Microsoft Word Socialized Choices 31-12 pod docx

Chapter 8 - Synthesis: overview and discussion 
203 
values and ideal family life will easily adapt to changing circumstances. The 
mothers’ narratives rather disclosed that their life paths have to some extent been 
characterised by continuity with origins formed in childhood.  
8.6 Conclusions 
The shared and personal social structures of mothers’ embedded employment 
choices 
In the Netherlands, the current dominant view of being ‘a good mother’ includes 
the normative standard of part-time work, and modest use of professional day-
care, with sparse institutional and moral room left for alternative maternal 
lifestyles such as not being in paid work or working full-time. Although it is 
nowadays possible for Dutch mothers to act outside society’s norms, they must be 
able to withstand comments and questions about their lifestyle, whether innocent 
or harsh. Nonetheless, despite these social institutions, mothers clearly differ in 
their perceptions about what one should do as a mother, since some of the values 
and attitudes behind these perceptions are ‘shaped’ differently in childhood, and 
are sustained heterogeneously later in life. Either way, the study has found little 
evidence to support the view that mothers are ‘free’ from social ties, as is 
assumed in the contemporary narrative of choice. On the contrary, the larger 
social system and mothers’ own micro social realities influence mothers’ actions. 
In other words, Dutch mothers’ choices are thoroughly socially embedded, since 
they are guided by (invisible) constraints and opportunities, which are shared in 
the dominant social system and dispersed in personal heterogeneous social 
experiences. 
Firstly, the study demonstrated that different personal work preferences can 
explain mothers’ diverse labour market decisions. Work preferences are based on 
current life circumstances and earlier experiences, but also on internally driven 
orientations (general values and personal attitudes) which influence a mother’s 
perception of these circumstances and experiences. Because mothers perceive 
(appreciate and evaluate) similar circumstances differently, they prefer a diverse 
number of work hours, whereupon they make different employment decisions. A 
mother’s work preference is therefore a good predictor of her labour market 
decision. Nonetheless, a mother’s work preference cannot be understood as sole 
expressions of free choice, but rather as an engendered and socialized preference.  
The origins of a mother’s gender (values) and work attitudes and values could 
partly be traced back to childhood by often subtle and complex processes of 
socialization. More specifically, various normative mental and verbal symbols 
that have been intentionally or unintentionally transmitted by her parents, 
especially by her own mother, still (partly) characterise a mother’s values and 
attitudes, and subsequently her work preference. Nonetheless, parental influences 
are mostly outside mother’s own awareness, and thus a mother perceives her 
work preference as her own preference, which of course it is as well, since part of 

---

Socialized Choices - Labour Market Behaviour of Dutch Mothers  
204 
a mother has become what is transmitted by others. This also adds to the 
explanation of the pre-existence of the narrative of free choice. 
In later life, the perceived support of significant others, such as teachers, 
partners and people at work, towards a mother’s professional life and her job 
ambitions adds to the explanation of why some mothers embrace egalitarian 
gender roles and other mothers are inclined towards a more traditional division of 
labour. Nonetheless, the study indicates that a mother who perceived career 
support from secondary socialization agents towards her work, often already had 
her egalitarian attitudes formed in childhood. It therefore appears that although 
probably subconsciously and automatically, a mother looks for social 
environments where she can find continuity and consistency of her previously 
developed attitudes. In this light, mothers’ diverse employment decisions can be 
partly understood as results of long-term and mostly steady social processes.   
Last but not least, the specific Dutch social structures (institutions and moral 
convictions) that enable but also push mothers towards part-time work came to 
light through the narratives of the interviewees. For example, they cited perceived 
social approval or punishment from people ‘out there’ when mothers did not 
conform to the part-time norm. This is echoed in a mother’s appraisal and 
evaluation of her own behaviour, which is often seen through the eyes of the 
‘generalized other’. The interviewed stay-at-home mothers especially frequently 
conveyed internal conflicts between their current unemployed situation, their own 
work preferences and societies’ moral obligations on them to work part-time.  
Therefore, Dutch mothers’ labour market decisions can be understood as the 
results of individual preferences that are embedded and deeply interwoven by 
joint and personal (invisible) constraints and opportunities. Examples of shared 
social structures include Dutch society’s social script for mothers to work part-
time, and the ‘magical’ border of a maximum of three days professional childcare 
per week (Kremer, 2007). Further corresponding social institutions exist in the 
form of inflexible school timetables, the narrative of non-complaining towards 
inequalities within the domestic sphere (which are justified by personal 
characteristics or by the ‘natural’ differences between men and women), mothers’ 
shared “engendered” adherence to intrinsic work values, and their reluctance to 
cling to instrumental work drivers such as salaries and careers. A final 
contributing factor is mothers’ shared memories of their fathers “sitting on the 
couch with a newspaper”, which tended to make the contributions of their own 
husbands seem a big improvement by comparison.  
Clearly, these shared social structures are not internalized or perceived by all 
mothers in the same manner. They have a specific composition for each woman, 
the basic components of which were consolidated during childhood. The study 
could point out some specific and diverse parental mental and verbal codes that 
still serve as internal guides for Dutch mothers in their labour market behaviour. 
Mental codes that could be distinguished from the interviewees were for example, 
a silent, consenting, satisfied or self-evident mother figure, or just the memory of 
a mother associated with being reluctant, unsatisfied, strong or the sole provider. 

---