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Using a unique representative online time use diary survey, we examine the UK population's behaviour both before, and at five key phases during, the COVID-19 pandemic. A main focus of our analysis is which of the significant changes in activities associated with the pandemic survived the government-defined end of most restrictions on `freedom day' (July 19th 2021). Our data (N7,000 diary days) includes a baseline pre-pandemic survey, conducted in 2016, followed by five subsequent waves coinciding with key moments of pandemic restrictions, including all three lockdowns and two periods of relaxation of restrictions between lockdowns and after the final lockdown. In multivariate regression analyses, we find that changes in behaviour that characterised lockdown periods but did not persist following the end of restrictions were: watching more TV; spending more time doing other home-based leisure activities; doing less paid work, and reducing leisure time spent out of the home, including socializing with friends. However, other important and policy-relevant changes in time use during the pandemic appeared to `stick', i.e. persisted even after the lifting of almost all restrictions. These were: an increase in exercising; a shift to more active ways of travelling; the increased contribution of fathers to childcare; more shopping online, more time spent sleeping, and more time spent doing paid work from home (teleworking). We assess the subjective enjoyment associated with these `sticky' activities as a possible explanation for their persistence, and discuss their policy implications.

This paper adds to the literature on cultural stratification by revisiting cultural voraciousness, nearly two decades after it was first introduced as a measure of cultural participation designed to capture inequalities in the pace and variety of cultural activities. Specifically, using the UK 2014–15 Time Use Survey, we compare measures of cultural voraciousness in the UK in 1998 and 2015, focussing in particular on the way cultural voraciousness is associated with both gender and class. We find continuity over time in the patterns of relationship between cultural voraciousness, gender and class, which are not explained by income or hours worked. While women at the bottom of the class scale are still the most disadvantaged in terms of unequal access to cultural participation, high level managerial women now equal equivalent men in their voracious cultural participation. We conclude that not only is cultural voraciousness still useful in depicting cultural inequalities delineated by gender and class, and not only do gender and class gaps in cultural voraciousness persist over time, but also that there is evidence for accentuated class inequality over time in cultural voraciousness among men and among women.

The recent global pandemic, involving restrictions on movement, social distancing and the displacement of many work activities to the home, has created an upsurge of interest in changes in the distribution and sequencing of our daily activities. Time use diary data is recognised as the leading source of evidence on this topic. The purpose of this paper is to provide a timely overview of the current state-of-the-art in respect of the designs of time use surveys with a view to online/smartphone deployment. It has three parts: Firstly, we briefly summarise the main reasons for using diaries to collect time use information (as opposed to survey questions), and we sketch out the long tradition of time-use research from which these designs emerged. We then outline the main methods currently deployed to collect time use data, with the focus on online and smartphone app instruments. Finally, we present a detailed example of a specific kind of online diary design, the Click-and-Drag Diary Instrument (CaDDI), that may be of particular interest in respect of the sudden demand for new data on time use as it is both user-friendly to complete and capable of timely adaptation and deployment. © 2020 Journal of Time Use Research. All rights reserved.

Research on time use has seen several major developments in recent years. These include the adoption of exciting new technologies (e.g., smartphones, wearable Global Positioning System devices) that track behavior in real time, as well as a growing international database—the Multinational Time Use Study—that has surpassed one million days’ worth of harmonized time-diary data. These developments are transforming our understanding of the social patterning of everyday behavior. This article provides updates about this area of work, including recent findings regarding foundational sociological issues such as trends in gendered divisions of household labor and over-time, cross-national aggregate estimates of time spent on paid work and leisure. We also highlight new approaches to the study of time use. This includes an overview of advances in the collection and analysis of time-stamped behavioral data, as well as a discussion of methodological advances in the analysis of the temporal sequential structure of everyday activities.

Time-use data can often be perceived as inaccessible by non-specialists due to their unique format. This article introduces the ATUS-X diary visualization tool that aims to address the accessibility issue and expand the user base of time-use data by providing users with opportunity to quickly visualize their own subsamples of the American Time Use Survey Data Extractor (ATUS-X). Complementing the ATUS-X, the online tool provides an easy point-and-click interface, making data exploration readily accessible in a visual form. The tool can benefit a wider academic audience, policy-makers, non-academic researchers, and journalists by removing accessibility barriers to time use diaries.

We present findings from three waves of a population-representative, UK time-use diary survey conducted both pre- and in real time during full ‘lockdown’, and again following the easing of social restrictions. We used an innovative online diary instrument that has proved both reliable and quick-to-field. Combining diary information on activity, location, and co-presence to estimate infection risks associated with daily behavior, we show clear changes in risk-associated behavior between the pre, full-lockdown and post full-lockdown periods. We document a shift from more to less risky daily behavior patterns (combinations of activity/location/co-presence categories) between the pre-pandemic pattern and full lockdown in May/June 2020, followed by a reversion (although not a complete reversal) of those patterns in August 2020 following the end of the first lockdown. Because, in general, a populations’ time use changes relatively slowly, the behavioral changes revealed may be interpreted as a consequence of the UK COVID-19 lockdown social restrictions and their subsequent relaxation.

Using time diary evidence on change in the frequency and distribution of activities from UK time diary data over the 15 years from the turn of the 21st century, we assess whether the thesis of ‘the speed-up society’ is manifested in an increase in time intensity in people’s daily lives. Comparing indictors like time fragmentation, multitasking and ICT use, to respondents’ reports of how rushed they normally feel, we find no evidence that time pressure is increasing, or that ICT use is associated with greater feelings of time pressure. Rather, we find consistent cross-sectional differentials in our measures of time intensity by gender and occupational status, supporting the idea of relative stasis in the underlying social inequalities of time. These findings are consistent with previous research based on time use data, and we pose them as a challenge to theories of societal speed-up.

This article brings up to date welfare regime differences in the time fathers spend on childcare and core housework, using Multinational Time Use Study data (1971–2010) from fifteen countries. Although Nordic fathers continue to set the bar, the results provide some support for the idea of a catch-up in core housework among Southern regime fathers. The results also suggest an increasing polarization in Liberal countries, whereby fathers who were meaningfully involved in family life were increasingly likely to spend more time doing core housework and, particularly, childcare. Fathers living in Corporatist countries have been least responsive to change.

Gender inequalities in work–family balance have wide-reaching ramifications: women shoulder the greatest burden of unpaid work and care, both decreasing their opportunities for employment and contributing significantly to the gender pay gap. Concerted measures at both the policy and ideological level are required to redress this problem. // Recent statistics show a gender pay gap of 16% in Europe1, and 18% in the USA2, despite half a century of women moving into paid employment. Gender inequality in pay is intricately linked to gender inequality in work–family balance, especially in the division of paid and unpaid work. Women shoulder the greatest burden of unpaid work and care, decreasing their opportunities for employment and career progression. The extent and cross-national scope of this inequality is a pressing matter on an international level, and it will require both innovative policy approaches and major shifts in attitudes to amend it.

(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)1.IntroductionIn this paper we update previous cross-national evidence on the gender division of housework. Due to the usual gap that occurs between the collection of survey data and their public launch, most research on this topic published up to the end of the first decade of the 21st century - including some influential decade reviews (Bianchi and Milkie 2010; Lachance-Grzela and Bouchard 2010) - relied on research based on data on housework time from the years up to 2005-2006 at the latest (although Bianchi et al. 2012 updated the US time use data to 2010).Using the Multinational Time Use Study (Fisher and Gershuny 2013), we bring the cross-national evidence up to date by including data from 10 additional surveys from 9 countries for the period 2005-2011 (Australia, Canada, Finland, France, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, U.K., and U.S.A.).The study of housework is interesting for three main reasons. Firstly, it is a routine, repetitive and disliked activity, which means that the relative time spouses spend on housework has long been recognized as an important indicator of marital power (Davies and Greenstein 2013). We use core housework (cleaning, cooking, and clothes care) as our measure in these analyses because these are both the most disliked domestic labour activities and the most traditionally feminine. They have, therefore, been the ones that have been most resistant to change. Since the burden of responsibility for these activities traditionally falls on women, this can have negative consequences for their work-life balance and their sense of time pressure. Secondly, the division of housework is significantly related to couples' well-being. Disagreement over housework is one of the main sources of marital conflict (Ruppaner 2010; van der Lippe, Voorpostel, and Hewitt 2014). Between 36% (Portugal) and 90% (Finland) of married/cohabiting couples across Europe report having disagreements over housework (van der Lippe, Voorpostel, and Hewitt 2014). Thirdly, housework has been an important measure in the debate over the stalling or not of the 'gender revolution' (e.g., England 2010). The inclusion of more recent surveys in our analyses allows us to bring the cross-national evidence underpinning the 'convergence versus stall' debate in the gender division of housework up to the end of the first decade of the current century.2.DataTime use diary data is generally regarded as the 'gold standard' for the measurement of time spent in routine activities such as housework (e.g., Robinson and Godbey 1997; Bianchi, Robinson and Milkie 2006). The data we use comes from Multinational Time Use Study (MTUS), an international archive of cross-national time use surveys dating from the 1960s to the current day. We use data from 19 countries between 1961 and 2011, chosen on the basis of their data series and quality. The sample is limited to adults aged 19 or older. Table 1 shows the full list of surveys included in the data, sample sizes, and average minutes spent on core housework by men and women.In the analyses that follow, housework refers to the most disliked, routine, and traditionally feminine-defined housework activities of laundry and cleaning, food preparation, and cooking. Household chores that are traditionally masculine or genderneutral, such as home maintenance, car repairs, or shopping, are excluded.3.MethodsWe first calculated average minutes spent on core housework by men and women across countries (see Table 1). We then applied multilevel models estimating the effect of gender, controlling for relevant socio-demographic factors. The baseline model is a random intercept model, where individuals are nested in surveys (country-year), showing the effect of being a woman on the time spent on core housework with no socio-demographic controls:...In a second model we add controls for demographic and socio-economic variables, namely age, educational attainment, employment and marital status, number of children under age 18 in the household, and the presence of a child under age 5 in the household. …

In this chapter I first define, and then examine the origins of research into, the gendered division of household labor and care. I outline the main theoretical approaches, finishing with the development of multi-level theoretical frameworks that connect the institutional and interactional levels of the gendered construction of labor and care. I follow the logic of these models to describe current configurations and trends. I focus on the factors identified by successive decade reviews as being the most important influences on the gendered division of household labor and care, and describe spousal resources and educational level as examples of individual-level influences. I then discuss cross-national trends in relation to institutional-level policy contexts, comparing evidence for and against the idea of a recent ‘stall’ in progress towards gender equality. I conclude by arguing that it is important to recognize the processes of progressive change that are at work, in order to continue to press for movement in the direction of greater equality. I outline the most significant barriers that need addressing, emphasizing in particular the persistency of traditional masculinities, and policy directions that fail to address the need for a better work-life balance for both women and men.

(1991). Unemployment: Family Circumstances and Childhood Correlates Among Young People in Britain. Population Studies: Vol. 45, No. sup1, pp. 115-132.

This article addresses the dilemma of consumption for those in income-rich, time-poor households in the contemporary affluent economies of the West. Following Linder, two `temporal strategies of consumption' are proposed, reflected in the consumption profiles of high status groups. The first is `voracious' consumption, denoting a fast `pace' and variety of leisure participation. The second is inconspicuous consumption — the purchasing of expensive consumer goods without the time to use them or the primary intent to display them. From a political economic perspective a solution is provided as to how to increase consumer spending among those with high disposable incomes and little leisure time.

According to the gender-deviance neutralization hypothesis, men and women in household circumstances that contradict the normal expectations of gender display their gender accordingly, by either increasing or decreasing their contribution to household tasks. In this article, I review and reassess the large-scale quantitative evidence, concluding that considerable doubt has subsequently been cast on this hypothesis. For women, research shows that the original identification of gender-deviance neutralization behavior was questionable, as it failed to take into account women's absolute levels of income. For men, both more recent quantitative and indicative qualitative research suggests that such behavior was always limited to a very small group. Subsequent changes in the contributions to housework of men from lower socioeconomic groups suggest that such display may no longer be evident.

A number of general features of interest in a social policy context emerge from the evidence for changes in patterns of time use. The question that we address here is: is it possible to specify public policy regime effects on patterns of time use? Some hypotheses are advanced concerning likely patterns of relationship between the liberal and social-democratic public policy regimes and the use of time in these societies. The data used are drawn from a multinational time-use data archive held at the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Essex. A clear relationship is found between public policy regime and paid work time (those in liberal market regimes work longer on average), however, there are no consistent regime effects found either for the amount of time spent in different leisure activities or in respect of the domestic division of labor. The conclusion is that, at least in relation to the time-use variables used in the these analyses, the gender division of domestic labor and type of leisure activity represent different dimensions of variability than those commonly used in the classification of public policy regimes.