Thursday, August 24, 2017

Gender Bend Your Way to Depression

Of course, this will not come as a surprise. When couples switch gender roles, both members become more depressed. When women become breadwinners and men become Mr. Mom, the results are negative for both. Who knew?

The Daily Mail reports:

When females were the main breadwinner in the family, they were discovered to report more symptoms of depression.

However, the opposite effect was found in men: Their psychological well-being was highest when they were the primary wage-earners….

Researchers at the University of Illinois examined data on nearly 1,500 men and 1,800 women, aged between 52 and 60. Their well-being was evaluated through surveys.

The researchers first found that men's well-being decreased once they had exited the workforce to become home-makers.

Meanwhile, the inverse was not so for women: Women's psychological well-being was not affected by leaving their jobs to become stay-at-home mothers.

'We observed a statistically significant and substantial difference in depressive symptoms between men and women in our study,' says lead researcher Karen Kramer.

'The results supported the overarching hypothesis: well-being was lower for mothers and fathers who violated gendered expectations about the division of paid labor, and higher for parents who conformed to these expectations.'

Feminists will tell you that it’s just a sign of rampant sexism. But, what if it is just a sign that we have not yet repealed human nature?

3 comments:

L. Beau said...

Not really off-topic, there's a story told about Ayn Rand:

"[S]he would raise, disturbed, the question of how she could have contracted cancer; she tended to think that cancer, as well as many other illnesses, was the result of what she termed "bad premises - that is, of philosophical-psychological errors and evasions carried to their final dead end in the form of physical destruction. How could she have a malignancy, when she had no bad premises?"

The Passion of Ayn Rand, Barbara Branden (1986)

It looks like biology beat ideology that time, too.


Sam L. said...

"But, what if it is just a sign that we have not yet repealed human nature?" Doesn't matter how we vote, we're not going to repeal human nature, no matter how much feminists want it.

Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCD said...

This is why we must take down statues of men... everywhere! Because if men and women don't see our culture making men look important and strong, then people will accept the idea of woman as breadwinner. These towering male monuments must come down now! Fight the patriarchy! Smash the bronze and rock glorifications of phallic might! Human nature must fall!