Exploring New Fathers’ Perspectives: Unraveling the Division of Unpaid Care and the Role of Caregiver

At the Canadian Sociological Association (CSA) 2024 Conference, Jiangyuan Lin prsented “Exploring New Fathers’ Perspectives: Unraveling the Division of Unpaid Care and the Role of Caregiver.” This study aims to answer the question, “How do fathers perceive their parental roles and responsibilities?” Specifically, the research hopes to gain a deeper understanding of the perceptions of fathers regarding unpaid childcare work and the division of labor within households. It is also intended to examine the emerging trend of the “new father,” a more involved parent, in the Canadian context.

Jiangyuan Lin worked with the Care Economies in Context project as an undergraduate student, funded through a University of Toronto Excellence Award. He graduated in 2024.

Abstract

Child development is significantly influenced by the involvement of fathers (Cardenas et al. 2021). However, existing literature has consistently indicated a gendered and unequal division of labor within households, with mothers often burdened with a greater division of care (Doan and Quadlin 2018; Ryjova et al. 2022; Shechory and Ziv 2007). To address this unequal divide in Canada, changes have been made to the parental leave policy to encourage greater paternal engagement (Employment and Social Development Canada 2019). As such, an emerging body of evidence in other countries with similar policies has started to report on an increase in fathers’ involvement in childcare (Almqvist and Duvander 2014; Evertsson, Boye, and Erman 2018; Schober and Zoch 2018). This study aims to answer the question “How do fathers perceive their parental roles and responsibilities?” Specifically, the research hopes to gain a deeper understanding of the perceptions of fathers regarding unpaid childcare work and the division of labor within households. It is also intended to examine the emerging trend of the “new father”, a more involved parent, in the Canadian context. This research draws data from The Care Economies in Context study, led by Professor Ito Peng, Canada Research Chair in Global Social Policy at the University of Toronto. The broader objective of the project is to measure and compare childcare and elder care provision in nine different countries, and to develop policy recommendations as a result. This research included interview data from 10 fathers, aged 28 to 57, 50% of whom are visible minorities and 90% from urban areas, and their children are mostly preschoolers. The thematic analysis was guided by two conceptual frameworks. The first framework comes from Coltranes (1997) concept of new fathers. The concept of a successful father has evolved to include the necessity of emotional and interactive care for children, compared to traditional successful fatherhood where fathers served as a breadwinner in support of finance. These fathers are labeled as “new fathers” (Coltrane 1997). It is often the case that the active involvement of “new fathers” in care work is a result of their endorsement of a new masculinity ideology that requires men to be more emotionally expressive and more self-reflective (Offer and Kaplan 2021). As another part of the theoretical framework, Andrea (2015) identifies three key dimensions of parental responsibility: emotional, community, and moral. Emotional responsibility extends to a parents conscious awareness of their childrens needs as well as their ongoing attention to them. Community responsibility emphasizes the importance of the skills of organization and negotiation necessary to navigate networks and individuals involved in childcare processes and daily routines. Often intertwined with emotional and community responsibility, moral responsibility places greater emphasis on adhering to public gender norms and parenthood role expectations. The combination of these dimensions provides a comprehensive framework for understanding the responsibilities of fatherhood. My results support Andreas concept of the new father, and most of the responsibilities discussed by fathers could be classified as examples of Andreas emotional or community parental responsibilities. Another major theme I identified was how fathers sought to balance their work responsibilities with their childcare responsibilities. This was in contrast to much literature about how fathers tend to see their work as composing their primary identity and fatherhood as secondary. Lastly, I did find that despite evidence of this progression toward ‘new fatherhood’ some gendered divisions of tasks persist and the division of labour is still not always described as 50/50 between the fathers and their partners. In brief conclusion, the study participants, self-identified caregivers, provided valuable insights into the evolving concept of new fatherhood and their increased involvement in childcare responsibilities. They reported contributing toward a wide range of emotional and community-based responsibilities, including accompanying children and caring for their mental, physical, moral, and health development as emotional responsibility, as well as community responsibilities, such as assisting mothers with grandparents’ involvement in care work and selecting quality child care facilities. The fathers also display a more emotionally connected form of fatherhood, where pride, enjoyment and the willingness of dedication are shown. However, a gendered division of tasks persisted, with mothers shouldering the majority of housework and emotional care responsibilities, reinforcing traditional gender roles to some extent.