Development and Validation of a Measure of Valuing Family Care Labor With U.S. Samples

Abstract

Unpaid family care labor, disproportionately completed by women, has been consistently devalued. Research on caregiving has been hindered by the absence of a measure to capture the extent to which individuals value caregiving, inhibiting research on this topic. The purpose of this research was to validate a new two-dimensional measure of valuing family care labor, defined as the belief that care labor is (a) important work and (b) deserves societal investment and compensation. Across five U.S.-based samples (total N = 1,344; 56.6% women, M_age = 33.1, 67.6% White), we provide evidence of internal consistency, construct validity, and some initial criterion-related validity for this new measure. As expected, valuing care labor was positively related to communal values and welfare support and negatively related to traditional gender ideology. Also, women scored significantly higher on the measure than men. Unexpectedly, there were no significant differences based on race or ethnicity, caregiver experience, or income. This newly validated measure provides a valuable tool for practitioners, policy makers, and scholars to examine shifts in how individuals value care, an important step for evaluating future efforts undertaken to support the fostering of a more caring society. Additional online materials for this article are available on PWQ's website at http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/suppl/10.1177/03616843251382257

Keywords

care labor family gender ideology value measurement

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