IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v54y2002i5p727-740.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Multiple roles and health among British and Finnish women: the influence of socioeconomic circumstances

Author

Listed:
  • Lahelma, Eero
  • Arber, Sara
  • Kivelä, Katariina
  • Roos, Eva

Abstract

Two contrasting hypotheses have been presented to predict women's health variations. The multiple burden hypothesis predicts that combining a paid job, being married, and having children is likely to be detrimental to women's health. The multiple attachment hypothesis predicts that multiple roles provide attachment to the community, which is likely to be beneficial to women's health. These hypotheses are examined in Britain and Finland, which have different patterns of women's employment participation. Lone mothers form a critical case, since they have fewer attachments and greater burdens, and therefore are expected to have poorer health. The socioeconomic position of lone mothers differs in Britain and Finland, but in both societies they are likely to have fewer attachments. We assess the extent to which health variations between women with different family and parental role combinations are because of the differences in their socioeconomic status and material circumstances. Comparable surveys from Britain and Finland from 1994 were used. Perceived general health and limiting long-standing illness were analysed for working age women (20-49 years) by family type and employment status, as well as other socioeconomic variables. In both countries, women living in two parent families and having children had better health than women living in other family types or on their own. Lone mothers form a disadvantaged group and showed overall worse health in both countries. Adjusting for employment status, education and household income weakened the association between family type and poor health. The findings are broadly in accordance with the multiple attachment hypothesis. Despite the more generous welfare state and high full-time employment among Finnish women, single lone mothers report poorer health than other women in Finland as well as in Britain. However, in Britain the disadvantaged social position of lone mothers accounts for a greater proportion of their poor health than in Finland.

Suggested Citation

  • Lahelma, Eero & Arber, Sara & Kivelä, Katariina & Roos, Eva, 2002. "Multiple roles and health among British and Finnish women: the influence of socioeconomic circumstances," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 54(5), pages 727-740, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:54:y:2002:i:5:p:727-740
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(01)00105-8
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Fritzell, Sara & Burstrom, Bo, 2006. "Economic strain and self-rated health among lone and couple mothers in Sweden during the 1990s compared to the 1980s," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(2-3), pages 253-264, December.
    2. Patricia Gómez-Costilla & Carmen García-Prieto & Noelia Somarriba-Arechavala, 2022. "Aging and Gender Health Gap: A Multilevel Analysis for 17 European Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 160(2), pages 1051-1069, April.
    3. Dahlin, Johanna & Härkönen, Juho, 2013. "Cross-national differences in the gender gap in subjective health in Europe: Does country-level gender equality matter?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 24-28.
    4. Anu Molarius & Alexandra Metsini, 2021. "Domestic Work, Self-Reported Diagnosed Depression and Related Costs among Women and Men—Results from a Population-Based Study in Sweden," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(18), pages 1-11, September.
    5. Rebecca E Lacey & Meena Kumari & Amanda Sacker & Mai Stafford & Diana Kuh & Anne McMunn, 2016. "Work-Family Life Courses and Metabolic Markers in the MRC National Survey of Health and Development," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(8), pages 1-13, August.
    6. Wiebke Schmitz & L. Naegele & F. Frerichs & L. Ellwardt, 2023. "Gendered late working life trajectories, family history and welfare regimes: evidence from SHARELIFE," European Journal of Ageing, Springer, vol. 20(1), pages 1-15, December.
    7. Chun, Heeran & Khang, Young-Ho & Kim, Il-Ho & Cho, Sung-Il, 2008. "Explaining gender differences in ill-health in South Korea: The roles of socio-structural, psychosocial, and behavioral factors," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 67(6), pages 988-1001, September.
    8. Jean Woo & Ruth Chan & Jason Leung & Moses Wong, 2010. "Relative Contributions of Geographic, Socioeconomic, and Lifestyle Factors to Quality of Life, Frailty, and Mortality in Elderly," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 5(1), pages 1-11, January.
    9. Ji-won Kang & Soong-nang Jang, 2020. "Effects of Women’s Work-Family Multiple Role and Role Combination on Depressive Symptoms in Korea," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(4), pages 1-12, February.
    10. Jin-Won Noh & Kyoung-Beom Kim & Jumin Park & Janghun Hong & Young Dae Kwon, 2017. "Relationship between the number of family members and stress by gender: Cross-sectional analysis of the fifth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(9), pages 1-9, September.
    11. Canivet, Catarina & Östergren, Per-Olof & Lindeberg, Sara I. & Choi, BongKyoo & Karasek, Robert & Moghaddassi, Mahnaz & Isacsson, Sven-Olof, 2010. "Conflict between the work and family domains and exhaustion among vocationally active men and women," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 70(8), pages 1237-1245, April.
    12. Kuntsche, Sandra & Knibbe, Ronald A. & Gmel, Gerhard, 2009. "Social roles and alcohol consumption: A study of 10 industrialised countries," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(7), pages 1263-1270, April.
    13. Lisa Harryson & Mattias Strandh & Anne Hammarström, 2012. "Domestic Work and Psychological Distress−What Is the Importance of Relative Socioeconomic Position and Gender Inequality in the Couple Relationship?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(6), pages 1-7, June.
    14. Lallukka, T. & Arber, S. & Laaksonen, M. & Lahelma, E. & Partonen, T. & Rahkonen, O., 2013. "Work–family conflicts and subsequent sleep medication among women and men: A longitudinal registry linkage study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 66-75.
    15. Furnée, Carina A. & Pfann, Gerard A., 2010. "Individual vulnerability and the nurturing state: The case of self-reported health and relative income," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 125-133, July.
    16. Dana Hamplová, 2019. "Does Work Make Mothers Happy?," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 20(2), pages 471-497, February.
    17. Petra Rattay & Elena von der Lippe, 2020. "Association between Living with Children and the Health and Health Behavior of Women and Men. Are There Differences by Age? Results of the “German Health Update” (GEDA) Study," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(9), pages 1-19, May.
    18. Fritzell, Sara & Ringbäck Weitoft, Gunilla & Fritzell, Johan & Burström, Bo, 2007. "From macro to micro: The health of Swedish lone mothers during changing economic and social circumstances," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(12), pages 2474-2488, December.
    19. Sabbath, Erika L. & Mejía-Guevara, Iván & Noelke, Clemens & Berkman, Lisa F., 2015. "The long-term mortality impact of combined job strain and family circumstances: A life course analysis of working American mothers," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 146(C), pages 111-119.
    20. Aitken, Zoe & Garrett, Cameryn C. & Hewitt, Belinda & Keogh, Louise & Hocking, Jane S. & Kavanagh, Anne M., 2015. "The maternal health outcomes of paid maternity leave: A systematic review," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 32-41.
    21. Sperlich, Stefanie & Geyer, Siegfried, 2015. "The mediating effect of effort-reward imbalance in household and family work on the relationship between education and women's health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 58-65.
    22. D'Ovidio, Fabrizio & d'Errico, Angelo & Scarinzi, Cecilia & Costa, Giuseppe, 2015. "Increased incidence of coronary heart disease associated with “double burden” in a cohort of Italian women," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 40-46.
    23. Stefanie Sperlich & Sonja Arnhold-Kerri & Siegfried Geyer, 2011. "What accounts for depressive symptoms among mothers? The impact of socioeconomic status, family structure and psychosocial stress," International Journal of Public Health, Springer;Swiss School of Public Health (SSPH+), vol. 56(4), pages 385-396, August.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:54:y:2002:i:5:p:727-740. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.