Adapting to the Dual Earner Family Norm? The Case of Immigrants and Immigrant Descendants in Norway

Abstract

How immigrants and their descendants adapt to the dual earner family model of Scandinavian welfare states is a topic of considerable interest. While earlier studies have addressed this issue in terms of economic integration, expanding our understanding of how cultural adaptation underpins these processes is vital. This study aims to identify patterns and dynamics shaping attitudes towards mothers' employment in Norway. The analysis draws on a survey including immigrants from Pakistan, Iran, Iraq and Vietnam, as well as descendants of Pakistani immigrants and a Norwegian control group. Survey data are linked with public register data. The analysis suggests both cultural persistence and adaptation; among immigrants, country of origin is a strong predictor of attitudes, whereas years of residence in the host country is of limited importance. While I find little evidence of a gradual process of adaptation over time, the analysis shows that both economic and linguistic integration is related to more positive attitudes to mothers' employment. Pakistani descendants express stronger support for mothers' employment than immigrants from Pakistan. Although Pakistani descendants are still less supportive of mothers' employment compared to the Norwegian control group, this suggest a significant degree of adaptation from one generation to the next.

Keywords:

• Breadwinner Models
• Cultural Adaptation
• Gender Equality
• Immigrants
• Norway

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Anne Britt Djuve, Anne Lise Ellingsæter and Axel West Pedersen, as well as two anonymous referees, for their helpful comments.

Notes

[1] See for example Official Norwegian Report 2011:7: Welfare and Migration. The future of the Norwegian model and Official Norwegian Report 2011:14: Better integration. Targets, strategies and measures.

[2] Migrants in the survey had an average of 40 months residence (Williams, Thornton, and Young-DeMarco 2014, 804).

[3] When the European Union in 2004 was enlarged with eight Eastern- and Central European countries, this spurred what might be labelled a fourth wave of migration to Norway.

[4] Concerns about confidentiality can prevent immigrants from conflict areas and small population groups to participate. The immigrants were therefore offered the choice of a Norwegian interviewer.

[5] For a more detailed discussion of the data's representativity, see Kavli and Nadim (2009).

[6] The questions are copied from the European Social Survey (1987). Respondents who answered ‘I do not know’ to one or more questions were removed (147 respondents).

[7] Several other measures were tested, including share of life spent in Norway, different categorical variables based on number of years in Norway and interaction variables between country of origin and years spent in Norway as well as gender and years spent in Norway. None of these measures were statistically significant (not shown).

Additional information

Funding

This work was made possible by funding from the Norwegian Ministry of Children, Equality and Social Inclusion.