Why some men don’t help with the chores

Do you often wonder why your man does not lift a finger to help you around the house?

Why he won’t grab that iron or wash the dishes? According to a new study, your man’s attitude to household chores boils down to whether he has sisters or not.

According to the research published in the Journal of Politics, men who grew up around sisters are likely to shun helping their spouses with chores at home in their adulthood.

This is because, while growing up, having younger sisters made it less likely for them to be assigned chores that were commonly associated with women and the gendered environment from childhood may have permanently altered these men’s perception of who takes on what role in the home.

The study showed that men who have sisters were 17 percent more likely to leave household chores to their spouses. The research paper analysed decades of longitudinal data on American families.

SONS AND DAUGHTERS TREATED DIFFERENTLY

According to the research, parents were found to treat their sons and daughters differently, with boys with sisters less likely to have household chores than boys without sisters.

Cleaning the dishes was found to be top on the list chores less likely to be done by men who grew up around sisters. “Our research indicates that parents almost treat their sons and daughters as husbands and wives,” said Neil Malhotra, one of the researchers.

According to the data examined, 82 percent of girls aged ten and above said they were expected to help with the chores in contrast to 60 percent of boys.

The researchers tracked data from the views and habits of thousands of families over three decades ranging between 1965 and 1997. The data was part of surveys of more than 3,000 individuals each that were conducted in 2006 and 2008.

In a related research paper presented by the American Sociological Association, women in the workplace were found to have profound impacts on how their male colleagues behaved at home.

According to the paper, men who work with women were more likely to take on more housework after switching from male-dominated careers to women-dominated careers.