Microsoft Word Socialized Choices 31-12 pod docx

Socialized Choices - Labour Market Behaviour of Dutch Mothers  
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Research group 
The interviewed mothers were born between 1962 and 1980. Their average age 
was 39.3 years. Seven interviewees (18 per cent) had a non-Dutch background. 
Of the total female population of Amsterdam, 50 per cent has a non-Dutch 
background, so non-native women are underrepresented in the research group 
(Vrouwenemancipatie in Amsterdam 2011). This also holds for single mothers: 
only four of the interviewed mothers had been divorced. However, as mentioned, 
ethnicity and the presence of a spouse were not discriminating factors in selecting 
the research group.  
23 mothers were highly educated (higher vocational education and 
university), and 16 lower educated (intermediate vocational education and lower) 
(see appendix 3). Ten mothers were full-time homemakers, eight mothers had a 
small part-time job (12 to 24 hours), eleven mothers had a large part-time job (25 
to 35 hours) and ten mothers worked full-time.  
Interview questions 
The interviews can be characterised as oral life history interviews (Bryman, 
2008). The interviewees were invited to look back at specific moments 
throughout the course of their life while focussing on the behavioural steps of 
social life: finishing high school, choosing a continuation course, starting their 
first job, giving birth to their first child, continuing through to the present.  
Iterative cycles formed the basis of the theoretical framework, centred on 
Grounded Theory (Bryman, 2008, p.541). Initially, the interview questions were 
based on a number of concepts that were expected to vary among the four groups 
of mothers: early adult work aspirations and choices, present preferred number of 
work hours, gender and work values and attitudes. After the first interviews, and 
an examination of the mothers’ answers in the light of this study’s central themes, 
more theory was incorporated, in order to interpret the interview-material more 
fully. For example, more questions towards early adult expectations of 
motherhood were included.  
The study is built on four core categories or central themes: narrative of 
choice towards work (including work experience and number of preferred work 
hours), work attitude, gender general values and personal attitudes, and attitudes 
towards motherhood. The main concepts within these themes are defined below. 
The interviewees were asked several open questions in order to discover how and 
with which words women refer to these themes themselves. 
Narrative of choice. In the interviews, specific attention was given to whether 
choices or decisions were made implicitly or explicitly, and whether this revealed 
something about mothers’ perceived behavioural control.  Perceived self-efficacy 
corresponds to the extent to which a person feels able to enact the behaviour, 
which is related to the supposed ease or difficulty of performing the behaviour. A 
person’s sensitivity may be based on past experiences as well as on expected 

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Chapter 3 - A qualitative typology of Dutch mothers’ employment narratives 
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hindrances and obstacles (Ajzen, 1991; Bandura, 1991).  Implicit decisions can be 
characterised in a number of ways, including as indirect, non-reflective, 
retrospective awareness of having made decisions, incremental behaviour, 
conflict avoidance, agreement without discussion, or as pure impulse. In other 
words, these contain relatively little perceived behavioural control. Explicit 
decisions on the other hand are characterised by a prospective awareness of 
making decisions, proactive planning, explicit agreements, and conflict 
management steps towards work (Wiesmann et al., 2010, p.343), and are thus 
highly perceived behavioural controls. Associated questions include the 
following: How did you end up in the type of work you do or did? Did you have, 
as a young adult, ideas about your future profession, and work in general? If you 
had time again, would you choose a different direction? Do you work the number 
of hours you prefer? What does your ideal working week look like? Why is it not 
that way? 
Work attitudes are defined as personal motivations to pursue paid work: What 
are the most important reasons for you to work? 
Gender attitudes refer to a mother’s personal desired division of labour with 
her spouse; questions were included on her general ideas about the ideal division 
of labour between men and women.  A traditional gender attitude means a desire 
to have the main responsibility at home, whereas her partner is in paid work. An 
egalitarian gender attitude implies a wish to equally share paid and unpaid work. 
Adaptive attitudes are here defined as the personal desire to combine paid work 
and family tasks, with consent to the idea that mothers have more responsibilities 
at home and fathers may work full-time. Related interview questions: Do you 
have ideas about the ideal division of labour with your spouse? Are you satisfied 
with your own current division of labour? What would you like to change? 
Some questions about mothers’ general gender values were also asked, such 
as: How do you perceive differences between men and women in general? Do 
you have an opinion about full-time working mothers or mothers who are not 
employed? 
Attitudes towards motherhood concern a mother’s early adult ideas and 
images of motherhood and children, and the way she experiences motherhood and 
childcare: Did you picture yourself as a mother before you had children? How 
many children did you want then? How do you experience motherhood now? 
Further questions were asked retrospectively, for example enquiring after the 
respondents’ ideas about education and work before they started their careers, and 
also to their juvenile desires to become a mother. In general, the mothers were 
able to answer the questions reasonably quickly without much hesitation. 
Nevertheless, one should be aware of the possibility of selectiveness of their 
memories, which may influence their answers. People may adjust their memories 
to justify their present behaviour, as is argued by interest-based theorists (Kroska 
and Elman, 2009).  

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