for organizational systems that value human complexity, interdependence, and care as core dimensions of effective and ethical work cultures.
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Developing and Evaluating the Usability of 'Hamkke Dolbom'(care together): An Integrated Digital Support Application for Young Carers in South Korea
Jun Hee Park, Ewha Womans University; eunseo nam, Ewha Womans University; and Sieun Lee, Ewha Womans University
Accepted
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<Introduction>
Young Careers(13-34 years old) in South Korea are taking care of families with severe diseases, disabilities or mental illnesses, and they are facing serious psychological and emotional difficulties, such as an average of 21.6 hours of heavy care per week, and as a result, life satisfaction is lower and the experience rate of depression is more than seven times higher than that of ordinary young people(Ministry of Health and Welfare, 2023). Existing welfare services are difficult to find necessary information at a glance, and do not fully consider the characteristics of Young Carer who are reluctant to reveal their care situations. Policy information is scattered, and there is no integrated platform that gathers it in one place, so it is difficult to get the help or obtain information in the moment of need. Reflecting the characteristics and needs of Young Carer, this study proposes a mobile application called "Hamkke Dolbom(Care together)” that integrates customized information provision, online community, and self-care functions. Furthermore, it aims to establish an effective digital support model for Young Careers by evaluating the possibility and usability of the app.
<Research Methodology>
The application's iterative development and evaluation process integrated multi-stage expert validation, foundational literature review, and empirical testing with end-users. Initial application requirements and core functions were established following structured expert consultation with two specialists in Young Caregiving and one research professor involved in related academic fields. A high-fidelity prototype was subsequently developed using Figma, grounded in these expert insights and relevant prior literature (preliminary studies). The research then proceeded through three stages of validation to ensure technical viability and usability. First, technical validation was performed via consultation with three active professionals in the application development sector, focusing on assessing the prototype's implementation feasibility, establishing robust personal data protection protocols, and proposing sustainable long-term maintenance strategies. Second, an empirical usability study was conducted with a target group of 30 young family caregivers residing in South Korea. This assessment utilized a rigorously modified version of the Users Version of the Mobile App Rating Scale (UMars), specifically tailored to the context and objectives of this research. Finally, the collected research data were analyzed using SPSS 29.0, and frequency analysis and descriptive statistics were employed to process the survey results and derive key quantitative findings regarding the application's usability metrics.
<Results>
The results of this study are as follows.
First, based on the expert consultation with developers, the key functions of the Together Care application—such as customized service information filtering (public/private) and an AI chatbot—were found to be technically feasible. Feedback on data protection and monitoring systems further validated the application’s technical soundness.
Second, the usability evaluation with young family caregivers indicated that the Together Care application was perceived positively overall. Participants reported that the community function (with anonymity) and the self-care recording feature helped provide emotional support, and that the application effectively reflected their needs and caregiving situations.
<Conclusion and Implications>
Through the development of an integrated application for Young Carers, this study sought to establish a digital support system that concurrently addresses the difficulty young people face in accessing appropriate welfare information and mitigates the problem of emotional isolation associated with their caregiving roles. The feasibility and usability of this application were robustly validated through expert consultation and subsequent user evaluation. Significantly, the application addresses the complexity of navigating South Korea’s welfare system—often based on individual application—and provides a critical platform for emotionally isolated Young Carers to connect and communicate freely with peers. This model presents a valuable challenge that could be explored prior to broader institutional implementation, especially within the Canadian context where various non-profit organizations currently offer services for Young Carers.
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Designing Intergenerational Care Models to Support Children, Older Adults, and Communities: A Campus-Based Case Study
Fran McIntyre, A Better Balance
Accepted
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Childcare shortages, an aging population, and fragmented service systems are simultaneously straining families, employers, and communities. Intergenerational care, co-located childcare and adult day services with structured, facilitated interaction, offers a promising way to center care across the life course while maximizing shared resources. Recognizing both the urgent local need and the broader national significance, a California university engaged Pendulum Dependent Care Solutions (PDCS) to conduct a comprehensive feasibility study for an on-campus intergenerational childcare and adult care facility. The study was designed not only to determine viability but also to model how universities and employers can reimagine dependent care as critical infrastructure.
Our mixed-methods approach combined a campus-wide needs assessment (N=563), site and program benchmarking (e.g., Virginia Tech’s Center for Inclusive Intergenerational Environments, ONEgeneration, Generations Crossing), licensing and compliance pathway analysis, concept design with architects, and multi-scenario financial modeling. Findings revealed substantial latent demand among students, staff, and faculty; feasibility of shared-site design with both dedicated and shared spaces; and key success factors including structured intergenerational programming, cross-system licensing navigation, inclusive governance, and realistic enrollment/operating assumptions. Anticipated outcomes span children’s socio-emotional gains, older adults’ reduced isolation and increased daily engagement, and measurable workforce benefits in recruitment, retention, and reduced absenteeism.
By presenting this case, we illustrate how integrating childcare and eldercare can operationalize the WFRN 2026 theme—Centering Care Across the Life Course—and provide a scalable, evidence-informed model for strengthening family well-being and organizational performance.
Relevance to WFRN 2026 theme
The project centers care across childhood and later life in one setting, with daily, structured intergenerational interactions and wrap-around supports. It links family well-being with workforce performance, aligning with WFRN’s focus on practices and policies that enhance lives and organizational outcomes.
Evidence base
Peer-reviewed reviews and trials show intergenerational programs can reduce loneliness and depressive symptoms for older adults, improve cognitive/functional engagement, and strengthen children’s language, communication, and socio-emotional skills; U.S./Canadian market and policy data highlight urgent access, and affordability gaps this model addresses.
Methods / Approach
• Needs assessment (campus survey, N=563)
• Program benchmarking/site visits and operational analyses
• Licensing and compliance pathway mapping (child & adult services)
• Concept design and space planning with architects
• Multi-scenario staffing and financial modeling
• Governance options and evaluation framework design
Anticipated findings / contributions
• Feasibility conditions (space, staffing, licensing) and pitfalls to avoid
• Governance structures that include campus/community voices
• Phased rollout/pilot strategy to derisk launch
• Outcome/evaluation plan spanning children, older adults, and workforce metrics
Practical implications
• **Employers/universities:** position care as critical infrastructure; reduce turnover/absenteeism; strengthen recruitment/retention
• **Families/caregivers:** easier navigation, reduced costs/stress, inclusive design
• **Policy & systems:** bridge fragmented funding/regulatory regimes; inform shared-site pilots and tax-credit/subsidy design
Learning objectives
• Define core design elements of intergenerational shared-site models and their evidence base.
• Identify licensing/compliance pathways and governance options for co-located child and adult day programs.
• Apply a phased implementation and evaluation plan to assess child, adult, and workforce outcomes.
A/V & format needs
LCD projector, audio, and standard laptop connection. Will present slides (case visuals + framework). Q&A welcome.
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Vermont’s Decade to Near-Universal Care
Rebecca Gale, New America
Accepted
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Ten years. This was how long it took for Vermont to go from an abstract idea for near-universal child care to having one of the country’s first care infrastructure systems in place. What began with an idea from philanthropist Rick Davis to focus on the years of education and care that would have the greatest impact evolved into a powerhouse movement that has set the tone for how child care infrastructure can be created in the United States, notably without federal support. So how did they do it? On June 21, 2023, Act 76 was signed into law with a veto override that made Vermont the first state in the nation to have a near-universal childcare system. Less than 10 days later, on July 1st, implementation began. In the two years since Act 76 passed, more than 100 new child care programs have opened, creating over 1,000 spaces for children and 230 new early childhood educator jobs. Four thousand additional children now qualify for tuition assistance, and a family of four with a household income up to $184K can qualify for subsidies. While Let’s Grow Kids worked to implement the bill they had fought for, they also began the quiet, behind-the-scenes process of sunsetting the organization.
In a forthcoming paper being published by New America, journalist Rebecca Gale does a deep dive into how this movement came to be, with lessons and toolkits for how other states looking to build a movement can utilize it. At its peak, Let’s Grow Kids raised over $70M in private philanthropy and grew to 40 paid staff plus a volunteer board of 12, all in a state with a population of less than a million. This session would highlight the ambitious timeline, the pivotal support of the business community to implement a payroll tax to fund child care, and the obstacles and setbacks, as well as why the decision to sunset the organization after 10 years was paramount in building a team and effectively raising money.
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The Gendered Burden of Ecological Care: How Environmental Organizations Frame Environmental Responsibility
Sam Castonguay, Michigan State University
Accepted
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At the 2024 Work and Family Researcher’s Network Conference, Big Ideas Speaker Andrea Doucet asserted that environmental concerns such as widespread toxic exposure and climate-change-related disasters were not just ecological crises, but care crises. Indeed, addressing these environmental hazards requires us to not only care about ourselves, but also care about the health and wellbeing of our families, communities, and the natural environments we are situated within. Much like care work generally, environmental caretaking disproportionately falls on women, especially low-income women and mothers of color. Environmental social scientists document a lengthy history of gendered divisions of labor in environmental activities, with men responsible for ecological discovery and movement leadership, while women were to engage in environmental caretaking, such as ecologically-friendly household practices and family safety. While literature supports gendered trends in environmental care, little is known on how these ideas and patterns are generated and reinforced.
In this study, I seek to uncover how gendered burdens of care became intertwined with efforts to care about the environment. I turn to the entities responsible for setting environmental priorities both formally and informally: environmental organizations. I ask, to what extent have environmental organizations used gendered framing to present their ecological caretaking priorities and activities? To address this question, I used computational text analysis and web-scraping techniques to examine feminine and masculine coded language present within the public facing materials (e.g., mission statements, activity descriptions, priority area descriptions) of 50 large, U.S. based environmental organizations. Once text data were collected, I applied gender-coded lexicons to assess whether environmental care priorities were coded as masculine or feminine in nature. Lexicon construction drew on word lists developed by Gaucher, Friesen, and Kay (2011) (i.e., the Gender Decoder commonly used to assess the gendered qualities of job advertisements), Morton (2019) (e.g., masculine and feminine lexicons developed to capture gender equity and trajectories in STEM fields), and U.S. EPA (2020) environmental justice and climate change glossaries.
Preliminary analyses reveal key gender differences in the framing of environmental care priorities, with specific initiatives coded more masculine (e.g., climate change action), but more general environmental aims coded as more feminine. For example, one organization’s central mission statement featured more feminine language, with word matches such as “sustainable”, “responsible”, “nurture”, “support”, “interdependent”, and “restore” appearing in the text data. However, specific initiatives, such as ones focused on the fossil fuel industry, featured overt masculine language, with word matches such as “challenge”, “champion”, “fight”, “aggressive”, or “defend”, especially when these initiatives involved activism, political engagement, or activities outside of personal action or responsibility (e.g., protesting and divesting from fossil fuel companies versus reducing personal vehicle emissions). Additional analyses are needed to parse out clearer gender trends, but these early results suggest that what it means to care about the planet is gendered in unique ways. Further, while women’s environmental care may be seen as standard and commonplace, evidenced by feminine presentations of environmentalism generally, men’s environmental care is seen as heroic and exceptional. In sum, our common, gendered understandings of care through parenting, caretaking occupations, or eldercare extend to ecological care, and are reinforced by social institutions.
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Harnessing MASS™: A Coaching-Based Framework to Advance Caregiver Wellness Across Home, Work, and Community
Teresa Dabney, Strive 4ward Coaching
Accepted
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CONCERNS
Family caregivers tend to provide care alongside family, workplace, and personal roles. The added role of family caregiver can create a reactive state of being. They constantly adjust decisions and plans around caregiving demands and the needs of others, often pushing their own needs down the ever-shifting list of priorities. When the reactive state becomes the norm, caregivers can cycle through various thoughts and feelings.
These may include overwhelm, stress, and loss of control of their circumstances and environment. Guilt can arise when they feel they haven’t done ‘enough’, experience anger, or even when they take a break. Some also experience a profound sense of disappearing or losing their identity. Together, these challenges can lead to emotional distress, lack of fulfillment, burnout, and depression (to name a few), creating significant risks to well-being. Caregiving also adds complexity to managing other life roles. Taking on the caregiver role can happen unexpectedly or earlier than anticipated. It can be emotionally charged depending on the relationship and how the individual became a caregiver. Not all caregivers enter this role by choice, and this lack of choice deepens the concern and highlights the urgent need for tools and frameworks that can provide support.
METHODS
This presentation draws on a practice-based coaching approach informed by qualitative observations from caregiver coaching sessions, emerging insights from written exchanges, and informal oral discussions with caregivers.
Findings from the AARP Caregiving Research Report (July 2025) and related caregiver wellness studies inform this presentation.
The International Coaching Federation’s Core Competencies ground this method, with emphasis on active listening, evoking awareness, and facilitating growth.
FINDINGS
• Through a coaching-based framework, caregivers can improve their personal wellness while navigating the complex demands of caregiving.
• The MASS™ framework (Mindset, Allowances, Strategies, Support) provides a structured yet flexible tool that empowers caregivers to maintain balance, resilience, and well-being across the life course. The MASS™ framework enables caregivers to:
• Reframe limiting beliefs (Mindset) that exacerbate stress and feelings of isolation.
− Establish and communicate healthy Allowances (boundaries) to protect time and energy.
− Adopt and adapt Strategies that support daily routines, health practices, and problem-solving.
− Build and leverage Support systems that expand beyond family to include workplace, faith-based, and community networks.
− Reframe not only what caregivers or employers must do, but how they approach these responsibilities, creating healthier, more sustainable practices.
• Practice-Based Outcomes: Caregivers who learn and apply MASS™ as a practice gain greater clarity, reduce feelings of guilt, and improve alignment between their personal values and their family caregiving roles.
IMPLICATIONS
• Individual Implications: MASS™ can improve capacity to pursue personal aspirations and reframe how necessary caregiving and life tasks are approached, aligning wellness with meaningful goals.
• Organizational Implications: Coaching frameworks like MASS™ can be used by employers to integrate caregiver support programs, contribute to improved family caregiver well-being at home and at work, higher employee retention, and a healthier workplace culture. This 360-degree approach recognizes the interconnectedness of workplace and home responsibilities, fostering resilience in both environments.
• Research: The MASS™ framework offers a testable model for measuring the impact of coaching-based interventions on caregiver wellness, resilience, and workforce outcomes.
• Policy: Findings highlight the importance of embedding caregiver wellness frameworks into public health initiatives and organizational benefit structures to reduce systemic inequities in caregiving support. MASS™ also contributes to cultural shifts that recognize and value caregiving as essential work, supporting structural reforms that better integrate care across family, workplace, and community contexts.
• Practice: The MASS™ coaching framework provides an accessible, replicable, and adaptable tool for caregivers across diverse contexts. While broadly applicable to navigating life changes and transitions, this presentation emphasizes the caregiving context. It aligns with WFRN’s 2026 theme, Centering Care Across the Life Course, offering a practical pathway to improve wellness and fulfillment, promote healthier family systems, and foster supportive workplace environments.
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The Lived Experience of Care: Work-Life Integration of Gen Z Pharmacists in Urban Nigeria
Charles Aigbona, Institute for Work and Family Integration
Accepted
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This qualitative study explores the work-life integration (WLI) experiences of 54 Generation-Z community pharmacists in Lagos State, Nigeria, a key demographic and urban centre in a developing economy. Drawing on semi-structured interviews and guided by a theoretical framework that includes the Conservation of Resources (COR) Theory and Generational Theory, the research provides a decolonial perspective on care and work-life dynamics from an African context.
Findings reveal that pharmacists contend with significant WLI challenges stemming from demanding work conditions (long hours, understaffing, sales target pressure) and the unique stressors of Lagos’s urban environment, including debilitating traffic and high cost of living. To navigate these challenges, participants employ diverse coping mechanisms, from proactive financial management and emotional detachment to leveraging strong social support networks. Crucially, individual differences and Gen Z-specific values—such as a prioritization of mental health, a desire for flexibility, and aspirations for international migration (“Japa”)—profoundly shape their perceptions and coping strategies.
This research contributes to global care theory by providing empirical insights from a non-Western context, nuancing established theories with contextualized findings. It highlights how an understanding of care must integrate the practical realities of a high-pressure, urban African environment and the unique perspectives of a new generation entering the workforce. The study’s insights offer a foundation for developing policies and practices that foster sustainable WLI and talent retention, ultimately reshaping global understandings of care beyond Euro-American frameworks.
Keywords: Work-Life Integration, Generation Z, Community Pharmacists, Lagos, Care Theory
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No mystery about it: how caring, friendship, and relational labor close cases in female-led detective shows
Kimberly Fox, Bridgewater State University; and NJ Anderson, Bridgewater State University
Accepted
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Overarching Questions/Concerns
This exploratory research project investigates how recent female-led “non-detective” detective shows—including Poker Face, Elsbeth, High Potential, and The Residence—reimagine investigation and problem-solving through the ethics and practices of care. Unlike traditional procedurals centered on institutional authority, these series feature protagonists who operate outside formal systems, relying on empathy, attentiveness, friendship, and keen observational skills as investigative tools.
The project asks:
• How do these narratives reframe inquiry and justice as forms of relational care emphasizing observation and attentiveness by women without formal authority?
• In what ways do they highlight friendship, empathy, and collaboration as critical social and emotional (and, to solve the crime, practical) skills?
• How might these cultural portrayals contribute to the broader goal of a care-centered society – one requiring both structural reforms and cultural shifts that recognize care as a shared responsibility?
By analyzing these series as cultural texts, the study explores how popular media can cultivate new imaginaries of relational labor that extend beyond familial caregiving to encompass workplace, community, and friendship networks. It illustrates how care-centered collaboration and emotional intelligence support healthy workplaces, individuals, and communities.
Statement on Methods
The project employs qualitative textual analysis of the first season of each series, using an ethics of care cultural sociology framework to interpret how gender, class, race, and institutional context shape representations of care. Episodes were coded for themes related to empathy, friendship, observational skill, collaboration, and the ways institutional hierarchies are countered through informal networks of trust and care.
This exploratory approach aims to identify patterns through which relational care functions as a narrative logic in these shows, offering insight into how the media participate in cultural conversations about responsibility, recognition, relational intelligence and the value of care.
Important Findings
• Observational Skill as Relational Labor:
Across the shows, observation itself becomes a practice of care—the ability to notice what others overlook, perceive emotional nuance, and interpret social cues. For example, age and life experience sharpen perception into wisdom for Elsbeth’s protagonist, Elsbeth Tacioni. Even in The Residence, where Cordelia Cupp is brusque and exacting, her watchfulness allows her to “see” the gardener’s unspoken ambitions and emotional world, suggesting that attentive observation can itself be a form of relational care.
• Relational Intelligence as Method:
The protagonists solve problems through empathy, humor, and moral curiosity rather than procedural expertise. They treat listening, noticing, and understanding as forms of work that bridge emotion and cognition. In Poker Face, Charlie Cale uses friendship and intuition to uncover truth, modeling care as a form of practical reasoning.
• Friendship as a Mode of Care:
Friendship provides trust, recognition, and mutual support that replace formal hierarchies. These relationships illustrate how care circulates through social ties beyond family, echoing real-world discussions of relational labor in workplaces and communities. In this way, the series expand the scope of caregiving across the life course, showing how informal networks meet emotional and practical needs when formal systems fall short.
• Care as Institutional Critique:
Each series exposes how bureaucratic or patriarchal systems depend on unacknowledged relational work to function. High Potential dramatizes the working-class maternal intelligence of Morgan Gillroy within male-dominated hierarchies, while The Residence uses Cordelia’s detached professionalism to interrogate how elite institutions privilege hierarchical authority and power over observational skill and relational insight
• Cultural Imaginaries of Care-Centered Society:
Together, these shows suggest that effective problem-solving depends on empathy, collaboration, and perceptiveness—qualities necessary for a care-centered culture.
Implications for Research, Policy, and/or Practice
For Research:
This study bridges feminist media analysis, care ethics, and work-family scholarship to show how popular culture helps define and circulate ideas about care as both emotional and cognitive labor. It highlights television as a key cultural site where the moral and affective dimensions of care are publicly negotiated.
For Practice:
These findings highlight the importance of recognizing diverse forms of caregiving and relational labor, including those often invisible due to gendered, classed, or racialized hierarchies. They resonate with inclusive, care-centered workplaces that value emotional labor, observational skills and collective responsibility. Recognizing these “soft skills” as social intelligence can guide the development of more inclusive and care-centered organizational cultures.
Conclusion
This exploratory study finds that Poker Face, Elsbeth, High Potential, and The Residence collectively recast detective work as an ethic of care rooted in friendship, attentiveness, and observation. Their protagonists’ attention to others’ needs and emotional worlds exemplifies the cultural reorientation necessary for a care-centered society—one that values connection and responsibility as much as efficiency and authority.
By depicting care not as weakness but as wisdom, these series invite audiences to imagine the connection between culture and practice—where friendship, interdependence, and relational care underpin healthy families, workplaces, and communities, forming the cultural foundation of a care-centered society.
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Culture of Care, Culture of Work: Childcare Norms and Women’s Labour Outcomes among Asian Indian Immigrants in Canada
Natasha Chhabra, The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada - PIPSC
Accepted
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While Indians represent a large group of recent immigrants in Canada (approximately 5 percent of the Canadian population), little research has focused on Indians as a group separate from the broader South Asian diaspora. Moreover, there have been fewer research studies investigating the experiences of Indo-Canadian women. Many more studies have focused on the broader “South Asian” category under which research on Indians, especially Indian women, is subsumed (George, 2024). The South Asian group comprises individuals who identify their origins as being from the Indian subcontinent, including, but not limited to, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, and Sri Lanka (Tran et al., 2005). More recently, researchers have criticized this homogenization of a rather large and diverse group of individuals, and newer research now focuses on immigrants born explicitly in India (Banerjee, 2024). This paper argues that while understanding the employment patterns of Indian immigrants in Canada, separate from the larger South Asian group, is essential, this categorization of Indian immigrants is also rather broad and unhelpful in understanding how women immigrants from different regions in India participate in the Canadian labor market. Researchers have argued that diversity among Indians, in terms of ethno-religious and linguistic backgrounds, needs to be explored in greater detail (Monteiro, 2024). Therefore, this paper will examine the differences among Indian immigrant women in Canada, with a particular focus on the employment differences among them, to understand if and how heterogeneity within Indian culture, particularly norms around childcare and distribution of labor within households, influences the employment of first- and second-generation immigrant women within the Canadian policy landscape.
Immigrant men have higher employment rates compared to immigrant women, who have lower employment rates compared to both immigrant men and Canadian-born women. Data from the Canadian Census and the Labor Force Surveys from 2001 to 2019 indicate that the employment rate gap between immigrants and Canadian-born men is narrowing. However, the employment rate gap between immigrant and Canadian-born women persists. This gap is the widest for new and recent immigrant women compared to Canadian-born women. For example, according to the 2016 Canadian Census, 61 percent of new immigrant women and 68.5 percent of recent immigrant women were employed, compared to 80 percent of Canadian-born women (Crossman et al., 2021). This paper asks if the nativity gap and length of time in Canada narrow employment outcomes for Indian women and if the gap is narrower for some ethno-linguistic groups which emphasize more equal distribution of labor within households compared to others.
Indian immigrant women in Canada may arrive as international students to reunite with family members in Canada, as spouses of economic immigrants, or as economic immigrants themselves. While traditionally, women have generally arrived as dependents of either economic immigrants or to reunite with family, there has been an increase in the number of Indian immigrant women arriving independently as international students (George, 2024). This is notable because while not all international students transition to permanent status in Canada, they have traditionally been considered an essential source of labor supply. For example, among international students who arrived in the 2000s and early 2010s, approximately three out of ten became landed or permanent immigrants within ten years of their first arrival in Canada. These rates are higher for those in Canada with master’s and doctoral degrees. Of the 69,950 students who arrived from India between 2010 and 2014, 46% transitioned to permanent residency within five years of arriving in Canada (Choi et al., 2021). Past research has also established that immigrant women who arrive as dependents or spouses of economic immigrant men are more likely to be employed than immigrant women who come as part of the family class of immigration (Bonikowska & Hou, 2017). This is because the points-based system awards more points to education, skills, and previous work experience. Given these labor market outcomes, this paper asks whether there are differences among Indian women, depending on their admission category (economic, family, refugee, or non-permanent resident), and how this interacts with different ethno-linguistic groups within India.
Based on these questions, the paper will explore the following hypotheses.
H1: Differences in labor force participation in the origin community within India, shaped by historical and cultural experiences of the region, persist in immigrant employment in Canada
H2: These differences persist even after controlling for immigration category, spousal education, income, family composition, and the number of children.
H3: These differences diminish with assimilation, with the length of time in Canada
Data
This paper uses data from the Public Use Individual Microdata File (PUMF) from the Census of Population of Canada for 2016. Although other datasets such as the Longitudinal Immigration Database (IMDB) and Labour Market Surveys are available to study labor market outcomes for immigrants in Canada, the use of the Census data allows me to include the place of birth for immigrants, as well as the ability to carry out comparisons with Canadian-born individuals. The Census also collects other vital variables of interest, such as the primary language spoken at home, race and ethnicity, year of immigration, type of immigration category, highest level of education, employment in the past year, and marital status.
Using PUMF data from 2016, I will employ logistic regression models to predict labor force participation among Asian Indian immigrant women in Canada. The models will measure the effect of the region of origin within India, which serves as a proxy for gender norms, as well as human capital, marital status, the number of own children in co-residence, the number of children under five, years in Canada, and the immigrant generation and category to which they belong. Following previously established research findings, I will test models using the dependent variable: worked last year.
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Coaching with care: Health and wellness-related considerations of teachers’ extracurricular work in rural school communities
Holly Marcolina, SUNY Potsdam
Accepted
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Concerts, athletic contests, and fundraising events central to life in rural school communities require the work of teachers. Together, these teachers produce school culture and what it means to be “from” a place, fostering a sense of community and pride while enriching life in rural communities, in addition to their typical instructional duties. Although the very name extracurricular confers additional, unnecessary work, these activities and events are, in fact, an essential part of the rural school community experience. The extracurricular care work of teachers is not “extra,” but a vital part of their workplace obligations, professional experience, and broader community culture.
By failing to articulate holistically the ways that teachers are called on to cultivate and reproduce school-community relationships while navigating contemporary political and socio-cultural demands, our view of teachers’ work, schools, and rural communities is incomplete and insufficient. Extracurricular responsibilities require teachers to work well beyond the school day and their formal training for the classroom. These additional duties affect teachers’ health and wellbeing. The considerations brought forth by this critical ethnographic study substantively reshapes discussions concerned with understanding equity, burnout, and overall school culture from the perspective of teachers and for the preparation and retention of the teaching workforce. Additionally, implications for conceptualizing power and authority, particularly as connected to equitable working conditions and educational policy emerge from the data.
By examining extracurricular activities in rural school communities, what do we learn about teachers’ work at its intersection with conceptions of a critical pedagogy of place (Azano et al., 2021; Greenwood, 2008; Gruenewald, 2003)? Extracurriculars are a tableau of challenging issues, involving power relations and inequity in school communities. How do teachers who advise extracurricular activities in rural schools describe their experiences? How are power and privilege exposed in rural places through the extracurricular work of teachers?
To capture the many facets of teachers’ extracurricular work, I built a critical ethnography (Burawoy et al., 1991), centered on the Northern Appalachian region of New York State, a place with a thin line of distinction between the school and community. Here, local historical and agricultural festivals are held within school buildings, demonstrating high levels of coordination between schools and the broader community. Using a structured interview method (Saldaña, 2021), I interviewed 27 teachers to learn about the nature of their extracurricular work in rural school communities. I took fieldnotes (Saldaña, 2021) as part of participant observations at 36 extracurricular events in 12 schools. These experiences enabled me to perform extracurricular work alongside rural teachers and witness firsthand issues of power and privilege on public display that are a consistent part of teachers’ extracurricular care work. Additionally, I collected 42 community artifacts (e.g., local newspapers, newsletters, and board of education minutes), which served as another data point to triangulate the disparities between formal, written policies and the enacted, actual practices of rural schools. Each of these data sources, gathered during 13 months of fieldwork, from April 2023 – May 2024, were essential to understanding the demanding nuances of teachers’ extracurricular work. The impetus for the study was my work as an educator, specifically as a principal in a rural high school in Northern Appalachia, during which I realized the existing literature did not capture the health and wellness related intricacies of teachers’ extracurricular work nor the importance of their care work role in the broader rural community.
This study amplified the voices and experiences of teachers who do this work, providing nuanced insights about establishing and maintaining school-community relationships and detailed understandings of the nature of teachers’ work, including enduring personal sacrifices and gender-based discrimination, adding to the complexity of being both a teacher and extracurricular advisor. Since the “well-being of people and places may often require transforming existing practices” (Gruenewald, 2003, p. 10), this study has securely rooted transformation in rural school communities to teachers’ perspectives of their work. After all, pedagogy and extracurricular activities are not just about students; teachers are vital cornerstones of the sociocultural ecosystem in rural places. Describing extracurricular work from teachers’ perspectives is important but does not examine issues of control or favoritism within rural educational contexts. Who is empowered and who is unempowered? Who, or what groups, are given preferential treatment and who, or what groups, are not?
Extracurricular events in rural communities provide opportunities to examine the “contested, asymmetrical power relationships between different groups occupying the same territory” (Greenwood, 2010, p. 356). Applying a critical pedagogy of place (Azano et al., 2021; Greenwood, 2008; Gruenewald, 2003) to critically analyze extracurricular teaching care work illuminates the hegemonic intricacies of a rural school community. The data sources in this study exposed subversive inequities that, over time in rural school community contexts, have become culturally assumed parts of the conditions in which teachers work, while looking toward possibilities for more equitable working conditions and a more just future for the health and wellbeing of rural teachers.
References
Azano, A. P., Brenner, D., Downey, J., Eppley, K., & Schulte, A. K. (2021). Teaching in rural places: Thriving in classrooms, schools, and communities. Routledge.
Burawoy, M., Burton, A., Arnett Ferguson, A., Fox, K. J., Gamson, J., Gartrell, N., Hurst, L., Kurzman, C., Salzinger, L., Schiffman, J., & Ui, S. (1991). Ethnography unbound: Power and resistance in the modern metropolis. University of California Press
Greenwood, D. A. (2008). A critical pedagogy of place: From gridlock to parallax. Environmental Education Research, 14(3), 336–348. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504620802190743
Greenwood, D. A. (2010). Education in a culture of violence: A critical pedagogy of place in wartime. Cultural Studies of Science Education, 5(2), 351–359. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11422-009-9231- 4
Gruenewald, D. A. (2003b). The best of both worlds: A critical pedagogy of place. Educational Researcher, 32(4), 3–12.
Saldaña, J. (2021). The coding manual for qualitative researchers (4th ed.). Sage.
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When retirement knocks at the door: Do generativity and enjoyment of grandparenthood shape grandparents’ retirement hopes and fears?
Bettina S. Wiese, RWTH Aachen University; and Noah de Lamboy, RWTH Aachen University
Accepted
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Background
Drawing on a lifespan developmental perspective on social roles and motives (Carstensen, 1992; Erikson, 1963), our research investigates a particular, though largely neglected question in terms of the work-family interplay, that is, how grandparenthood might positively affect a person’s expectations about the transition to retirement. For many adults in their late middle age, retirement means a major change in their lives as they lose an important social role. Older workers may anticipate this transition with concern if there is no alternative to replace this role. Grandparenthood, for many people a second major life transition in late midlife, could be such an alternative. Being a grandparent offers the opportunity to take on new productive roles within the family, for example by helping the parents of grandchildren with childcare or acting as a mentor and confidant to grandchildren. Thereby, grandparenthood might help develop a positive attitude toward retirement.
However, it is most likely not the simple fact of having grandchildren or not that contributes to developing a positive attitude toward the prospect of retirement, but rather whether a person appreciates and enjoys this new family role. The enjoyment of this particular role itself might be affected by how much a person is motivated by the fulfillment of generative needs. Generativity, defined by Erikson (1963) as the concern for guiding and promoting the next generation, could influence how grandparents evaluate their role. Grandparenthood offers the opportunity to live generativity. Therefore, grandparents who have a strong need for generativity may particularly welcome and benefit from this role. These grandparents may perceive retirement as less threatening and might have greater hopes for this life stage as it provides opportunities to express generative desires and realize generative goals in the family domain. In other words, grandparents who have a strong need for generativity are likely to experience more positive feelings when thinking about or interacting with their grandchildren (i.e., joy, pride, or fulfillment), and these positive experiences could in turn provide an emotional buffer against retirement fear and strengthen positive hopes for life after retirement. Hence, we hypothesized that generativity is positively associated with retirement hopes and negatively associated with retirement fears. Second, it was expected that these associations would be mediated, at least in part, by the subjective enjoyment of grandparenthood, with generativity leading to higher enjoyment of grandparenthood, which in turn should be related to retirement-related hopes and fears.
Methods & Sample
We used questionnaire data from the first of five measurement points of a larger longitudinal research project on developmental processes in midlife. The analyses were based on data from the subsample of N = 389 participants (M = 60.05 years old, SD = 4.30) who reported having at least one grandchild. The subsample consisted of 314 grandmothers (M = 59.70 years old, SD = 4.29) and 75 grandfathers (M = 61.51 years old, SD = 4.04), all of whom lived in Germany. In order to test our hypotheses, we estimated mediation models with bootstrapping analyses. In all regression analyses, age, marital status and biological sex were included as control variables.
Results
As hypothesized, generativity was positively associated with both the enjoyment of grandparenthood and retirement hopes. Additionally, enjoyment of grandparenthood partially mediated the relationship between generativity and retirement hopes. Contrary to our expectations, neither generativity nor enjoyment of grandparenthood was significantly related to retirement fear.
Discussion
The present findings partially support the expected relationships. The greater a grandparent’s need for generativity, the greater the hopes for retirement. As hypothesized, this association could be explained in part by the joy these middle-aged adults derived from their role as grandparents. Therefore, the positive feelings that come from being a grandparent seem to reinforce the hope of generative grandparents that their lives will continue to be fulfilling after retirement. Partial mediation suggests that other psychological resources related to generativity independently contribute to more optimistic expectations about retirement. Surprisingly, neither generativity nor enjoyment of grandparenthood was related to retirement fears. It seems that generativity is supporting the potential for positive expectations about retirement, rather than acting as a buffer against fear. One explanation could be that fear of retirement largely rests on financial or health related concerns that are independent of one’s generative orientation. These distinct findings on hopes and fears underscore how important it is to consider different aspects of attitudes toward retirement separately.
Clearly, our study is not without limitations. The cross-sectional data preclude causal inference. However, this project will provide longitudinal data in the future, which ideally should also include actual transitions to retirement and possible changes not only in attitudes towards retirement but also in experiences related to grandparenthood. In summary, we advocate for more research to deepen our understanding of the intergenerational interplay between social roles in different life domains, particularly with regard to older family members and their specific need of helping the next generation to flourish.
References:
Erikson, E. H. (1963). Childhood and society. W. W. Norton.
Carstensen, L. L. (1992). Social and emotional patterns in adulthood: Support for socioemotional selectivity theory. Psychology and Aging, 7(3), 331-338.
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Intrahousehold homeownership structure and the gender division of housework
Davide Gritti, University of Trento; Agnieszka Althaber, LMU Munich; and Anna Zamberlan, LMU Munich
Accepted
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Background, research question, and main hypothesis
Gender inequality in housework remains widespread and persistent across societies (Milkie et al. 2025). Building on resource-based approaches to the division of household labor (e.g., Blood & Wolfe 1960), we argue that relative resource theory provides a fruitful framework for understanding how power dynamics shape housework division among partners, and we extend it to a largely overlooked resource: homeownership. While prior work has highlighted both the strengths and limitations of resource-based explanations (Davis & Greenstein 2013), we underscore their value for theorizing bargaining power as negotiated within intimate relationships.
In our contribution, we investigate whether within-couple housing inequality is conducive to within-couple housework inequality. Our research question is: How does intrahousehold homeownership structure shape the gender division of housework?
The relative resources perspective builds on the idea that bargaining power within couples is shaped by partners’ resources. Because housework is seen as a form of personal disutility—giving both partners incentives to minimize their share—greater resources provide stronger leverage to avoid it. Previous research has typically operationalized resources as education, occupational status, or income (e.g., Evertsson & Nermo 2007), while wealth and its distribution between partners have received little attention. This gap contrasts with the growing importance of wealth—relative to income—as a stratifier of life chances (Hällsten & Thaning, 2022).
We argue that homeownership structure is a fundamental wealth resource for testing the relative resources thesis applied to the division of housework. First, unlike education, status, or economic-based resources, it is not directly tied to market productivity, making it well suited to isolate bargaining power from household-level efficiency considerations. Second, while resource exchanges among partners can occur with any valuable resource, the shared household context makes homeownership and housework particularly intertwined and suitable for exchange. Finally, housing wealth is typically more stable than other socio-economic resources, and may thus exert a stronger and longer-lasting influence on couple-level power dynamics.
To date, no empirical work has examined the link between wealth—more specifically, housing wealth, and even more specifically homeownership—and the gender division of housework within the relative resources framework. A cautionary note regarding the role of household financial organization as a potential mediator between earnings and housework comes from Hu (2019), who shows that the bargaining power associated with earnings arises only when individuals have actual control over their finances. The evidence most closely related to our contribution comes from Wang (2014), who exploited a state-subsidized transition into homeownership in China and found that new homeowners gained bargaining power in negotiating, among other things, their share of housework.
Following the relative resources perspective, greater wealth resources in the form of homeownership translate into higher bargaining power, which in turn increases the ability to negotiate a smaller share of housework. Thus, we hypothesize that sole homeowners perform a smaller share of housework than their non-owning partners.
While the primary aim of this contribution is to introduce wealth as a relevant resource for intrahousehold bargaining, we acknowledge the simultaneous role of gender dynamics. It is highly plausible that consistent gender differences in housework persist, with women performing more than men regardless of the homeownership structure.
Data and methods
To address our research question, we need to draw on household panel surveys that follow cohabiting couples over time and include detailed information on both the distribution of homeownership between partners and the division of housework. Such data are relatively rare, as most socioeconomic surveys record wealth and assets only at the household level, thereby obscuring intra-household differences in wealth resources. At this stage, we have identified suitable data sources in the United Kingdom (BHPS and UKHLS) and Germany (G-SOEP), with the goal of expanding to other countries where comparable data exist. Cross-national comparison is especially valuable, as it allows us to assess whether the mechanisms we observe are context-specific or consistent across different institutional and housing systems.
Our outcome of interest is the division of routine housework between partners, including tasks such as cooking, cleaning, and laundry. While transitions from renting to homeownership may increase involvement in repairs or renovations, these tasks are not the focus here. On the contrary, routine housework is particularly relevant as it structures daily life, strongly affects outcomes such as labor market participation, and remains among the most resistant tasks to gender-equality changes.
To identify the effect of intrahousehold homeownership structure on the division of housework, we focus on transitions into homeownership—specifically, couples moving from renting (or other arrangements) to owning their residence. Such transitions create a new resource that can alter bargaining dynamics, particularly when ownership is distributed unequally between partners. Our main analytic strategy consists in fixed-effects models and specifically impact functions (Andreß et al., 2013; also referred to as distributed fixed effects, Dougherty, 2006), which allow us to estimate the time path of changes following the transition into homeownership. By exploiting within-person or within-couple variation, this method removes time-constant confounders and unobserved heterogeneity, enabling unbiased identification of the treatment effect under the assumption that all relevant time-varying confounders are accounted for (Allison, 2009). To examine heterogeneity by intrahousehold homeownership structure, we estimate separate models for shared ownership and sole ownership, alongside pooled models.
Preliminary findings
Our preliminary results from the UK indicate that transitions to shared homeownership have no effect on the division of routine housework. On the contrary, in cases where only one partner owns the home, owners show a slight—but not statistically significant—decline in housework, while non-owners show an increase, consistent with the relative resources perspective.
Notably, gender differences persist: across all arrangements, women continue to perform the largest share of housework. This suggests that, while homeownership represents a valuable bargaining resource, it is insufficient to overcome entrenched gender inequalities.
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The Daughter's Dichotomy: Work-Daughter Conflict, Enrichment, and Career-Family Implications
Grisel Lopez-Alvarez, North Central College
Accepted
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While existing literature has extensively examined work-family conflict and, most recently, work-family enrichment, research in these major work-family interface domains has predominantly focused on parental roles, particularly mothers, neglecting the experiences of women in other family roles. This oversight is particularly pronounced when considering the importance of cultural context in shaping women’s familial role experiences. Addressing these gaps, this research investigates the experiences of Latinx daughters in navigating the work-family interface, and the impacts of the daughter role on career decision-making and family outcomes. Drawing from qualitative interviews with 40 Latinx daughters in their early career stages, this research seeks to build new theory related to sources and implications of work-daughter conflict and enrichment. This research aims to answer three questions: (1) How do Latinx women view their daughter role in relationship to their work goals? (2) How, why, and when do Latinx daughters experience work-family conflict and enrichment associated with the daughter role? and (3) What are the implications for their career and family? By examining the daughter role, cultural influences, and the implications on careers and family, this research contributes to a deeper understanding of the work-family interface. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
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Embracing Black Fathers of Children with Disabilities in the Family Conversation
Dr. Brandy James, Ball State University
Accepted
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To comprehensively understand Black fathers of children with disabilities, their experiences must be considered throughout the family system and other social systems, such as race, policy, healthcare, and education. Addressing their influence on these systems impacts how, when, and to what extent their parenting of a child with a disability is impacted and supported. This study explored Black fatherhood within the Family Systems Theory, Intersectionality, and Fatherhood frameworks, thereby addressing the understanding of disability, initial emotional reactions to diagnosis, familial relationships, and the lack of support systems in health, education, and disability within the Black family system.
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Women as Primary Breadwinners: Implications for Work Family Conflict and Health Outcomes
Zoe Betts, Memorial University of Newfoundland; and Alyson Byrne, Memorial University
Accepted
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Overarching Questions
Breadwinning is openly discussed as which family member brings in the bulk of the family's finances and is the primary provider for the family (Warren, 2007). There has been an increase in women taking on the role of primary earner, where women outearn their spouses in 32.8% of dual-income different gender Canadian couples, up from 25.9% in 2000 (Battams & Mathieu, 2024). We suspect women face an increased chance of work-family conflict (WFC) (Van Der Lippe & Lippényi, 2018).
This may be particularly true for working mothers who are also the primary breadwinners. While early concerns that women who engaged in fulltime work would impact their kids negatively have been alleviated (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) Study of Early Child Care), the strain of balancing breadwinning, childcare and household responsibilities places a burden on women themselves (Grzywacz & Smith, 2016). We suspect that breadwinning women are more likely than their non-breadwinning counterparts to experience high levels of work-family conflict (Hypothesis 1), and that this is particularly true for breadwinning mothers (Hypothesis 2).
When breadwinning women experience increased levels of work-family conflict, we argue that this will result in increased levels of negative health consequences. High levels of work-family conflict are also associated with negative effects on workers’ general health, with working caregivers experiencing the worst health outcomes (Weale et al., 2022). We suspect that breadwinning women who experience increased work-family conflict will report worse general and psychological health outcomes over time (Hypotheses 3 & 4), and that breadwinning mothers will report poorer outcomes than their non-mothered counterparts (Hypotheses 5 & 6).
While we position that breadwinning women will experience worse general and psychological health outcomes via their increased levels of work-family conflict, we also suggest that they will report higher levels of a women’s health issue that is typically understudied in the work-family domain: menopause symptoms. While scholars have suggested that job status can act as a menopause symptom mitigator (Burke & Grandey, 2020), other studies suggest that stress can exacerbate women’s experience of menopausal symptoms (Arnot et al., 2021; Bauld & Brown, 2009). We argue that sustained work-family conflict due to one’s breadwinning role can lead to exacerbated menopausal symptoms (Hypothesis 7), particularly for breadwinning mothers (Hypothesis 8).
Methodology
To test these hypotheses, we will analyse data from the Midlife in the United States Dataset (MIDUS). The MIDUS data set is a longitudinal dataset that reviews patterns, predictors, and consequences of midlife development in the areas of physical health, psychological well-being, and social responsibility. Research took place in 3 waves, known respectively as MIDUS 1 (1995-1996), MIDUS 2 (2005-2006) and MIDUS 3 (2015-2016). MIDUS 2 and MIDUS 3 were done with the same participants, over a 20-year timespan. For our analyses, most variables will be analysed from Wave 1, with health outcomes and symptoms collected at Time 2.
Measures for this study are as follows:
Breadwinning (Wave 1). Breadwinning will be measured as a continuous variable from 0-1, dividing respondents' pre-tax income to the overall household income.
Work-Family Conflict (Wave 1). WFC will be measured in two different ways, consistent with Allen et al., (2023), by using 4-items to measure Work Interference with Family and 4-items to measure Family Interference with Work.
Motherhood (Wave 1). Motherhood will be measured by asking the individual how many children are in the household.
Physical health. (Wave 2). Consistent with Gonzalez et al., (2020), we will measure physical health using the AL index, which examines risk scores across 24 biomarkers, where higher total scores indicate poorer physical health.
Psychological health. (Wave 2). Psychological well-being will be measured using sub-scales that reflect six dimensions of psychological well-being (Riff & Keyes, 1995).
Menopause (Wave 2). Consistent with Strauss (2013), a menopause symptom scale will be used to obtain a score, where women were asked to rate their experiences with five menopausal symptoms over the past 30 days (i.e., insomnia, heavy sweating). Higher scores will indicate more frequent symptom levels.
Study Status
The study is currently in progress, with results to be analysed by February 2026, and thus will be available for presentation at the WRNF conference in June 2026.
Implications
Our aim is to understand the nuanced effects of integrating the gendered aspects of breadwinning and caregiving to the long-term consequences of workers physical, psychological health and menopause symptoms. Examining the longitudinal consequences of women’s breadwinning and work family conflict will enable organizations to better support the long-term needs of employees across their lifespan.
Reference list
Arnot, M., Emmott, E. H., & Mace, R. (2021). The relationship between social support, stressful events, and menopause symptoms. PLOS ONE, 16(1), e0245444. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0245444
Battams, N., & Mathieu, S. (2024). Women are breadwinners in a growing percentage of couple families. In Families count 2024. The Vanier Institute of the Family. https://vanierinstitute.ca/families-count-2024/women-are-breadwinners-in-a-growing-percentage-of-couple-families
Bauld, R., & Brown, R. F. (2009). Stress, psychological distress, psychosocial factors, menopause symptoms and physical health in women. Maturitas, 62(2), 160–165. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.maturitas.2008.12.004
Gonzalez-Mulé, E., & Cockburn, B. S. (2021). This job is (literally) killing me: A moderated-mediated model linking work characteristics to mortality. Journal of Applied Psychology, 106(1), 140–151. https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0000492
Grzywacz, J. G., & Smith, A. M. (2016). Work–family conflict and health among working parents: Potential linkages for family science and social neuroscience. Family Relations, 65(1), 176–190. https://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12169
Ryff, C. D., & Keyes, C. L. M. (1995). The structure of psychological well-being revisited. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69(4), 719–727. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.69.4.719
Strauss, J. R. (2013). The baby boomers meet menopause: Fertility, attractiveness, and affective response to the menopausal transition. Sex Roles, 68(1), 77–90. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-012-0160-4
Van Der Lippe, T., & Lippényi, Z. (2018). Beyond formal access: Organizational context, working from home, and work–family conflict of men and women in European workplaces. Social Indicators Research, 151(2), 383–402. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-018-1993-1
Warren, T. (2007). Conceptualizing breadwinning work. Work, Employment and Society, 21(2), 317–336. https://doi.org/10.1177/0950017007076642
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Is marriage a “gendering institution”? The causal effects of marriage on the gendered division of labor
Kimberly McErlean, European University Institute
Accepted
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Overarching questions/concerns
Marriage is thought to be a “gendered institution” (Cherlin, 2020; Killewald, 2016; Sayer et al., 2011), in that once couples marry, institutionalized norms about how they should behave might become more salient. Following a traditionally gendered division of labor is one such behavioral norm (Cherlin, 2020; Elder, 1998; Lauer & Yodanis, 2010). Cohabitation may not have this same level of institutionalization, perhaps because of its lack of legal bonds and the lower levels of commitment and joint investments typically made by cohabitors (Cherlin, 2004; Nock, 1995). Indeed, much (primarily cross-sectional) research indicates that cohabiting couples tend to divide their labor in more egalitarian ways than married couples across many different countries (Baxter, 2005; Bianchi et al., 2014; Chao, 2022; Domínguez-Folgueras, 2013; Kuperberg, 2012). However, differences between relationship types may be driven by differences in who opts-in to marriage rather than the transition to marriage itself. Limited longitudinal research on this topic exists (but see Barg & Beblo, 2012; Zhou & Kan, 2023), so it is unclear whether cohabitors and married couples differ because of the institutionalized nature of marriage or because more traditional couples select into marriage. The effects of marriage may also vary across countries, based on differences in welfare regimes, legal treatment of cohabiting and married couples, and family and gender norms.
This study seeks to understand the role of marriage in perpetuating gender inequality within couples, asking (1) Does marriage have a causal effect on the gendered division of labor or are differences between married couples and cohabitors due to selection? and (2) Do these effects vary across the United States, United Kingdom, and Germany? I consider three possibilities: marriage has a causal effect on the division of labor; traditional couples self-select into marriage; marriage has no effect on the division of labor in the context of a potential “gender revolution” and broad changes in partnering dynamics.
Statement on methods
I use three longitudinal surveys to examine the transition from cohabitation to marriage among couples: the Panel Study of Income Dynamics in the United States, the Harmonized British Household Panel Survey and UK Household Longitudinal Survey in the United Kingdom, and the Socio-Economic Panel in Germany. I focus on contemporary coresidential relationships [those started after 1985 (US, DE) or 1991 (UK)] and couples had to be observed at least twice.
I measure three aspects of the gendered division of the labor: paid work, housework, and childcare (only available for Germany). All measures are operationalized as women’s share of weekly work hours (women’s hours divided by the sum of men’s and women’s hours).
Because my analysis hinges on identifying the causal effect of marriage, I take several approaches. One set of analyses uses a dummy impact function, which estimates the average treatment effect of marriage specifically among those who marry by comparing durations pre- and post- the transition to marriage using couple and year fixed effects and other controls. Another set of analyses uses propensity score matching, allowing me to estimate the causal effect of marriage among the entire population, including those who never marry. I match couples using covariates at the start of their relationship, then estimate propensity-score-weighted growth-curve models, interacting treatment (marriage) with relationship duration.
I also take care to distinguish the effects of marriage from parenthood. Parenthood is a well-known turning point for the gendered division of labor (Bian et al., 2024; Fan, 2024; Killewald & Zhuo, 2019; Musick et al., 2020; Zhou & Kan, 2023), and the transition to parenthood often happens within the few first years of marriage, so disentangling the effects of marriage from parenthood is crucial.
Important findings
- Cross-sectionally, women in married couples contribute less to paid work and more to housework than in cohabiting couples, with largest effects in Germany.
- Adjusting for unobserved heterogeneity reduces effect sizes across all countries, suggesting some role for selection into marriage. Only in Germany do differences remain somewhat large and significant [-5 percentage point decrease in paid work and 1.3 point increase in women’s share of housework among married couples relative to cohabitors].
- Among cohabitors who transition into marriage, marriage seems to have a persistent causal effect on the division of labor in the US, but only short-term effects in Germany. In the UK, marriage has no effect.
- Once parenthood is accounted for, the effects in Germany largely disappear and are concentrated in the very early years of marriage (with some anticipation effects the year prior to marriage). This is not the case in the US, where both marriage and parenthood seem to affect the division of labor long-term.
- In all countries, parenthood leads to a drastic reduction in women’s contributions to paid labor and small increase in their unpaid labor; effects are smallest and least persistent in the UK.
Implications for research, policy and/or practice
This research aimed to explore the role of marriage in reinforcing gender inequality, complementing the body of work that has shown how this is the case for parenthood. Marriage does not have as strong of an impact on the division of labor as parenthood, but the effects of marriage are greater in countries that value marriage symbolically (the US) or institutionally (in Germany).
In the United States, it seems as though the high economic bar to marriage in tandem with pro-marriage policy enforces clear boundaries between marriage and cohabitation, making marriage a site of durable gender inequality. In Germany, anticipation effects suggest that the tax incentives associated with (a single-earner) marriage operate by leading couples to become more specialized, starting in the year preceding marriage. The strong effects of parenthood highlight the influence of a conservative welfare regime that emphasizes male-breadwinning. In the United Kingdom, limited differences between relationship types might support the gender revolution framework and the convergence in meaning between cohabitation and marriage, facilitated by an institutional regime that decenters marriage and provides (some) support for women to reconcile work and family. These results demonstrate how the social context in which couples are embedded has implications for the perpetuation of gender (in)equality within marriage.
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The Parenting Life Course
Kristen Burke, University of Central Florida; and Carolyn Waldrep, University of Texas, Austi
Accepted
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Overarching questions/concerns:
American adults born in recent decades have had fewer children than those in previous generations. But studies of fertility patterns focus on summary statistics, like the total fertility rate, or discrete events, like the timing of first birth. These statistics flatten the long-term implications of reproductive events, instead of presenting childbearing—and responsibility for such children—across the parent’s life. We take a person-centered approach to ask: how do reproductive life course patterns differ by gender and educational achievement in the United States? And how have these patterns changed over time?
By reframing around the life course, we consider how fertility events are spread across adults’ lives, moving into a state of caregiving with the first childbirth, continuing until caregiving for children (broadly defined here as responsibility) ends when the youngest child completes adolescence. By reorienting these demographic events into the life course, we evaluate when and how adults move through their lives as parents.
Statement on methods:
The data for this analysis comes from the 1992-2018 Health & Retirement Study (HRS), a nationally-representative longitudinal study of people over the age of 50 in the United States. Respondents are ages 51-56 when they enter the study, at which time they report their reproductive history; this history is the focus of our analysis. For women, a reproductive history reported between ages 51-56 captures their completed childbearing history; for men, this captures the majority of their reproductive history, as roughly one percent of births occur to fathers over age 50.
In our analyses, we stratify by gender, educational attainment, and birth cohort. Building from the cohorts established by Claudia Goldin in her 2021 book, Career & Family: Women’s Century-Long Journey toward Equity, we specify four birth cohorts: 1890-1923, 1924-1943, 1943-1957, and from 1958. First, we estimate the proportion of the population who had any children. Among those who had any children, we estimate the average number of children ever born.
We extend beyond traditional measures in our rigorous descriptive analysis of the adult parenting life course by identifying “windows” for those who become parents. We identify average age at first pregnancy (one year before first birth), average age at last birth, and, from these, the difference which comprises the “reproductive window” for adults in a given sub-group. We also estimate the “caregiving window” of responsibility for minor children, from the birth of the first child to eighteen years after the birth of the last child. This window broadly identifies caregiving for any children.
We also include linear regression estimations of the duration of the reproductive window, controlling for the number of children. Through our descriptive analysis, we explore changes in the duration of the reproductive window across cohorts, and we compare these windows by gender and educational achievement.
Before WFRN 2026, we will advance our analyses. Beyond fertility and caregiving measurements, we will also include other key life course and sociodemographic characteristics, including marital status, racial/ethnic background, and parental education. We anticipate conducting more extensive regression analyses and implementing approaches such as multi-state life tables and/or sequence analysis, reframing reproductive and caregiving windows as states within parents’ lives.
Important findings
• Across our sample the reproductive window is similar by gender: men’s reproductive window is 7.5 years, while women’s averages 7.43 years.
• Overall, men’s reproductive window changes across cohorts:
Relative to men in the 1890-1923 cohort, those born in 1958+ had a 1.3 year shorter window.
These differences were not explained by changes in the number of children across cohorts.
o While there were educational differences in men’s reproductive windows, these did not change significantly across cohorts.
Those with a Bachelor’s degree have, on average, a 3 year shorter window than those with less than a high school education. In regression models, this difference was not entirely explained by the number of children.
Regression models interacting cohort and education showed that differences in men’s reproductive window by education were not changing over time.
• Women’s caregiving life course varies much more:
o Overall, the duration of the reproductive window changes for women across cohorts:
Relative to women born in 1890-1923 with a window of 7.7 years, on average the 1924-1943 cohort window of 8.24 years. The windows shortened to fewer than 7 years for the last two cohorts.
Regression models show that this shrinking reproductive window across cohorts is largely explained by the declining number of children.
o Whereas men had limited differences in their reproductive window by educational achievement, we find big educational differentials for women.
Overall, women with the highest levels of education had four-year faster reproductive windows than those in the lowest levels.
Regression models show that this four-year difference is not entirely explained by the number of children. Controlling for the number of children, those with a college degree still have a shorter reproductive window, by one year on average, than those with less than a high school degree.
o Differences in educational achievement also drove differing patterns by cohort.
Highly-educated women maintain an increasingly smaller reproductive window than less-educated women over time. Their reproductive window declines by 1.4 years across cohorts.
Regression models indicate a significant interaction between educational achievement and cohort, controlling for the number of children. Those with the highest levels of education have a shrinking window across cohorts that is not just explained by parity differences.
Implications for research, policy, practice:
• Our work reframes childbearing and caregiving from demographic measurements focused on the discrete event of birth, to ongoing states within the life course of the parent. By focusing on completed fertility, we link separate births into a childbearing window, overlapping and continuing into a caregiving window. While the overall window for men and women is similar, we find variation across education and time.
• Parents—women in particular—are not just as vessels for childbearing; by reframing reproduction and parenting as a life course process, we bring parent’s lives and experiences to the forefront, as the trajectories of their lives change with parenting.
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Sirens to Sleepless Nights: The Family Cost of Public Safety Work
Marilyn Cox, Queen's University; and Heidi Cramm, Queen's University
Accepted
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Background: The 2026 WFRN Conference theme, Centering Care Across the Life Course, resonates with the often-overlooked challenges faced by public safety personnel (PSP) and their families. While PSP (e.g., firefighters, police, paramedics) are lauded for their dedication, the demanding nature of their work profoundly impacts sleep health. Irregular shift work, trauma exposure, and high-stress environments contribute to widespread sleep disturbances—sleep deprivation, insomnia, and poor sleep quality. A holistic view of sleep health recognizes its embeddedness in family and social contexts, shaping well-being across the life course. Poor sleep not only impairs PSP cognitive functioning and job performance, but also has ecological consequences, affecting community safety. These sleep issues reverberate through the entire family system. Care, in its multifaceted forms, is central to PSP family well-being, encompassing both direct caregiving and the “relational labour” required to sustain healthy functioning amid occupational stressors. Although occupational health research increasingly addresses PSP sleep, the family context remains underexplored. Existing literature focuses on individual health consequences, with limited attention to family impact. This gap calls for a paradigm shift—from individual responsibility to systemic understanding of sleep health and its broader relational implications. To address this oversight, this research applies Bogenschneider’s (2012) family impact framework to PSP sleep health, advocating for systemic, family-centred, and ecologically informed interventions that place care at the heart of work, family, and policy conversations.
Methods: This presentation draws on a narrative review of reviews, designed to lay groundwork for future research on the family impact of sleep health issues among public safety personnel (PSP). The study synthesized existing literature on PSP sleep health, with particular attention to family-level implications. Narrative reviews are well-suited to building on current evidence and generating new insights from secondary sources. A systematic search was conducted across multiple databases in mid-2024, targeting reviews that examined sleep-related outcomes among PSP populations. Nineteen eligible reviews were included, most published between 2019 and 2024. Data extraction focused on review characteristics, sleep health findings, and any discussion of family outcomes. An inductive approach was used to identify connections between PSP sleep challenges and family dynamics. These findings were then interpreted through Bogenschneider et al.’s (2012) family impact framework, grounded in Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory. This lens guided analysis across five key principles: family responsibility, stability, relationships, diversity, and engagement.
Implications: Findings from this narrative review confirm that PSP experience high rates of sleep disturbances linked to occupational factors such as shift work, trauma exposure, and work stress. Applying the family impact lens illuminated the interconnected nature of individual, relational, and systemic factors, revealing how these sleep challenges profoundly affect PSP families across multiple dimensions:
Family Responsibility: Irregular schedules and unpredictable hours strain family responsibility. Sleep-deprived PSP may struggle to be present, requiring others to adjust roles and accommodate recovery sleep. Chronic health issues compound this burden, adding financial and emotional strain.
Family Stability: Sleep health and family well-being are bidirectionally linked. Occupational stress disrupts household dynamics, while family transitions can worsen sleep debt. Cognitive impairment and accident risk further threaten family safety.
Family Relationships: Fatigue and irritability impair emotional availability. Sleep disorders affect both partners, increasing conflict and reducing relationship quality. Trauma and danger spill into the home, causing emotional strain and sleep disruptions for family members.
Family Diversity: Impacts vary by career stage, schedule, life course, and cultural beliefs. Families with young children or night-shift PSP face distinct challenges, highlighting the need for tailored, culturally responsive approaches.
Family Engagement: Sleep problems and mental health issues (e.g., burnout, PTSD, anxiety) impair PSPs’ ability to maintain familial roles and connections. This disruption can leave families vulnerable and isolated.
Conclusions and Research Agenda: This review highlights a critical gap in the literature regarding the family impact of sleep health issues among PSP. To truly centre care across the life course for PSP families, structural reforms and cultural shifts are imperative. Our research agenda, informed by these findings, calls for a comprehensive, system-level, and family-centred approach. The proposed research agenda to guide family-centred investigations on PSP sleep health includes:
Expanding the focus beyond the individual to the family context: Prioritizing primary studies that delve into the family impact of PSP sleep health issues.
Exploring the bidirectional relationship between PSP sleep health and family well-being: Investigating how PSP sleep disturbances impact family relationships, roles, and functioning, and conversely, how family factors influence PSP sleep health.
Adopting a family-centred, ecological approach: Recognizing the complex, interdependent nature of families within broader social systems and developing comprehensive, family-centred theories to guide future research and inform tailored policies and programs.
Investigating the diverse family contexts of PSP: Exploring how the specific impact of sleep disturbances varies across different family types, career stages, work schedules, life course stages, and cultural beliefs.
Identifying family-level interventions and support strategies: Exploring the benefits of family-centred approaches like couple and family therapy, and developing organizational policies that empower families and provide essential resources.
Expanding the diversity of PSP occupations represented in research: Moving beyond the current focus on firefighters, police, and paramedics to explore the family impact across a broader range of PSP roles.
By prioritizing the family context, this approach recognizes the interconnected nature of individual, relational, and systemic factors, fostering healthier, more resilient PSP families and, by extension, the communities they serve. This presentation will elaborate on these propositions, offering concrete recommendations for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners to integrate care into every aspect of PSP well-being.
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Pre-service teachers' responses to children's literature on diverse family structures using arts-based workshops: a review of the literature
Maria Stergiou, McGill University
Accepted
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Abstract
Pre-Service Teachers’ Responses to Children’s Literature of Diverse Family Structures
This paper and presentation are based on my Ph.D. candidacy papers, which include a comprehensive review of the literature, the proposed methodological framework, and an overview of the future study I will conduct as part of my doctoral research. The purpose of this presentation is to situate my forthcoming study within the broader scholarly discourse on teacher education, children’s literature, and the representation of diverse family structures, particularly those that include LGBTQIA+ identities.
Contemporary Canadian classrooms increasingly reflect a wide range of family configurations, including single-parent, blended, adoptive, and LGBTQIA+ families. Yet research continues to demonstrate that pre-service teachers often enter the profession underprepared to address this diversity in their teaching practice (Cherrington et al., 2021; Cooper, 2023; Grafft, 2020). This persistent gap highlights the urgent need to diversify teacher education curricula and pedagogical frameworks to better represent and support diverse communities (Rodríguez, 2021).
Children’s literature—especially picture books—has long been recognized as a powerful pedagogical resource capable of acting as both “windows” and “mirrors,” helping children to see themselves reflected in stories and to understand others’ experiences (Bishop, 2015; White, 2015). However, while such literature fosters empathy and inclusion, its potential remains underutilized within many teacher education programs. These programs often adhere to narrow curricular frameworks that marginalize, silence, or avoid discussions of family diversity and LGBTQIA+ representation (Dursun, Agirdag, & Claes, 2022).
Recent controversies surrounding the inclusion of LGBTQIA+ books in Canadian schools—such as the temporary restrictions in Ontario’s Waterloo District (Toronto Star, 2023)—underscore the political and cultural tensions that shape access to diverse texts. These debates raise broader questions about representation, censorship, and educators’ preparedness to navigate social diversity. Within this complex landscape, my research asks how pre-service teachers engage with children’s literature portraying diverse family structures, and how their interpretations, emotional reactions, and reflective processes reveal underlying beliefs, biases, or discomforts surrounding gender and family diversity.
Literature Review and Context
Existing literature demonstrates that many pre-service teachers do not identify with or feel comfortable teaching children’s literature featuring LGBTQIA+ or non-traditional families. This lack of familiarity often results in avoidance of such materials in classroom contexts (Fix, 2019). Fears of backlash from parents, administrators, or the wider community frequently compound this hesitation. As Buchanan et al. (2019) observed, one pre-service teacher admitted concerns about “hostility” and the perception that LGBTQIA+ books might be “too graphic” for children (p. 178).
Such apprehensions are not isolated but are deeply embedded in societal norms that position heteronormativity as the default and “natural” order (Cooper, 2023). Many educators who resist introducing LGBTQIA+ content often appeal to the notion of “protecting childhood innocence,” suggesting that discussions of gender, sexuality, and family diversity are inappropriate for young audiences (Cherrington et al., 2021; Buchanan, 2020). This discourse, however, reinforces silence and exclusion, denying children exposure to the rich realities of diverse family life. Furthermore, confusion between sex and gender, as well as rigid gender norms, contribute to educators’ uncertainty and discomfort in addressing these themes (Cherrington et al., 2021).
The literature suggests that silence itself becomes a form of response—one that signals uncertainty, internalized heteronormativity, or institutional barriers (Cherrington et al., 2020; Ryan & Hermann-Wilmarth, 2013). It is within this culture of silence that my research seeks to intervene. My study will explore how creative, arts-based approaches might offer pre-service teachers an alternative space to engage with sensitive or complex topics surrounding diverse family structures.
Theoretical Framework
My research is grounded in three interconnected theoretical perspectives: critical pedagogy, social constructivism, and queer pedagogy.
Critical pedagogy (Giroux, 2024) emphasizes reflection on the power structures and social forces shaping education, encouraging educators to act as agents of social change who challenge inequitable norms. Social constructivism posits that knowledge, identity, and social realities are co-constructed through human interaction; thus, constructs like heterosexuality and gender norms are not fixed but culturally produced and open to critique (Marinucci in Cooper, 2023). Queer pedagogy (Schmidt, 2010) further interrogates how educational institutions construct and reproduce normative understandings of gender and sexuality, urging educators to disrupt binary frameworks and to embrace pedagogies of fluidity and inclusion.
Together, these perspectives inform both the design of my study and its interpretive framework. They provide a lens through which to understand how pre-service teachers’ reactions to children’s literature might be shaped by broader social discourses, and how reflective engagement can lead to transformative professional growth.
Research Questions
The following research questions guide my future study:
RQ1: How do pre-service teachers respond to children and families from diverse backgrounds (including LGBTQIA+ families) when participating in creative and reflective workshops?
RQ2: How do pre-service teachers interpret and engage with children’s literature featuring LGBTQIA+ families, and in what ways do these texts serve as “windows” and “mirrors” to challenge heteronormativity and foster inclusive classroom dialogue?
Methodology and Methods
My future study employs an arts-based qualitative research methodology, integrating collage-making as a reflective and expressive practice (Whitelaw, 2021; Butler-Kisber, 2010). Two 90-minute workshops will be conducted with twelve pre-service teachers enrolled in McGill University’s B.Ed. Kindergarten/Elementary program, organized into groups of five to six participants.
Stage 1: Participants will be introduced to children’s picture books depicting LGBTQIA+ families, such as Heather Has Two Mommies (Newman, 1989), Molly’s Family (Garden, 2004), and Donovan’s Big Day (Newman, 2011).
Stage 2: During the workshops, participants will reflect on their familiarity and comfort with these books, followed by a read-aloud session. They will then create collages to represent their emotional and cognitive responses to the stories. These collages will be displayed in a Reggio Emilia–inspired “piazza” (Schroeder-Yu, 2008), promoting shared dialogue and collective reflection.
Stage 3: Data will be analyzed thematically, focusing on both the visual and verbal data. Comparative analysis will be conducted to identify changes in participants’ perspectives before and after the collage-making process.
Collage-making as a research method provides a creative, non-linear means of inquiry that allows participants to express complex emotions and ideas beyond the limits of traditional discussion (Culshaw, 2019; Butler-Kisber & Poldma, 2010). This arts-based process aligns with the study’s social justice framework, offering a safe and expressive space for participants to confront and articulate their beliefs about diversity, inclusion, and equity.
Expected Contributions and Implications
This study is expected to make several key contributions to the field of education:
Knowledge Advancement: It will extend existing research on pre-service teacher education by providing insight into how future educators perceive and engage with diverse family representations in children’s literature.
Pedagogical Transformation: By fostering creative reflection, participants may become more aware of their own assumptions and better prepared to incorporate inclusive practices in their teaching.
Actionable Recommendations: Findings will inform curriculum design and professional development in equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI), addressing the need for comprehensive training in these areas.
Policy Relevance: Results may influence provincial and institutional policy, particularly as Quebec’s Ministry of Education has mandated EDI integration in teacher education programs (Ministère de l’Éducation du Québec, 2023).
Researcher Positionality and Timeline
With over fifteen years of experience as an early childhood and elementary educator, I bring a practitioner’s perspective and a commitment to advancing social justice in education. My work is informed by both professional experience and academic mentorship under Dr. Claudia Mitchell, Distinguished James McGill Professor and expert in arts-based and visual methodologies. My committee members, Dr. Sheryl Smith-Gilman and Dr. Jessica Prioletta, bring expertise in teacher education and social justice in early childhood contexts, further grounding this study in scholarly rigor and pedagogical relevance.
Ethics approval and data collection are planned for 2025, with analysis to follow in winter 2025 and dissertation writing in 2026. Findings will be disseminated through conference presentations, journal publications, and symposia to contribute to ongoing discussions about inclusive literacy, teacher education, and social equity.
Ultimately, this work—rooted in my Ph.D. candidacy research—seeks to advance a transformative model of teacher education that challenges heteronormativity, centers diverse family narratives, and embraces children’s literature as a vehicle for inclusion and social change.
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All Hands on Deck? How Gendered Attitudes Toward Parents’ Work-Family Priorities Depend on Children’s Ages
Reilly Kincaid, University of Arkansas
Accepted
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Cultural lag theory suggests that despite gender-egalitarian shifts in Americans’ personal, or “first-order” attitudes, perceptions of majority opinion, or “third-order beliefs,” remain more gender-traditional. However, little research compares both first- and third-order beliefs. Moreover, past studies have not considered how ideological support for gendered work-family behavior might depend on the ages of parents’ children. To extend knowledge about gender attitudes and cultural lag, this study uses a novel survey experiment to examine first-order and third-order beliefs about how employed heterosexual parents with children across the childhood age spectrum should navigate work-family trade-offs. Findings suggest that cultural lag theory is most applicable to beliefs toward fathers of young children, as people personally prefer fathers to prioritize parent-child time when children are young, but think most people prefer fathers to prioritize financial providing regardless of children’s ages. Compared to first-order beliefs about mothers, first-order beliefs about whether fathers should prioritize providing or parent-child time are more substantively dependent on children’s ages. This study contributes to gender scholarship by theorizing gender ideology as context-dependent and demonstrating that third-order beliefs about fathers continue to support a “provider-fathering” model that people may personally reject when children are young.
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The Right to Disconnect Revisited: Toward a Holistic, Multi-Stakeholder Framework Grounded in Ecological Systems Theory
Uthpala Senarathne Tennakoon, Mount Royal University; and Vanessa Maillet, Mount Royal University
Accepted
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Introduction
The increasing use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) has transformed modern work environments, blurring the boundaries between professional and personal life [1, 2]. A blurred work/life boundary could lead to extended work hours, contributing to stress, burnout, and work-life conflict [3-5].
Constant connectivity to work, and even the anticipation of being contacted, can increase telepressure, elevate stress, and diminish recovery from a stressful workday [6-9]. Over time, these effects could contribute to burnout, fatigue, and impaired well-being [10-12]. Such outcomes can reach beyond the individual to affect family dynamics, through phenomena like technoference and parental phubbing, which reduce parent-child interaction quality and increase household tensions [13-16]. These findings underline the importance of disconnection not just for personal recovery, but also for family well-being and social functioning [7].
The Right to Disconnect (RTD) movement has emerged as a modern policy response to these challenges, advocating for employees' right to disengage from work communications beyond work hours without fear of retaliation or negative career consequences [17, 18]. Pioneered by France, legislative frameworks in many countries in the EU and South America, Australia, and the province of Ontario, Canada have introduced RTD provisions through internal policies or formal amendments to labour law [19-21]. Organizational responses range from hard disconnection policies (e.g., server shutdowns at Volkswagen) to soft policies emphasizing employee autonomy [22, 23]. However, there are enforcement challenges due to vague policy language, inconsistent implementation, and limited mechanisms to monitor compliance [24].
Conducting a scoping review on RTD literature, Hopkins [17] identified that there are significant gaps in the scholarship on RTD. Existing studies have centered on individual-level outcomes with a focus on individual work-life boundary management, predominantly examined RTD through Boundary Theory and Border Theory [25, 26]. Additionally, there is limited attention to equity considerations, long-term policy effectiveness, and broader implications for multiple stakeholders such as managers, families, and policymakers [27, 28]. Therefore, our understanding of RTD policies from broader systemic influences such as organizational culture, legal frameworks, industry-specific norms, and socio-economic conditions is somewhat limited. Addressing these gaps, this paper introduces a holistic, multi-level framework for examining RTD through the Ecological Systems Theory (EST) perspective (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), which recognizes that individuals are embedded within interconnected systems that shape their work-life experiences. Drawing from a comprehensive review of academic literature and international RTD legislation, the paper demonstrates how EST offers a more robust, stakeholder-inclusive perspective to understand the challenges and opportunities surrounding RTD.
Application of Ecological Systems Theory (EST) to RTD
This paper adopts Ecological Systems Theory (EST) [29, 30] to propose a multi-level framework to examine the RTD. Each layer of the EST model offers insight into the conditions and impacts of RTD through these nested systems (See Figure 1).
Microsystem: In the context of RTD, the microsystem focuses on direct interactions between individuals and their immediate environment, such as relationships with family and work colleagues. Issues like telepressure [31], strained family dynamics, and the inability to mentally detach from work are prominent here [32]. RTD policies can alleviate telepressure by legitimizing delayed responses and encouraging employees and managers to respect response delays after hours.
Mesosystem: This level examines the linkages and processes between different microsystems surrounding an individual, such as work-family boundary management. RTD can reduce boundary conflict by creating clearer distinctions between work and home domains. Additionally, team norms, social networks, and shared expectations could shape whether RTD policy adoption is supported or frowned upon [9, 33].
Exosystem: This encompasses external structures that indirectly affect the individual, such as organizational policies, union agreements, labour laws and workplace culture [24, 30, 34]. Cultures of constant availability can undermine RTD even in the presence of formal policies, while supportive organizational climates enhance effective adoption [7, 8, 17].
Macrosystem: This encompasses broad cultural values, societal attitudes, and economic conditions that form the backdrop for all other systems. For example, European contexts often support disconnection, while work-centric cultures (e.g., U.S., East Asia) may resist it [21, 35]. Broader socio-economic conditions, technological trends and social views on gender and equity norms could also influence how RTD is framed and practiced [36, 37].
Chronosystem: This is the dimension of time, acknowledging how life transitions and historical events influence individual and systemic development. For example, the COVID-19 pandemic significantly altered work patterns, intensifying discussions around the necessity of RTD policies. Additionally, RTD must be viewed over time, considering historical shifts in work culture and technology use (e.g., the Blackberry era to the proliferation of smartphones). Longitudinal focus is needed to assess RTD’s long-term impact on families, organizations, and societal well-being [38, 39].
These layers emphasize that RTD impact goes beyond individual work-life boundaries to a systemic issue embedded in broader cultural, legal, and organizational structures. EST offers a robust foundation for both theoretical development and practical application in RTD research, particularly to address equity, sustainability, and contextual variation across stakeholders.
Implications of the Study
The multi-method, multi-level design grounded in EST provides a holistic framework to examine RTD, recognizing how experiences with RTD at the microsystem level (e.g., individual well-being, boundary management) are shaped by influences from the exosystem (e.g., organizational policies, labour laws) and macrosystem (e.g., cultural norms, economic pressures). For example, a worker’s ability to disconnect may be supported or undermined not just by their manager's behaviour but also by broader societal expectations around availability. Longitudinal approaches aligned with the chronosystem layer are essential to assess the evolving impact of RTD over time, such as whether it sustainably mitigates burnout or unintentionally limits flexibility in work arrangements [28, 39].
The EST framework also highlights the importance of policy design that considers how RTD operates across and within systems in an equitable manner. For instance, gender norms embedded in the macrosystem, combined with caregiving responsibilities within the microsystem, and blended work-family roles in the mesosystem, may interact in ways that make some groups more vulnerable to digital overreach [37, 40] . Recognizing these cross-system dynamics allows for more nuanced and inclusive RTD policies that promote fairness across social groups, sectors, and countries. Furthermore, EST encourages researchers to examine how emerging technologies (e.g., AI influences, gig platforms) function as new exosystem or macrosystem forces that influence RDT policy adoption at work-life boundaries.
Conclusion
As work becomes increasingly digitized, the Right to Disconnect becomes more than just an individual concern, but a societal necessity. However, current scholarship has been limited by its focus on the individual level, overlooking the broader systemic view to fully understand and implement RTD. This paper proposes Ecological Systems Theory as a unifying framework that accounts for stakeholder diversity, cultural variability, organizational policy, and longitudinal change. By mapping RTD across microsystem to chronosystem layers, researchers, policymakers, and organizations can better navigate the complexities of digital work and promote sustainable, equitable work-life integration.
Note: Figure 1 and References attached.
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Transnational Family Norms and Expectations in the Entrepreneurship of First-Generation Chinese Immigrants in the UK
Kexin Yan, University College London
Accepted
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For first-generation Chinese immigrants living in the UK, entrepreneurship is closely entangled with transnational family relationships. Chinese family norms and expectations extend beyond nation-state borders to shape how businesses are run. While prior research has emphasized family resource exchange in transnational entrepreneurship, less attention has been paid to how family norms and expectations shape Chinese immigrant entrepreneurs’ work and family lives—a gap I address in this study. Drawing on participant observation and seven semi-structured interviews with immigrant entrepreneurs in the UK across different sectors, my study uncovers three ways in which family norms configure transnational entrepreneurship among Chinese immigrants.
First, some families embody a reciprocal norm of mutual support, encouraging immigrants to pursue business goals in the UK by providing financial or emotional support, which entrepreneurs reciprocate with remittances, gifts, and emotional gestures that sustain reciprocity. Second, parents often impose normative expectations for immigrant entrepreneurs to both provide for children and fulfill the duty of filial piety by providing material, physical, and emotional care to their ageing parents. Contributing to reinforcing these family norms, other senior relatives often remind immigrant entrepreneurs of their familial responsibilities and sometimes even extend filial expectations to themselves. For some, these expectations conflict with their business goals, prompting intense negotiation or resistance. For others, such expectations are internalized; even under the dual pressure of caregiving and business, they are seen as “natural” duties that drive greater effort in both entrepreneurship and family. Third, some families remain non-interfering, reflecting a new caring norm that grants entrepreneurs autonomy while keeping basic contact through periodic reunions or digital communication, which sustains mutual care ties.
These patterns suggest that what has often been described as resource exchanges in prior research on transnational immigrant entrepreneurship is closely underpinned by family norms. Reciprocity and caregiving show the reconfigured persistence of Confucian norms, whereas non-interference reflects their transformation into a new caring logic. This study demonstrates that Confucian-rooted norms persist across transnational space in diverse and reconfigured ways, while highlighting entrepreneurs’ agency in responding to the norms.
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From Family Networks to Temporal Sequences: Understanding British Working Parents' Family Responsibilities and Well-being using UK Time Use Survey
Yucheng He, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou); Yujia Hou, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou); and Muzhi Zhou, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou)
Accepted
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Due to the shifting of family structures over decades, time with whom quality within household and its mental consequences through gender lens have been subjects of ongoing debate in sociology of time and family. Using UK Time Use Survey, this study employees a combination of Social Networking Analysis, Sequence Analysis and Ordinary Least Square regression to empirically investigate the nuanced mental consequences of British dual-earner parents’ time with whom quality across genders on both weekdays and weekends. We find that working mothers tend to take more family responsibilities, but experience mitigation effects against mental costs from family work, compared to fathers who have similar time with whom quality. From the social network perspective, mothers are more likely to occupy the center position in the family networks with stronger connections to their children. Both working parents tend to feel rush more frequently on weekdays and weekends, while this effect is more pronounced among fathers during weekends, suggesting the potential mental cost to be in the family center. Regarding the with whom patterns perspectives, on weekdays, four main clusters emerge: (a) Standard interaction, (b) Standard interaction with more child involvement, (c) All-day mixed interaction, (d) All-day parenting. On weekends, five clusters are identified: (a) Standard interaction, (b) All-day mixed interaction, (c) All-day parenting, (d) All-day co-parenting, (e) All-day spouse interaction. Compared to the standard interaction cluster, working parents belong to All-day parenting cluster show lower rush feelings, and such mental buffer brought by childcaring are more pronounced among mothers both on weekdays and weekends. Taken together, these findings underscore the mental health consequences of gendered family roles, viewed through the lens of role switching, role overlap, and gender norms. This study also calls for more gender-sensitive policies in family support to better address the unique challenges faced by working parents.
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Pursuit of Permanent Status and Career Choices for International Students in Canada
Rujun Zhang, Washington University in St. Louis
Accepted
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International students constitute an important part of Canada’s population, and a large portion of international students intend to settle permanently in Canada after graduation. The post-graduation work permit program (PGWPP) is a major potential pathway for international students to achieve that goal. Regarding the situation of post-graduation work permit (PGWP) holders in Canada’s labour market, although there is extensive literature about how temporary immigrant status affects an individual’s career outcome, it is unclear how pursuing permanent status will affect an immigrant’s career and life. My thesis is centered on this puzzle. Building on existing research on immigrant insecure legal status and school-to-work transitions, drawing on theories of precarious work, my current study aims to answer the following research questions: How does the pursuit of permanent legal status affect international student graduates’ career plans and trajectories? Furthermore, how does the pursuit of permanent status affect other aspects of immigrant lives?
To collect empirical data, I conducted in-depth semi-structured interviews with 17 international student graduates from Canadian universities who had experiences using PGWP to work in Canada and intended to gain permanent legal status. I coded my interview data thematically, informed by data analysis methods including abductive analysis and flexible coding.
My findings reveal that PGWP holders frequently engage in trade-offs to strategically prioritize their immigration goals. These trade-offs involve but are not limited to career decisions, education plans, and taking on more uncertainties regarding their future. PGWP holders face obstacles at various stages of their labour market experiences due to the temporary nature of their status: they are more disadvantaged when seeking jobs, they are at risk of potential exploitation from employers, and they encounter increased difficulty when attempting to switch jobs. Meanwhile, career trade-offs aiming at pursuing permanence often effectively reinforce existing labour market inequalities faced by temporary immigrants, because individuals tend to accept or remain in unsatisfactory jobs as part of those trade-offs. When looking at aspects of immigrant lives other than career, I find that PGWP holders face a lack of institutional support and sufficient information as they navigate their own status and when they go through the process of applying for permanent residency. They are often placed in precarious situations when unexpected policy changes occur.
My research has yielded valuable insight into international students’ experiences with the PGWPP. Although the PGWPP does not directly contribute to people’s immigration intention, it greatly enables the formation of the latter. Many of my study participants said that they did not plan to immigrate when they first arrived in Canada, but the availability of the PGWP encouraged them to remain longer in Canada, and the time they spent studying and working in Canada often led to their subsequent immigration intention. However, the prospect of having an open work permit for up to three years does not always play out as ideally as hoped, and the PGWP policy does not give international student graduates a direct and smooth pathway to gaining permanence in Canada. People face challenges in the labour market due to their temporary status as PGWP holders, making it difficult to fully convert the time granted by the PGWP into satisfactory Canadian work experience that builds towards their immigration goal.
