Task Allocation in Marriage in the United States and Belgium

Abstract

Three miniature theories constructed to account for patterns of task allocation in marriage are compared for their explanatory power on data collected from similarly designed samples of American and Belgian families. Cultural prescriptions theory fails to explain either American or Belgian findings. Availability theory, namely, that the more available a spouse is to perform family tasks, the more tasks he is likely to perform, best explains American task allocation but does less well in explaining the Belgian findings. Family development theory which puts availability theory into time perspective over the family's life cycle explains best both American and Belgian variations in task allocation. Task performance, task specialization, and adherence to gender definitions of task assignments are shown to vary in both settings with changes in the size and composition of the family over its life cycle.