Özet:

Family has always interacted with social, economic, cultural and other historical changes. In the last 50 years women have increasingly been represented in the labor market, and dual-earner families have become the norm in developed countries. Nevertheless, a great number of women from those families experience difficulties in balancing work and family life, which suggests the dual role of women in contemporary families. The status of women in society has changed, but their role in the family, childcare and household responsibilities have remained the same as when they were primarily tied to the house. The aim of this paper was to examine the attitudes of students of the University of Zadar towards the dual role of women in Croatian families, i.e. towards women’s market position and family obligations, as well as to determine the extent to which students evaluate the efficiency of the offered measures that could help women with balancing work and family obligations and improve their status in society. The research was conducted on a convenient sample of 181 participants, 91 of which were women, and 90 of which were men. Students generally showed moderately egalitarian attitude towards this issue. However, as it was assumed, the results showed a difference in attitudes according to independent variables, where women, participants from humanities and social sciences, those whose mothers are employed and more educated, on the one hand, showed more egalitarian attitudes than men, participants from technical field of study, those whose mothers are homemakers and less educated, on the other hand. This difference in attitude was most evident in terms of women’s balancing between work and family obligations, and the effect of their employment on the child’s wellbeing. Moreover, data analysis showed that the participants who express more sensitivity towards the issue of the dual role of women, think that the root of the problem lies in the law and social values, and that a solution for the reconciliation of women’s work and family obligations should be consistent gender equality law enforcement, education and the increasing of gender issue awareness.

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