History & Trends on Gender, Marriage & Family Life

A briefing paper prepared by Daniel L. Carson, University of Utah, and Melissa A. Milkie, University of Toronto, for the Council on Contemporary Families symposium The COVID-19 Pandemic and the… Read more: Work-Family Stressors, Gender, and Mental Health during COVID-19 and Beyond

A briefing paper prepared by Jeff Hayes, Women’s Bureau, U.S. Department of Labor[1],  and H. Elizabeth Peters, Urban Institute, for the Council on Contemporary Families symposium The COVID-19 Pandemic and… Read more: Leave Laws Support Equity

A briefing paper prepared by Arielle Kuperberg, University of North Carolina – Greensboro,  Sarah Thébaud, University of California, Santa Barbara, Kathleen Gerson, New York University,  and Brad Harrington, Boston College,… Read more: Dads Home with Kids Peaked During The COVID-19 Pandemic – But Not for The Reason You Think

A briefing paper prepared by Jill E. Yavorsky, University of North Carolina Charlotte, Yue Qian, University of British Columbia, and Liana Christin Landivar, Women’s Bureau, U.S. Department of Labor, for… Read more: Mothers Continue to Experience Career Consequences Three Years into the Pandemic

A briefing paper prepared by Liana C. Sayer, University of Maryland and Joanna R. Pepin, University of Toronto for the Council on Contemporary Families online symposium The COVID-19 Pandemic and… Read more: Pandemic Influences on Gender Inequality in Unpaid Work

A briefing paper prepared by Liana Christin Landivar, Women’s Bureau, U.S. Department of Labor, and Pilar Gonalons-Pons, University of Pennsylvania for the Council on Contemporary Families online symposium The COVID-19… Read more: Childcare Challenges During the Pandemic and Their Impact on Parents and Care Providers

Prepared by Daniel L. Carlson, University of Utah, and Richard J. Petts, Ball State University, for the Council on Contemporary Families symposium The COVID-19 Pandemic and the Future of Gender… Read more: Executive Summary: The COVID-19 Pandemic and the Future of Gender Equality

A new CCF symposium highlights what emerging research tells us about changes to family & work life during the COVID-19 pandemic and what they mean for the future of gender equality in the U.S.

CCF Expert and Director of Research and Public Education Stephanie Coontz spoke at the recent opening of Legacy Washington’s “Love, Equally” exhibit.

Family formation has long been touted as a source of racial inequality, but what does the research actually say?

It turns out there is a big difference between dividing up the tasks so that each partner does different ones versus sharing or alternating the same tasks, so that partners contribute equally to each.

A new study estimates that about 70% of U.S. moms can expect to be primary financial providers before their children turn 18.

A new study finds that recognizing one type of inequality doesn’t automatically lead to recognition of another.

Read his thoughts in his new essay for Aeon, “Modern culture blames parents for forces beyond their control“ Tweet

Children face continued social isolation this fall, with 21 of the 25 largest school districts in the country choosing remote learning instead of in-person classes.

“Legacy Washington recently recorded an interview with author/historian Stephanie Coontz. Watch Legacy Washington historian Bob Young interview Coontz, an expert on family and marriage whose writing influenced the U.S. Supreme… Read more: CCF’S Stephanie Coontz Interviewed by Legacy Washington

CCF experts Dan Carlson, Richard Petts, and Joanna Pepin discuss the findings of their latest brief report on gendered division of labor during the covid-19 pandemic with Deseret News’ Lois M.… Read more: CCF Experts Featured in The Washington Post, Boston Globe, Deseret News

Read her thoughts on the challenges mothers are facing in “Coronavirus Is Killing the Working Mother” Tweet

The Marriage Strengthening Research & Dissemination Center (MAST) recently released a new research brief, “Trends in Relationship Formation and Stability in the United States: Dating, Cohabitation, Marriage, and Divorce.” Co-authored… Read more: New MAST Center Brief on Trends in Relationship Formation and Stability

A briefing paper prepared by Daniel L. Carlson (University of Utah), Richard J. Petts (Ball State University), and Joanna R. Pepin (University of Buffalo – SUNY) for the Council on… Read more: Men and Women Agree: During the COVID-19 Pandemic Men Are Doing More at Home

Five years after marriage equality, CCF Director of Research and Public Education Stephanie Coontz asks: What can different-sex couples learn from same-sex couples? Featuring research by CCF experts Joanna Pepin, Dan… Read more: CCF’s Stephanie Coontz for The New York Times: What Can Different-Sex Couples Learn From Same-Sex Couples?

January 23, 2020 A fact sheet on prospects for marriage in contemporary America prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families by Daniel L. Carlson, University of Utah, and Stephanie Coontz,… Read more: National Spouses Day Is This Sunday…. Feeling Any Pressure?

Parents Can’t Go It Alone introduces you to important new work about what parents need to meet their goals and successfully raise the next generation.

A briefing paper prepared by Kathleen Gerson, New York University, for the Council on Contemporary Families’ Symposium Parents Can’t Go It Alone—They Never Have.  If debates about women’s rights, relationships… Read more: Why No One Can “Have It All” and What to Do About It

In her Op-Ed for NBC News, CCF Director of Research and Public Education Stephanie Coontz writes about the origins of gendered wedding traditions and possible implications for marital satisfaction. Coontz… Read more: Stephanie Coontz on History of Wedding Traditions in NBC News

JSTOR looks beyond the hype to examine what the “sex recession” is and whether we should be concerned about it. Several CCF experts weighed in on why the fear of… Read more: CCF Experts Weigh in on the “Sex Recession”

A briefing paper prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families by Arielle Kuperberg, Associate Professor of Sociology and Women and Gender Studies, UNC Greensboro.  October 9, 2018  In the early… Read more: From Countercultural Trend to Strategy for the Financially Insecure: Premarital Cohabitation and Premarital Cohabitors, 1956-2015

A Research Brief Prepared for the University of Texas at Austin Population Research Center Research Brief Series Download a PDF of this Brief Kelly Raley Introduction Today, nearly two-thirds of first… Read more: Cohabitating Couples With Lower Education Levels Marry Less. Is This Because They Do Not Want To?

In her piece for Harvard Business Review, CCF Director of Research and Public Education, Stephanie Coontz, writes about a pernicious form of nostalgia – a collective nostalgia that involves people… Read more: CCF’s Stephanie Coontz Writes for Harvard Business Review

New research by CCF members Daniel Carlson and David Cotter is featured in the Deseret News. Carlson and Cotter presented two new reports to CCF about gender differences in household… Read more: Men are helping more around the house and favor more gender equality, new research shows

Not All Housework is Created Equal: Particular Housework Tasks and Couples’ Relationship Quality A brief report prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families by Dan Carlson, Assistant Professor, Family and… Read more: CCF BRIEF: Not All Housework is Created Equal: Particular Housework Tasks and Couples’ Relationship Quality

Patterns of Progress? Changes in Gender Ideology 1977-2016 A briefing paper prepared for The Council on Contemporary Families by David A. Cotter, Department of Sociology, Union College, cotterd@union.edu. April 3,… Read more: CCF BRIEF: Patterns of Progress? Changes in Gender Ideology 1977-2016

On August 26, 2017, Women’s Equality Day Turns 44.   A fact sheet compiled for the Council on Contemporary Families by Nika Fate-Dixon and Stephanie Coontz, The Evergreen State College.… Read more: CCF BRIEF: On August 26, 2017, Women’s Equality Day Turns 44

ADVISORY: Women’s Equality Day Turns 44. Gains, stalls, and setbacks   August 25, 2017, Austin, TX: Since 1973, August 26th has been designated as Women’s Equality Day, offering a chance… Read more: CCF ADVISORY: On August 26, 2017, Women’s Equality Day Turns 44

CCF members Daniel Carlson and Amanda Miller respond to new research on declining sexual frequency among American couples. In their Op-ed, they debunk four common myths about couples’ sex lives,… Read more: Daniel Carlson and Amanda Miller Shed Light on Couples’ Sex Lives

Michelle Janning’s recent release, The Stuff of Family Life, offers a timely look at how modern society and technology shapes our relationships and our lives. Like an archaeologist studying ancient… Read more: CCF Chair’s New Book Reveals What Your Underwear Drawer Can Say About You

Welfare Reform’s 20th Anniversary A briefing paper prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families by Stephanie Coontz, Professor of History and Family Studies, The Evergreen State College August 22, 2016… Read more: Welfare Reform’s 20th Anniversary

Welfare Reform at 20. How’s that working? Overview of the Welfare Reform at 20 Online Symposium prepared for Council on Contemporary Families by symposium editor Virginia Rutter, Professor of Sociology,… Read more: Welfare Reform at 20. How’s that working for you?

The New Republic has published an introduction to the new version of The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap, by CCF’s own, Stephanie Coontz. Tweet

The Way We Still Never Were: Another Quarter Century of Family Change and Diversity A briefing paper prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families by Stephanie Coontz, Director of Research… Read more: The Way We Still Never Were: Another Quarter Century of Family Change and Diversity

CCF Research Director and eminent expert on the history of marriage, Stephanie Coontz reflects on the blurred meaning of marital status in Single or married: Does it really matter anymore?,  an… Read more: Renowned expert on the meaning of marriage, Stephanie Coontz, opines for the WP

Husbands and wives who share similar levels of education now enjoy a lower risk of divorce than those in which husbands have more education—a trend consistent with a shift toward egalitarian marriages.

Today the Council on Contemporary Families releases the third set of papers in a three part symposium marking the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act. The first two sets of papers described changes in America’s religious and racial-ethnic landscape in the half century since it became illegal to discriminate on the basis of religion, skin color, national origin, race, ethnicity or gender.

By Heidi Shierholz Labor Market Economist Economic Policy Institute, Washington, DC hshierholz@epi.org, (202) 775-8810 In the late 1970s, after a long period of holding fairly steady, the gap in wages… Read more: The Wrong Route to Equality: Men’s Declining Wages

By Leslie McCall Professor of Sociology and Political Science Faculty Fellow, Institute for Policy Research Northwestern University l-mccall@northwestern.edu It used to be that the most economically successful women earned no… Read more: Men against Women, or the Top 20 Percent against the Bottom 80?

The last bastion of the feminine mystique may be a sexual mystique. Like the feminine mystique before it, the sexual mystique relies on the fantasy that men and women live in different worlds, and that these differences must be maintained for everyone to be turned on and sexually satisfied. According to this mystique a happy sex life requires a macho man who is in control and a woman who is charged up with desire, yet submissive and teachable.

Latinas are often described as being either too devoted to their cultural values or not sufficiently connected to them. They are often told that they must choose “one of way of being,” either Latina or American. This expectation not only implies that there is an “authentic” Latina femininity and American femininity, but that their success depends on enacting the “right” femininity.

The gendered mystique that still poses barriers to African-American women in their personal and public lives is perhaps best described as an “unfeminine mystique” – the idea that they have characteristics and embrace lifestyles that are outside the boundaries of “real” womanhood. This “unfeminine mystique” has plagued African-American women for more than 200 years.

In the 1950s and early 1960s, a woman’s first priority, even if she had superpowers, was to catch and keep a man. She caught him by being beautiful; she kept him by being adoring and submissive. Whatever powers she might possess, be they brains, creativity, or levitation, had to be suppressed as an unforgiveable threat to the male ego. Keeping a happy marriage was her primary aim; a clean house came second; and well-adjusted children, third.

Today, a male manager who selected only young, beautiful women employees would be seen as a Neanderthal. But in the personal sphere, when a 50 year-old single man dates only much younger women, and chooses one to marry, few of his friends question his sense of entitlement to a younger woman.

In the half century since the publication of The Feminine Mystique, many myths have grown up about what Friedan actually wrote and what the feminist movement, which she helped found, has and has not achieved. Here are four of the most common.

On the 50th Anniversary of The Feminine Mystique, Council on Contemporary Families Scholars identify what’s changed—and what hasn’t.

At a time of dramatic change in attitudes towards gays and lesbians in America, a new study released this month in Gender & Society highlights the diversity of gay and… Read more: It’s Not Just City Folk: Gays and Lesbians Experience Striking Gains in Acceptance in All Regions and Subgroups of America

July 25, 2012 Download Fact Sheet as a PDF Download Fact Sheet as a Word Document Today, almost 40 percent of all babies in the United States are born to… Read more: Myths About Later Motherhood: Fact Sheet

By Paula England Professor of Sociology New York University Email: pengland@nyu.edu Phone 650-815-9308 Jonathan Bearak Ph.D. Candidate New York University Email: jonathan.bearak@nyu.edu Download Full Report as a PDF Download Full… Read more: Women’s Education and their Likelihood of Marriage: A Historic Reversal

In 1973 – less than 40 years ago — the Supreme Court ruled that sex-segregated employment ads were illegal. The next two decades saw massive, rapid action in eradicating old laws and prejudices. But now three researchers argue that progress toward gender equality has slowed or even stalled since the early 1990s. In this CCF online symposium in time for International Women’s Day, David A. Cotter, Joan M. Hermsen and Reeve Vanneman present their discussion paper “Is the Gender Revolution Over?” and CCF fellows from around the United States offer a series of responses that add to this discussion.

By Paula England, Ph.D. Professor of Sociology New York University Email: pengland@nyu.edu Back in the 1960s, feminist activists declared that “the personal is political,” meaning that seemingly innocuous personal interactions,… Read more: CCF Gender Revolution Symposium: In Sex and Romance, Not So Much Gender Revolution

By Stephanie Coontz Professor of History The Evergreen State College Phone: 360-352-8117 Email: coontzs@msn.com Some of the ideals of the gender revolution are not yet achieved, and new forms of inequality… Read more: CCF Gender Revolution Symposium: Revolutions Seldom Revolutionize Everything

The New Jersey Supreme Court has given the state Legislature a historic opportunity, and I don’t mean the chance to allow same-sex couples to marry. The Legislature has the chance to enact civil unions for all couples – same-sex and different-sex. New Zealand does it. So does the Netherlands, under the name “registered partnership.” Maine and the District of Columbia recognize “domestic partnerships” for both straight and gay couples, although both give domestic partners fewer rights than those accorded married couples. Even New Jersey’s current domestic partnership law allows different-sex couples to register – but only if both partners are over 62, presumably a nod to the impact of remarriage on certain pension and retirement benefits.

By Michael J. Rosenfeld Professor of Sociology Stanford University mrosenfe@stanford.edu, 415.205.1892 Prior to 1970, the overwhelming majority of all couples were same-race married couples. Couples who lived together outside of marriage,… Read more: The Steady Rise of Non-Traditional Romantic Unions

Download Full Report as a PDF Download Full Report as a Word Document By M. V. Lee Badgett Professor of Economics University of Massachusetts, Amherst As a way to understand… Read more: Will Providing Marriage Rights To Same-Sex Couples Undermine Heterosexual Marriage? Evidence From Scandinavia