Microsoft Word Socialized Choices 31-12 pod docx

Socialized Choices - Labour Market Behaviour of Dutch Mothers 
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Consistent with previous research, the higher the level of education of a 
mother, the more hours she works.  As expected, mothers who consider 
themselves to be religious work fewer hours. Most relevant for the analysis is the 
strong impact of the work preference of the mother on her actual number of work 
hours (beta 0.765). For every extra hour she wishes to work, she actually works 
three quarters of an hour more. As mentioned, the results confirm the first 
hypothesis of this study.  
6.4 Work 
preference 
 
Since work preference is both theoretically and empirically an important 
determinant of the labour participation of mothers, I next turn to an explanation of 
the number of hours a mother prefers to work. Which factors explain why 
mothers differ in the preferred number of work hours?  With the full model I can 
explain approximately 22 per cent of the variance of work preferences.   
Firstly, a number of background characteristics contribute to explaining the 
differences. As expected, the more children the mother has, the fewer hours she 
prefers to work. For every extra child she bears, she desires to reduce her working 
week by roughly 1.5 hours. Neither the income of a partner nor his or her 
presence has an additional effect on a mother’s preferred number of work hours, 
contrary to her actual number of work hours. This result underlines the 
assumption in this study, that work preferences have more stability than the actual 
number of work hours. The older the mother, the more hours she prefers to work, 
whereas her actual number of hours decreases compared to younger mothers. 
Apparently, her older age makes it more difficult to put her preference into 
practise.  
The second hypothesis of this study concerns the relationship between work 
preferences and general gender values, and personal work and gender attitudes. 
As expected, general gender values relate significantly to a mother’s work 
preference. The more egalitarian her general values, the more hours she prefers to 
work (beta .129). As expected, a mother’s own ideal family life (personal gender 
values) corresponds stronger with her work preferences than her general values. 
In particular, a mother’s ideal family life corresponds with her work preference 
(beta .232).  
Only two work attitudes matter. When she chooses “I like to work” and “I 
work in order to be economically independent of others” out of the eleven 
questions asked about her work attitude, the number of hours she prefers to work 
is 2.4 (beta .135) and 2.5 (beta .138) larger, respectively, compared to mothers 
who have not chosen these answer categories.  
The maternal behaviour during childhood also has a direct significant effect 
on the work preferences of mature women. In cases when her own mother had a 
paid job when the respondent was twelve years old, she (the daughter) increases 
the number of hours she desires to work herself by almost 3 hours (beta .247).  

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Chapter 6 - Intermezzo: the full model 
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6.5 
Ideal family life 
The mothers in the sample were asked about their ideal family lives, as was also 
asked by Hakim (2000, 2003 a-d). The full path model explains 33 per cent of the 
variance of a mother’s personal ideal family life.
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 In the sample, 12 per cent of 
the mothers have a traditional ideal, 36 per cent are adaptive, and most mothers, 
52 per cent, have an egalitarian ideal (which also includes the role reversal 
model). A mother’s general gender values largely correspond with her own ideal 
family life.  
As expected, if her general gender values are more traditional, she also 
idealises a more traditional family life for herself (beta .381). If she has a partner 
then she prefers a more traditional family life, compared to single mothers. Apart 
from this, her educational level influences her ideal family life in the expected 
direction.  
Several primary and secondary socialization variables relate to mothers’ own 
ideal family lives as well. If a mother recalls that her parents mainly transmitted 
the message that caring for others is important, the daughter later comes to 
embrace a more traditional ideal family life (beta -.141). A mother who when 
young experienced her own mother enjoying work, or wishing that she could 
have paid work, has a more egalitarian ideal family life (beta .147).  
Secondary socializing agents (teachers, supervisors and colleagues) are also 
significantly associated with a mother’s ideal family life. If a mother has been 
supported by her teachers in her choice of occupation, she adheres to a more 
egalitarian family life (beta .182). Furthermore, in line with exposure-based 
theory, earlier work experiences in the presence of stimulating supervisors and/or 
colleagues towards fulfilling her full potential at work increase a mother’s 
preference for an equal division of paid and unpaid work with her spouse (beta 
.216).  
6.6 
General gender values  
As shown, a mother’s general gender values are significantly related to her work 
preference. Therefore next I shall examine which variables affect her general 
gender values. The full path model can explain approximately 16 per cent of the 
variance. If the focus is on the background characteristics, religiousness is, as 
expected, associated with a more traditional general gender attitude, while a 
higher education makes mothers more egalitarian. The respondents’ general 
gender values are also influenced by an objective characteristic of her own 
mother: her mother’s educational level (beta .103). 
The perceived support of some secondary socialization agents correspond to a 
mother’s general gender values as well. The analysis shows that previous support 
                                                           
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  This figure is substantially less than in the separate model. However, the estimates and strength of 
the variables remain similar, which is most key within this study. 

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