rehabinkmag Commentary, Issue 17

What about Single Mothers? A Narrative Review on Mental Health, Unpaid Care Work, and Gender Inequality during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Topical Commentary

By Lisbeth Alexandra Pino Gavidia

The COVID-19 public health emergency was announced by the World Health Organization on January 31, 2020 (1). By April 16, 2020, the infection of COVID-19 was spread globally, resulting in worldwide quarantines, 2 million cases and 137 thousand deaths (1,2). Canada ranked sixth in COVID-19 related deaths among high-income countries by the end of July 21, 2021 (3). Single mothers are the target population of interest within this review as they were uniquely affected by the pandemic. The shutdown of public facilities compromised mothers’ employment, led to school closures, and reduced access to family/social supports were no longer available. This resulted in the loss of income, daily routine, and social interaction. This narrative review focused on understanding the unique challenges of single mothers as they juggled to adapt to changing family responsibilities while they first prioritize the needs of their children. In fact, there is a need to raise awareness among rehabilitation science professionals about these unique challenges. Through a focus on women who are parenting alone, three themes are addressed: 1) mental health; 2) unpaid care work; and 3) gender inequality.

Nathan Dumlao (Unsplash)

1. Mental Health

Mental illness affects 970 million people worldwide, with depression and anxiety being the most prevalent mental health issues (4). Before the COVID-19 pandemic, three million Canadians experienced a mental health disorder, of which the annual costs were $32 billion for depression and $17 million for anxiety (5). Stay-at-home orders and social distancing measures came with isolation, loneliness, and adverse psychological effects (6). There was an increase in family responsibilities, where women were often responsible for family, work, and caretaking roles compared to men (6). In turn, single mothers managed unaided childcare and children’s home-schooling while, in some cases, working from home. All of these stressors and feelings of isolation may cause symptoms of depression and anxiety as their main focus was to take care of their children. The pandemic response impacted mental health and other aspects of life at large, from health to family and economy (7).

2. Unpaid care work

In Canada, between the ages of 25-54, 5% of women lost their jobs compared to 2% of men during the pandemic (8). Single mothers were more likely to lose their jobs if their work involved public sectors that had been closed (7). For example, single mothers decreased employment from 76% in 2019 to 67% in 2020 (9). Seventy-five percent of unpaid labour falls under women and girls, globally, which on daily average represents 4 hours and 25 minutes (10). This unpaid labour is called care economy that can be broadly defined as: “The work that involves looking after the physical, social, psychological, emotional, and developmental needs of one or more people” (11). Unpaid care work is done to maintain the well-being of family members, including cooking meals, doing laundry, taking care of children, and cleaning the house, etc. Women do twice more housework, while men do the majority of paid work (11,12).

3. Gender inequality

Women earn less than men globally (13). Women also perform far more unpaid work than men (8,14). Regardless of employment status, women typically bear the burden of family role responsibilities, mostly attributed from societal gender norms (8, 13). As there were significant reductions in paid work, women faced care obligations:

Mothers were typically left with [the] sole responsibility for caring for their children, and with much greater responsibility for their education as schools made the shift to online learning (7).  

This is problematic for women who shoulder a higher amount of family expectations in accomplishing unpaid labour (14). COVID-19 has exacerbated the opportunity to close the gender gap.

Women-headed households are more vulnerable to maternal distress. Due to life-long inequalities, single mothers are a vulnerable group of the population because they put aside their own needs in order to meet the needs of their children (15). Additionally, single mothers have fewer supports of raising children without a co-parent (9):

Single mothers have been found to be more socially isolated than married mothers, work longer hours, receive less emotional and tangible support, and have less stable social networks (9).

These various forms of adversity impact unpaid and paid work as family role responsibilities are deeply embedded in social constructs (16).

The division of work between women and men are embedded in two theoretical explanations. The first theoretical explanation is gender ideology that plays a major role in the division of work. Women do more housework than men due to beliefs and societal attitudes about gender roles: “From childhood onwards, women and men acquire gender role attitudes through the socialisation process, including preferences for how women and men should behave” (12). As such, gender ideology is developed through the earliest years of life, positioning women in household labour, and men in paid labour. Both unpaid and paid labour are strongly gender-specific ideology. Women with an egalitarian gender ideology engaged in more paid labour compared to women with a traditional gender ideology who performed more household labour (12). Yet, gender inequality persists because gender ideologies are cultivated before adulthood. This influence not only affects individual behaviours, but also government policies and distribution of resources (17).

The second theoretical explanation, within the division of work, is time availability. Women spend more time in housework regardless of their paid employment and even if their partners work non-standard hours (17,18). “It is likely that the work intensity in unpaid tasks has also increased through multi-tasking, such as minding the children while actively engaging in another activity” (19). Women’s time is influenced by gender ideologies. It is important to note that gender attitudes remain strong among men regarding the divisions of labour and shared domestic and childcare responsibilities. Individual choices are constrained through societal norms that establish the conditions in which women and men should act and live (5,11). Therefore, time allocation is influenced by social relations.

Ron Lach (Pexels)

Further Steps

The global COVID-19 pandemic has negatively impacted families headed by women, resulting in increased unpaid work, parenting ‘more’ alone, and substantial challenges in competing demands, exhaustion, financial constraints, and lack of social supports. The findings from the themes support that the impact of COVID-19 has brought disruption within the home. In particular, family responsibilities increased during quarantine measures, while employment decreased. This resulted in women having more work in unpaid roles and more precarious income. This increased burden of care jeopardized mothers’ well-being as they first prioritized families’ care needs. Prior to COVID-19, women already faced gaps to parenting alone, but the pandemic exposed more vulnerabilities among women.

Findings suggested three areas of further research to challenge the role of rehabilitation science professionals to consider the social determinants of health and the importance of working together to create a family plan that help women manage their mental health and complete their daily tasks and goals. Health is not only determined by physical, social, emotional, but spiritual. It would be helpful to have a primary study on mother’s mental health and internal strengths. It is paramount to incorporate mothers’ internal strengths such as spirituality and gratitude. Perceived coping mechanisms and emotional support will positively impact mothers’ health and well-being.

Acknowledgements

Featured illustration by Fusion Medical Animation (Unsplash) for rehabINK. Additional images by Nathan Dumlao (Unsplash) and Ron Lach (Pexels) for rehabINK.

To refer to this article, it can be cited as:

Pino Gavidia LA. What about Single Mothers? A Narrative Review on Mental Health, Unpaid Care Work, and Gender Inequality during the COVID-19 Pandemic. rehabINK. 2024:Issue17. Available from: https://rehabinkmag.com

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