The mental load: building a deeper theoretical understanding of how cognitive and emotional labor overload women and mothers

The mental load has received considerable public attention especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this article, we synthesize existing literature to argue that the mental load is a combination of cognitive and emotional labor and it is this combination that makes the mental work a load. We argue that the way the mental load operates within families and society has three characteristics: (1) it is invisible in that it is enacted internally yet results in a range of unpaid, physical labor;(2) it is boundaryless in that can be brought to work and into leisure and sleep time;and (3) enduring in that it is never complete because it is tied to caring for loved ones which is constant. We also offer some future directions for addressing the problems associated with the mental load. First, questions measuring the mental load should be standard in health and social surveys to better understand the problem. Second, employers should adopt better policies that allow for greater work-life reconciliation to lessen the mental load. Third, caregiving should be vital infrastructure developed and invested in by governments to reduce competing work and care demands that accelerate the deleterious consequences of the mental load. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Community, Work & Family is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Unpaid Work and Care During COVID-19: Subjective Experiences of Same-Sex Couples and Single Mothers in Australia

This paper draws on data from Work and Care During COVID-19, an online survey of Australians during pandemic lockdown in May 2020 (n = 2,722). It focuses on how subsamples of lesbian, gay, and bisexual mothers and fathers in couples (n = 280) and single mothers (n = 480) subjectively experienced unpaid work and care during lockdown compared with heterosexual mothers and fathers in couples, and with partnered mothers, respectively. During the pandemic, nonheterosexual fathers? subjective reports were less negative than those of their heterosexual counterparts, but differences between heterosexual and lesbian/bisexual mothers were more mixed. Unlike their partnered counterparts, more single mothers reported feeling satisfied than before with their balance of paid and unpaid work and how they spent their time overall during the pandemic, perhaps because they avoided partnership conflicts and particularly benefited from relaxed commuting and child care deadlines.

COVID-19 and the immediate impact on young people and employment in Australia: A gendered analysis.

Young people have been regarded as "not at risk" of coronavirus, but what about the economic impact of social distancing and "lockdowns" arising from the pandemic? How have young women fared in comparison to young men? To address these questions, this study draws upon data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, comparing young men and women and their older counterparts. The study also uses the Global Financial Crisis as a reference point to compare the immediate impact of COVID-19 on young people. Results suggest that young people have been significantly impacted by COVID-19 compared to older Australians. Young women in particular are being exposed to the economic fallout, especially those women in their 20s, wanting more work and more hours. COVID-19 threatens to erode some of the gains women have made in recent decades in terms of participation unless governments act to provide opportunities and support for young women.

Dual-earner parent couples' work and care during COVID-19.

COVID-19 and the associated lockdowns meant many working parents were faced with doing paid work and family care at home simultaneously. To investigate how they managed, this article draws a subsample of parents in dual-earner couples (n = 1536) from a national survey of 2722 Australian men and women conducted during lockdown in May 2020. It asked how much time respondents spent in paid and unpaid labour, including both active and supervisory care, and about their satisfaction with work-family balance and how their partner shared the load. Overall, paid work time was slightly lower and unpaid work time was very much higher during lockdown than before it. These time changes were most for mothers, but gender gaps somewhat narrowed because the relative increase in childcare was higher for fathers. More mothers than fathers were dissatisfied with their work-family balance and partner's share before COVID-19. For some the pandemic improved satisfaction levels, but for most they became worse. Again, some gender differences narrowed, mainly because more fathers also felt negatively during lockdown than they had before.

Caring during COVID-19: A gendered analysis of Australian university responses to managing remote working and caring responsibilities.

COVID-19 is dramatically reconfiguring paid work and care. Emerging evidence in the global media suggests that academic women with caring responsibilities are being disproportionately impacted. This article fills a key knowledge gap by examining how Australian universities are supporting academics to manage remote work and caring during the COVID-19 pandemic. We conducted a desktop analysis of public information about remote working and care from 41 Australian universities and compared them to the world's top ten ranked universities. Findings suggest that during the pandemic, the Australian higher education sector positions decisions about caring leave and participation in the paid labour force as 'private' matters in which employees (mainly women) design their own 'solutions' when compared with international institutional counterparts. We argue that COVID-19 provides another context in which universities have evaded their responsibility to ensure women's full participation in the labour force.