New life patterns and changing gender roles

This chapter links new life patterns in western industrial societies to societal change and a new division of labor between women and men. Four aspects of this change are shown to parallel the processes of adaptive change that Talcott Parsons outlined in his theory of evolution of modern societies and that Miriam Johnson applied to the gender revolution: (1) technological innovation and new patterns of time use (adaptive upgrading); (2) wider role options for men and women (goal differentiation); (3) new rules and policies about equity and integration of work and family (inclusion and integration); and (4) reframing of values to achieve a better balance between productivity and caregiving (value generalization).