Exploring the Diverse Perceptions of Home

Question: Compare and contrast what quantitative and qualitative evidence can reveal about inequalities within the home

The concept of home derives diverse perceptions between and among the people. In some people’s eyes, homes are viewed as structures, buildings and spaces yet in the eyes of the others, a home is a place where happiness, love, and socialization are nurtured. Nevertheless, others view home as an exploitative place where their rights are infringed by the very people that are closest to them. This presents a glimpse of the whole concept of inequality existing within the home and manifested between father, mother, and children. Inequality can be understood as differences in terms of rights, status, and opportunities exhibited between one person and the other. Seeking sociology dissertation help can offer valuable insights into these dynamics.

To understand inequalities within the home, qualitative and quantitative evidence can be relied upon. By definition, qualitative research is an approach that is focused on particular aspects of social life in detail often analysed using small sample size and addresses the complexities, context and the details of a particular topic and links it to the patterns of social action (Silva 2010). On the other hand, quantitative research approach seeks to generate evidence empirically and present its analysis by use of percentages and numerical data (Bitman et al 2004). This assignment seeks to identify similarities and differences in the qualitative and quantitative evidence regarding the aspect of inequality within homes. To achieve this, two forms of inequalities will be established and substantiated using qualitative and quantitative evidence

Technology and social change in the homes

The modern age of digitization has led to the acquisition of home appliances which have been designed to perform several household duties, or at least, make work easier. However, the very distribution of this technological equipment is premised. For instance, since these appliances are costly, their concentration is largely among families with high socioeconomic status compared to those in lower social cadre.

Qualitative and quantitative comparisons have been drawn from studies to examine the use of technological appliances within the home. A qualitative study conducted by Silva (2010) focused on the use of a washing machine against the Television set and sought to examine the disparities between the use of these two appliances between husband and wife, in a home setting. Silva (2010) identifies that while the home appliances are intended to save time and energy doing household chores, there are selective choices among partners about the most frequently used appliances compared to the others. Having conducted participant observation of 24 families, the washing machine was the most preferred appliance for most of the women interviewed, while the Men’s responses favoured the TV as the most useful tool in the home.

In a quantitative view, however, Bitman et al (2004) examined the time spent using the four home appliances through a survey. These appliances are microwave oven, dishwasher, tumble dryer, and lawnmower and identified that the laundry appliance use was largely dominated by women who accounted for 88% of the total time spent on it. Bitman et al (2004) additionally found that 57% of men spent their time on gardening and ground care. Thus, both qualitative and quantitative studies, regardless of the differences in the presentation of the results, identify that home appliances use present inequality between men and women with each gender having different preferences on the appliances to be used.

Work, family time and division of labour

Quantitative studies have also been conducted to examine inequalities within the family. A study conducted by Craig et al (2012) sought to examine the aspect of employment and division of labour in the home. This examined the elements of employment, self- employment and child care at home and how the father and mother perceive each of these elements. With the social change, women increasingly took up positions in the active employment sector, while others concentrated in self- employment to meet the needs of the family. Data were analysed through a multivariate regression model and the findings were identified from the surveyed participants. This study involved 1168 fathers and 855 mothers who were categorized as employed, self-employed (with employees) and self-employed (with no employees).

Carig et al (2012) established that among mothers, whose employees spend more time in paid work that employees while self-employed mothers spend more time on domestic work and child care. Mothers who are employers spend less significantly less time in primary child care and more time in secondary care compared to employed mothers (p<.01). Employer mothers, therefore, spend significantly more time doing paid work and child care simultaneously (p<.001). Craig et al (2012) further explained that father’s time in domestic work and child care was largely constant and even when they are working less their extra time is not devoted to childcare. A qualitative study conducted by Sayer (2005) sought to examine two popular arguments in the 1960s to 1990s that men are doing more unpaid work and less paid work while women are doing more paid work than unpaid work thus have little leisure activities. Sauer (2005) established that over time, men are increasingly spending more time on unpaid work with more emphasis on childcare and cooking. Furthermore, a time inequality has been established since the researcher identified 30 minutes free time gap between men and women.

There are some differences in the results presented between Craig et al (2012) and Sayer (2005). As can be noted above, Craig et al (2012) maintain that men's involvement in childcare is slightly less, while Sayer (2005) establishes that men are increasingly devoting more time in childcare and cooking.

From the above-detailed analysis, it is clear that both similarities and differences exist between quantitative and qualitative approaches in presentation of evidence. The main similarity is that both studies are structured with scientific tools of data collection and analysis and may equally present similar results on the same topic. However, there are peculiar differences too apportioned to these studies. For instance, quantitative studies rely on large sample of respondents, as indicated in the survey by Craig et al (2012) presented above while qualitative studies are generally focused on a small sample. This may account for the differences in the results between the study conducted by Craig et al (2012) and that of Sayer (2005). However, it can be concluded that inequalities within the home are evident and may range from home appliance use and childcare to gender disparities in the choice of the duties at home. However, as a result of social change the inequalities are increasingly becoming dynamic. For instance, as pointed out by Craig et al (2012), women are increasingly being involved in paid work which was previously dominated by men and this has affected their presumed primary role of childcare with the employed mothers dedicating the functions and duties of childcare to other females recruited as house workers (Craig et al 2012).

References

Bittman, M., Rice, M. and Wajcman, J. (2004) ‘Appliances and their impact: the ownership of domestic technology and time spent on household work’, British Journal of Sociology, vol. 55, no. 3, pp. 401–23.

Craig L, Powell A and Curtis N. (2012) Self-employment, work, family time and the gender division of labour. Work, employment and society. Sage Publishers

Sayer, L. (2005) ‘Gender, time and inequality: trends in women’s and men’s paid work, unpaid work and free time’, Social Forces, vol. 84, no. 1, pp. 285–303.

Silva, E. (2010) Technology, Culture, Family: Influences on Home Life, Basingstoke, Palgrave.

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