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A three-stage process of reactions to change: Maternal employment and day care

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Abstract

This article delineates a three-stage process of reactions to social and economic changes that threaten traditional values. In the first stage, public and professional reactions are predominantly negative; in the second stage, predominantly ambivalent; and in the third stage, predominantly accepting. This three-stage process is used to analyze the reactions to increases in maternal employment and day care. A key issue for future investigation is whether the same process represents a predictable sequence of reactions to other social and economic changes that threaten traditional values.

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determine how maternal employment relates to home environment and children's development in a longitudinal study from infancy through the early school years is maternal employment status independently related to proximal home environment and children's development contemporaneously from infancy through the early school years is there a long-term effect of maternal employment on children's development and home environment from infancy through the early school years is consistency versus inconsistency of maternal employment status related to home environment and children's development do mothers' occupations, hours of employment, or employment attitudes relate to children's development and home environment (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
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does maternal employment affect children's development results will be integrated to determine generalizability of findings across studies important processes pertaining to the relationship of maternal employment to children's development will be highlighted contemporaneous and long-term relationships between maternal employment status and children's development family environment / child's gender / schedules of employment / maternal occupation / maternal attitudes / role satisfaction directions for future research and implications for social policy are advanced (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Article
Many children of working parents regularly care for themselves after school. Questionable findings about the danger of children's self-care (latchkey) arrangements are being used in an effort to obtain public funding for after-school care. The use of this evidence poses a dilemma for feminists and others. Arguing that latchkey children are at risk may improve the chances of receiving funds for child care. But it could also lead to unintended negative consequences for women. Emphasizing the risks of self-care could result in greater social opposition to working mothers. From a feminist perspective, the best argument for after-school care would be one that focuses on the special needs and circumstances of working parents, and does not rely on suspect data that suggest negative consequences of self-care for children's development. Copyright 1989 by The Policy Studies Organization.
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Modern personnel practices, social consensus, and the Depression acted in concert to delay the emergence of married women in the American economy through an institution known as the "marriage bar." Marriage bars were policies adopted by firms and local school boards, from about the early 1900's to 1950, to fire single women when they married and not to hire married women. I explore their determinants using firm-level data from 1931 and 1940 and find they are associated with promotion from within, tenure-based salaries, and other modern personnel practices. The marriage bar, which had at its height affected 751 of all local school boards and more than 50% of all office workers, was virtually abandoned in the 1950's when the cost of limiting labor supply greatly increased.
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