Browsing by Autor "Toni Schmader"

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Gender Gap in Parental Leave Intentions: Evidence from 37 Countries
(Wiley, 2023) Maria I. T. Olsson; Sanne Van Grootel; Katharina Block; Carolin Schuster; Loes Meeussen; Colette van Laar; Toni Schmader; Alyssa Croft; Molly Shuyi Sun; Mare Ainsaar
Despite global commitments and efforts, a gender‐based division of paid and unpaid work persists. To identify how psychological factors, national policies, and the broader sociocultural context contribute to this inequality, we assessed parental‐leave intentions in young adults (18–30 years old) planning to have children ( N = 13,942; 8,880 identified as women; 5,062 identified as men) across 37 countries that varied in parental‐leave policies and societal gender equality. In all countries, women intended to take longer leave than men. National parental‐leave policies and women's political representation partially explained cross‐national variations in the gender gap. Gender gaps in leave intentions were paradoxically larger in countries with more gender‐egalitarian parental‐leave policies (i.e., longer leave available to both fathers and mothers). Interestingly, this cross‐national variation in the gender gap was driven by cross‐national variations in women's (rather than men's) leave intentions. Financially generous leave and gender‐egalitarian policies (linked to men's higher uptake in prior research) were not associated with leave intentions in men. Rather, men's leave intentions were related to their individual gender attitudes. Leave intentions were inversely related to career ambitions. The potential for existing policies to foster gender equality in paid and unpaid work is discussed.
Policy as normative influence? On the relationship between parental leave policy and social norms in gender division of childcare across 48 countries
(Wiley, 2024) Simon Schindler; Carolin Schuster; Maria I. T. Olsson; Laura Froehlich; Austin Y. Hubner; Katharina Block; Colette van Laar; Toni Schmader; Loes Meeussen; Sanne Van Grootel
In the present work, we addressed the relationship between parental leave policies and social norms. Using a pre-registered, cross-national approach, we examined the relationship between parental leave policies and the perception of social norms for the gender division of childcare. In this study, 19,259 students (11,924 women) from 48 countries indicated the degree to which they believe childcare is (descriptive norm) and should be (prescriptive norm) equally divided among mothers and fathers. Policies were primarily operationalized as the existence of parental leave options in the respective country. The descriptive and prescriptive norms of equal division of childcare were stronger when parental leave was available in a country - also when controlling for potential confounding variables. Moreover, analyses of time since policy change suggested that policy change may initially affect prescriptive norms and then descriptive norms at a later point. However, due to the cross-sectional nature of the data, drawing causal inferences is difficult.