Oh boy, the knives are about to come out:
In a study which will cause renewed debate over who have to divide their time between caring for their offspring and going out to work, the researchers found children whose mothers worked were more likely to be driven to school, to watch more than two hours of TV a day, and have sweetened drinks between meals.
Children of mothers who worked full time also ate less fruit and vegetables, the study suggests.
Middle class families suffer the same problems as the findings remained similar even when household income was taken into account, the paper said.
It’s funny. We are surrounded by people who seem to think that moms actually don’t matter. I’m sure there are plenty of examples of families that work well even if Mom is out working, and sure, some women really don’t have much of a choice in the matter. But that doesn’t change the main point, which is that, all else being equal, growing up with Mom is better than the alternative. So why this?
Research author, Professor Catherine Law, paediatric epidemiologist at the Institute of Child Health, said: “Our results do not imply that mothers should not work.
“Rather, they highlight the need for policies and programmes to help support parents to create a healthy environment for their children.”
If this were a study showing that, say, breast-fed babies tended to be healthier than formula-fed ones, you think the researchers would insist that what was needed was a good set of policies to help support parents?
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Andrea adds: The fantastic lengths we will go to to avoid stating the obvious are amazing. That said, I believe most women have more sense about them, and they get the results of said study, furthermore, as Margaret Wente pointed out in her recent column, know what they prefer to do too. The main thing may be in this and so many other cases–the women reporting the findings are themselves working with kids. And very few will advise themselves against their current course of action.
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