Intimate Partnership: Foundation to the Successful Balance of Family and Work

Researchers have begun documenting the adaptive strategies of dualearner couples in balancing family and work. This line of research provides therapists and dual-earners with research-based strategies for effective work-family balance. Data for this study were drawn primarily from interviews with 47 middle-class, dual-earner couples with children, who perceive themselves as successful in balancing family and work. The majority of these couples stated that striving for marital partnership or equality is an integral strategy to their success. This article details how these couples practiced marital partnership in ways that supported effective work-family balance; their descriptions clustered into six general partnership themes: shared housework, mutual and active involvement in childcare, joint decision-making, equal access to and influence over finances, value placed on both partners work/life goals, and shared emotion work. Both quantitative and qualitative data indicated that these successful couples equally share housework and emotion work. Wives tend to perform slightly more childcare and to be primarily responsible for organizing family life. Wives perceive that husbands careers are slightly more prioritized. Clinical applications for therapists working with dual-earner couples are offered.