Feeling Pressure to Be a Perfect Mother Relates to Parental Burnout and Career Ambitions.

Loes Meeussen,Colette Van Laar

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02113

Abstract

Background and aims: Intensive mothering norms prescribe women to be perfect mothers. Recent research has shown that women’s experiences of pressure toward perfect parenting are related to higher levels of guilt and stress. The current paper follows up on this research with two aims: First, we examine how mothers regulate pressure toward perfect mothering affectively, cognitively, and behaviorally, and how such regulation may relate to parental burnout. Second, we examine how feeling pressure toward perfect mothering may spill over into mothers’ work outcomes.Methods: Through Prolific Academic, an online survey was sent to fulltime working mothers in the United Kingdom and United States with at least one child living at home (N = 169). Data were analyzed using bootstrapping mediation models.Results: Feeling pressure to be a perfect mother was positively related to parental burnout, and this relation was mediated by parental stress, by a stronger cognitive prevention focus aimed at avoiding mistakes as a mother, and by higher maternal gatekeeping behaviors taking over family tasks from one’s partner. Moreover, pressure toward perfect mothering had a positive direct effect on career ambitions; and a negative indirect effect, such that mothers with higher felt pressure toward perfect mothering experienced lower work-family balance, which in turn related to lower career ambitions.Conclusion: The findings suggest that intensive mothering norms might have severe costs for women’s family and work outcomes, and provide insights into where to direct efforts to reduce motherhood hardships and protect women’s career ambitions.

Highlights

The transition to parenthood is considered one of the major milestones in people’s lives that comes with great joy and happiness (Hansen, 2012)
We investigated the relation between pressure to be a perfect mother and parental burnout and career ambitions using an online survey presented as a study “interested in people’s daily lives and how they feel about family and work.”
Hypothesis 1: Pressure to Be a Perfect Mother Is Positively Related to Parental Burnout, and This Relation Is Mediated by Parental Stress, Prevention Focus as a Mother, and Maternal Gatekeeping Behaviors

Summary

Introduction

The transition to parenthood is considered one of the major milestones in people’s lives that comes with great joy and happiness (Hansen, 2012). Parents increasingly face the challenge to combine childcare tasks with a paid job as more and more women entered the labor market and there are more and more dual earning families (Cotter et al, 2008; Pew Research Center, 2015). This combination of work and family is not always easy, and parents have to make decisions regarding the extent to which they spend time and energy on their family or on pursuing career ambitions (Greenhaus and Beutell, 1985; Allen et al, 2000). We examine how feeling pressure toward perfect mothering may spill over into mothers’ work outcomes

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