Here we go again: Children of working mums are less healthy than those who work part time. To the BBCs credit, they do at least briefly ask ‘what about Fathers’ – but this is yet another judgemental article, castigating full time work, and making assumptions about the type of parenting that goes on. I found the abstract for the paper (and why doesn’t the BBC link to this??), and it is clear that the associations found are very small – and short lasting! By the time the children in the study are school age, no association exists! However, surely what these studies highlight is the need for good quality childcare – rather than yet again putting working mums on the naughty step.
Working mums in the doghouse
March 4, 2010 by puddlepie
Posted in Children, Employment, Health, Parents | Tagged bbc, research, working mother | 5 Comments
5 Responses
Leave a reply to ladyblahblahs Cancel reply
Archive
- January 2011 (1)
- September 2010 (1)
- August 2010 (1)
- July 2010 (6)
- April 2010 (2)
- March 2010 (18)
- February 2010 (62)
Recent Articles
Tags
audit commission bbc breastfeeding bullying cancer career censorship childcare child development child protection conservatives contraception councils economy Education election euthanasia expenses feminism fertility food gender girls government grandparents Halloween Health home homebirth home education homework horror internet Labour Labour party legislation libdems Liberal Democrats marriage maternity Media memory military MMR mother mothers newborn obesity parenting parliament paternity leave peace PGD policy politicians Politics postcode lottery post natal depression pregnancy psychology pyjamas research Role Models safeguarding school Simon Hughes tax teenagers terry pratchett under fives vegetarian vote voting war working mother-
Join 17 other subscribers
Categories
- Budget (3)
- Children (35)
- 0-5s (5)
- Criminal Justice (2)
- Disability (1)
- Education (24)
- Employment (7)
- feminism (3)
- Health (16)
- Parents (19)
- Politics (40)
- pregnancy (6)
- religion (2)
- sex (1)
- The Coalition (5)
- Uncategorized (3)
- Welfare (2)
Follow us on twitter
Tweets by laptopmums
the BBC are really starting to pee me off with their onesided sensationalist news. First the stuff over home ed and now this. Why are people constantly trying to pit one set of parents against another?
SAHMs get a small bash in this too don’t they (although for some reason it’s not the main focus of the article)? I guess it’s because we’re all too busy watching Jeremy Kyle while the kids have crisps for breakfast. Like Heather, I get fed up with the in-fighting about who makes the best parents!
PS – you’d love the name of our local day nursery – Working Mums… presumably all the Dads in SW14 are sitting about drinking beer or something??????
Its nuts isnt it? They start off all *OMG isnt this shocking* stylee but buried near the bottom is this quote:
“A lot of the time when you look at the actual statistical differences in these studies, they are really quite small. We see associations, but not necessarily causes,”
Right. So we cant tell anything from this study then? So why report it. Honestly!
Honestly? Because it’s “news-worthy”.