Although the participation of women in the labour force has increased the last decades, the division of tasks at home has hardly changed. In this article we examine the absolute time spent on household labour (including child care) of the husband and his relative share in the total amount of household labour. This is explained by investigating the sex-role ideology of partners, their relative resources, the demand for housework and the husband's available time. Results indicate that men spend more time on household tasks, when there is a young child present. It also appears that if partners have modern norms, the husbands' housework participation is higher. Contrary to expectations, husbands do not spend more hours on household labour, when their wife is working for pay. Husbands' relative share in housework however, increases when their wife is working for pay, but this is mainly due to the fact that women with a paid job are doing less household labour compared to women without a paid job. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]; Copyright of Mens en Maatschappij is the property of Amsterdam University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)
