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ABSTRACT
The paper examines how in Britain the time fathers and couples spend in employment shifts in the first years of children’s lives, the conditions under which this happens and how fathers feel about and experience time with their families and time in paid work. In order to achieve these aims new longitudinal analysis of the UK Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) is carried out together with secondary analysis of narrative case studies drawn from a qualitative study of Fatherhood across the Generations. By linking these datasets the paper examines the potential for corroboration and complementarity between different types of data. Further, it seeks to show how qualitative cases corroborate, elaborate and expand on the main employment trajectories in the MCS population of fathers and how these extend understandings of fathers’ experience of time within families.
RÉSUMÉ
Le papier examine comment en Grande-Bretagne les pères et les couples passent leur temps à faire l'emploi dans les premières années de la vie des enfants, les conditions dans lesquelles cela se produit, et comment les pères connaissent l'expérience du temps avec leur famille et au travail rémunéré. Afin d'atteindre ces objectifs une nouvelle analyse longitudinale des données de la Millennium Cohort Study, UK (MCS) est réalisée, en même temps que l'analyse secondaire des narratives tirées des recherches qualitatives au sujet de la Paternité à travers les Générations. Le papier examine le potentiel de la corroboration et de la complémentarité entre les différents types de données. De plus, il cherche à montrer comment les recherches qualitatives confirment, élaborent et développent les principales trajectoires d'emploi dans la population des pères (MCS) et comment ceux-ci étendent la compréhension de l'expérience du temps entre des familles des pères.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes on contributors
Dr Heather Elliott is a researcher at the Thomas Coram Research Unit, UCL Institute of Education, working on narrative methods, the psychosocial and motherhood.
Dr Sam Parsons is a Senior Researcher at the Centre for Longitudinal Studies, UCL Institute of Education.
Professor Julia Brannen is a professor of the sociology of the family at Thomas Coram Research Unit, UCL Institute of Education.
Professor Jane Elliott is Chief Executive of the Economic and Social Research Council and former director of the Cohort and Longitudinal Studies Enhancement Resources (CLOSER) at UCL Institute of Education.
Professor Ann Phoenix is a Professor of Psychosocial Studies at the Thomas Coram Research Unit UCL Institute of Education and director of the NOVELLA (Narratives of Varied Everyday Lives and Linked Approaches) programme.
Notes
1. We did not include employment status at nine months as we did not have information on how parents felt about the time they spent with their child at nine months old.
2. We cannot, however, be sure that these mothers were continuously in work during the time between each of the three interviews.
3. When fathers responded that they did not have enough time with their child, they were asked why this was in a multi-coded follow-on question but were also asked to select the main reason for this. Answer categories included ‘work long hours’, ‘work away from home’, ‘demands of other children’, ‘demands of domestic duties’, etc. At least 85% of fathers at each age selected ‘work long hours’ and 16% that they ‘worked away from home’.
4. The National Qualification Framework aligns academic and vocational qualifications into levels. Level 1 equates to GCSE grades D–G, level 2 to GCSE grades A*–C.