Gendering boundary work: Experiences of work-family practices among Finnish working parents during COVID-19 lockdown

In the spring of 2020, the COVID-19 outbreak and governmental lockdowns changed the everyday lives of families with children worldwide. Due to remote work recommendations and the closing of school premises and childcare centers, work-family boundaries became blurred in many families. In this study, we examine the possibly gendered boundary work practices among Finnish parents during the COVID-19 lockdown in spring 2020 by asking, how do parents perceive the blurring of work-family boundaries? What kind of boundary work practices did families develop to manage their work and family roles, and were these practices gendered and how? Boundary practices are analyzed by combining theories of doing boundaries and gender theories in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and applying them to survey data. The results revealed that during lockdown, both spatial and temporal boundaries blurred or partly disappeared, and boundary practices developed by families were highly gendered. Especially in families where childcare practices had been gendered already before the lockdown, it was predominantly mothers, who shouldered the main responsibility of increased childcare and struggled to manage their work duties. Hence, families had varying means to cope with blurring boundaries based on their ability to switch to remote work, but also on their work-family practices before the pandemic.

Automated summary

The study found that during the COVID-19 lockdown, families developed highly gendered boundary practices, with mothers taking on more household and childcare responsibilities, especially in families where childcare practices had been gendered before the lockdown. These findings highlight the challenges faced by families in managing work-family boundaries during the pandemic, with different coping strategies based on their pre-lockdown work-family practices.