School of Social and Political Sciences - Research Publications

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    Time on housework and selection into and out of relationships in Australia: a multiprocess, multilevel approach
    Haynes, M ; Baxter, J ; Hewitt, B ; Western, M (BRISTOL UNIV PRESS & POLICY PRESS, 2015-07)
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    Disagreements among cohabiting and married couples in 22 European countries
    van der Lippe, T ; Voorpostel, M ; Hewitt, B (MAX PLANCK INST DEMOGRAPHIC RESEARCH, 2014-07-22)
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    SEPARATED PARENTS REPRODUCING AND UNDOING GENDER THROUGH DEFINING LEGITIMATE USES OF CHILD SUPPORT
    Natalier, K ; Hewitt, B (SAGE PUBLICATIONS INC, 2014-12)
    The use of child support is a politically and personally contested issue and a policy challenge across developed countries. This offers an opportunity to identify family practices and relationships through which hegemonic masculinity and socially valued femininities are reproduced and challenged. We present data from interviews with 28 fathers and 30 mothers to argue that when people discuss how child support is or should be spent, they are managing gendered parenting identities. Most fathers defined child support as “special money.” This position buttresses the hegemonic masculine characteristics of authority and breadwinning, discursively de-genders the care of children, and challenges mothers’ conformity to feminine and good mothering ideals. A minority of fathers presented an alternative definition of child support and fathering that underplayed the relevance of money and values mothers’ and fathers’ care and financial contributions. Mothers’ accounts of using child support emphasized their financial authority and child-centered consumption in ways that both challenge and reproduce socially valued femininity. We conclude that definitions of how child support should be used reproduce relationships of dominance and subordination that constitute the gender order.
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    Gender differences in relationship preferences after union dissolution
    Poortman, A-R ; Hewitt, B (ELSEVIER SCI LTD, 2015-12)
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    Digital socialization: young people's changing value orientations towards internet use between adolescence and early adulthood
    Smith, J ; Hewitt, B ; Skrbis, Z (ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD, 2015-09-02)
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    Young Mothers' Experiences of Receiving the Baby Bonus: A Qualitative Study
    Garrett, CC ; Keogh, L ; Hewitt, B ; Newton, DC ; Kavanagh, AM (ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD, 2017)
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    The benefits of paid maternity leave for mothers' post-partum health and wellbeing: Evidence from an Australian evaluation
    Hewitt, B ; Strazdins, L ; Martin, B (PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD, 2017-06)
    This paper investigates the health effects of the introduction of a near universal paid parental leave (PPL) scheme in Australia, representing a natural social policy experiment. Along with gender equity and workforce engagement, a goal of the scheme (18 weeks leave at the minimum wage rate) was to enhance the health and wellbeing of mothers and babies. Although there is evidence that leave, especially paid leave, can benefit mothers' health post-partum, the potential health benefits of implementing a nationwide scheme have rarely been investigated. The data come from two cross-sectional surveys of mothers (matched on their eligibility for paid parental leave), 2347 mother's surveyed pre-PPL and 3268 post-PPL. We investigated the scheme's health benefits for mothers, and the extent this varied by pre-birth employment conditions and job characteristics. Overall, we observed better mental and physical health among mothers after the introduction of PPL, although the effects were small. Post-PPL mothers on casual (insecure) contracts before birth had significantly better mental health than their pre-PPL counterparts, suggesting that the scheme delivered health benefits to mothers who were relatively disadvantaged. However, mothers on permanent contracts and in managerial or professional occupations also had significantly better mental and physical health in the post-PPL group. These mothers were more likely to combine the Government sponsored leave with additional, paid, employer benefits, enabling a longer paid leave package post-partum. Overall, the study provides evidence that introducing paid maternity leave universally delivers health benefits to mothers. However the modest 18 week PPL provision did little to redress health inequalities.
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    Editorial for Special Collection on New Relationships from a Comparative Perspective
    Poortman, A-R ; Hewitt, B (MAX PLANCK INST DEMOGRAPHIC RESEARCH, 2017-07-05)
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    Contemporary fatherhood: Social, demographic and attitudinal factors associated with involved fathering and long work hours
    Coles, L ; Hewitt, B ; Martin, B (SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD, 2018-12)
    Time pressures around work and care within families have increased over recent decades, exacerbated by an enduring male breadwinner culture in Australia and manifested in increasingly long work hours for fathers. We identified fathers who spent relatively long hours actively caring for children despite long work hours and we compared them with other fathers who did less work, less childcare, or less of both. Using 13 waves of the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey, we explored characteristics associated with the time fathers spent in work and care. The age and ethnicity of fathers differentiated those who spent long hours in both work and childcare from all other groups of fathers, yet other factors were also important for the time fathers spent at work or with children. By examining fathers at the margins of the distributions of work and childcare hours, we add valuable insights into associations between work and care for families.