Are Fathers’ Non-Standard Working Hours Bad?


Key takeaways for caregivers

  • Parents who work outside of the usual Monday-Friday, 9-5 hours must strike a balance between their work schedule and the demands of parenting.
  • Parenting of fathers often influenced by non-standard work schedules and some types of work, such as night shift, may increase some types of parenting, while others may decrease the amount of parenting.
  • Achieving the right balance between work and parenthood must be considered within the context of the family. For example, the mother’s work schedule, the child’s age, and the type of parenting activity may all play a role in the impact of nonstandard work schedules.

How do fathers’ unusual work schedules affect their parenting?

Fathers are important. We know the positive impact of fathers as caregivers about emotional support, interactive care, and daily raising of their children. But does it matter if they often work unusual hours, such as evenings, nights, or weekends, which may challenge their ability to perform their parenting activities? Given that more than half of working fathers in the UK work like that non-standard hours during the first decade of their children’s lives, it is necessary to understand how this affects fathers’ parenting and if the effects vary by context. (Non-standard work schedules too common among fathers in the US.)

New quantitative evidence from the United Kingdom offers a nuanced answer. My colleague, Anne McMunn, and I used data from Millennium Cohort Study – a nationally representative sample of children born in the United Kingdom between 2000 and 2002. We analyzed 11,412 fathers when their children were nine months old and 7,791 fathers when their children are about seven years old. We focus on two dimensions of parenting – basic care (in both age groups) and play and recreation (for seven-year-olds).

Photo: Gustavo Fring. Pexels.

Fathers of nine-month-old babies were asked how often they cared for their babies alone, changed diapers, fed their babies, or got up at night to nurse. them. Fathers of seven-year-old children were asked whether they helped their children prepare the bed or cared for them alone. They were also asked how often they read with or to their children, tell stories, do musical activities, draw, play active physical games, take the children to the park, or play toys or games indoors.

Different non-standard schedules influence fathers’ involvement in different ways

We found that fathers who worked at night, between 6pm and 10pm, spent less time on basic parenting activities when their children were infants and when they were seven older than fathers who work standard hours. For example, they spend less time caring for a child alone, getting a child ready for bed, changing diapers, or getting up at night to comfort a child. . In contrast, fathers who worked evening schedules, such as 10 p.m. to 7 a.m., spent more during these basic care activities.

Initially we found that fathers who regularly worked nights spent more time and those who worked weekends spent less time playing and having fun than fathers who worked regular hours. However, these differences may stem from job characteristics, such as long working hours, rather than work schedules. Finally, we found no evidence that the relationship between fathers’ work schedules and parenting differed by the intensity of fathers’ work hours, families’ poverty status, or fathers’ educational attainment.

While fathers who work nights may decrease the amount of parenting they do, fathers who work nights have opportunities to be more actively involved in parenting.

These findings support a more nuanced view of combining non-standard work schedules with parenthood. Not all non-standard work schedules negatively affect fathers’ involvement. While fathers who work nights may decrease the amount of parenting they do, fathers who work nights have opportunities to be more actively involved in parenting.

Previous research on specific working hours of the day help interpret these results. Evening schedules can create openings for fathers to be involved in parenting routines during the day, or in the early morning or evening, depending on when work starts and ends. In contrast, night work may occur during children’s sleep, giving working fathers during this time fewer opportunities to be involved in parenting. In addition to the basic parenting activities we examined, other studies have found that as well fathers who work evening schedules are unable to participate in family activitieslike helping with homework and eating together.

Mothers’ work schedules also influence working fathers’ parenting time

The story is not complete if we do not consider the role of mothers’ work. We check if the parents are present at the time of the home is also important during fathers’ parenting. We found that fathers’ work at night facilitated more basic parenting activities when mothers work than they did when mothers were not working. However, fathers participate in more basic parenting activities when both parents work irregular schedules than when both work regular hours.

Father feeding the child

Photo: Tima Miroshnichenko. Pexels.

Perhaps this indicates a preference for childcare by parents. Some couples engage in tag-team parenting, which involves minimizing overlap between their work schedules and maximizing time with their children. For example, if one parent works nights or weekends, the other parent stays home and participates in parenting instead of paying for child care.

Alternatively, our findings may reflect not that parents choose to work non-standard schedules but the financial constraints of finding childcare at non-standard hours. Despite the greater provision of publicly funded childcare in the United Kingdom for three to five-year-olds, relative to the US context, childcare is expensive and harder to find. outside of regular daytime hours.

Policies and programs can help reduce the challenges of parents’ non-standard work schedules

How can fathers do this so that they can make important contributions to their children’s lives? The challenge for workplace policies and government programs is to reduce the potential difficulties for fathers to work non-standard schedules. Employers need to recognize a lesson learned from the COVID-19 pandemic: that many jobs can be outsourced quickly.

Unusual working hours can compromise supportive parenting – but it also has the potential to lead to more parenting time under the right circumstances.

Some parents see non-standard work schedules as an opportunity to fulfill their goals of combining family time, parenting, and paid work. Employers can advertise flexible work vacancies and in the United Kingdom, reduce the qualification period before employees can request a flexible work schedule. This policy promotes inclusivity because the demand for non-standard work is met and matched with workers who are available and willing to work at those hours.

When parents have no control over work schedules

However, not all parents have control over their work schedules. For parents, government policies can provide incentives for childcare facilities to stay open at night and on weekends, and employers can offer pay premiums for working. outside of normal hours. Such programs can ease the constraints of families needing affordable child care.

Parents who work unusual work schedules may want to minimize the potential negative effects of their work hours on their parenting. As parents contemplate combining their work schedules with family time, they should consider the context of their home life—for example, the ages of their children, whether both parents work and what time day, and the types of parenting. activities they do during a day (for example, play or basic care).

In our research, we did not consider whether a parent chooses to work non-standard hours, but such a choice of work schedules is undoubtedly a factor in how parents combine work and family time. . Between the daily challenges of balancing work and parenting time, working irregular hours can be compromised. supportive parenting – but it also has the potential to lead to more parenting time under the right circumstances.





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