scholarly journals Thirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall - Do East and West Germans still differ in their attitudes towards women’s employment and the division of housework?

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gundula Zoch
Keyword(s):  
Life Course ◽  
Maternal Employment ◽  
Well Being ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Female Employment ◽  
Gender Ideologies ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
East And West ◽  
The Life Course ◽  
East West

Previous cross-sectional studies show less traditional gender ideologies among East Germans after German reunification and even suggest slightly increasing East-West disparities. These findings challenge the assumptions of stable ideologies over the life-course as well as cohort replacement-based convergence over time. This study expands on previous research by analysing differences and trends in gender ideologies in the context of East and West Germany using data from the German Family Panel pairfam (2008-2018). It distinguishes between three cohorts born in the early 1970s, 1980s and 1990s who have different socialisation experiences before and after reunification. The results show smaller East-West differences in gender ideologies for the youngest cohort compared with larger gaps for the two older cohorts born before reunification. Convergence of ideologies is partly due to modernisation trends in West Germany and re-traditionalisation effects in East Germany across cohorts, but also due to attitudinal changes with age. Attitudes towards housework and female employment have particularly converged, while views on maternal employment and the consequences for children’s well-being continue to differ between East and West Germany. The findings underline the importance of persistent, long-lasting ideology differences due to the regime‐specific socialisation and composition resulting from the division of Germany, but also emphasizes the role of ideology change across cohorts and over the life-course for the overall converging trends in gender ideologies.

A German Detente

Worldview ◽  
1984 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 11-12
Author(s):  
Thomas Kielinger
Keyword(s):  
West Germany ◽  
East Berlin ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
Sound And The Fury ◽  
East And West ◽  
East West

Amidst the sound and the fury that attended last year's missile controversy came an astonishing development in relations between the two Germanies, one which seemed to go against the prevailing winds of East-West tensions. While Moscow and its stalwart ally East Berlin were threatening hellfire if Bonn went ahead with NATO plans to station Pershing II missiles, exchanges on all levels between East and West Germany were never more relaxed. And (touch wood) 1984 continues on the same promising note on which 1983 left off.

How Robust is the IAT? Measuring and Manipulating Implicit Attitudes of East-and West-Germans

2001 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 135-144 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ulrich Kühnen ◽  
Michael Schießl ◽  
Nadine Bauer ◽  
Natalie Paulig ◽  
Claudia Pöhlmann ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Implicit Attitudes ◽  
West Germany ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
East German ◽  
Self Knowledge ◽  
Dimension 2 ◽  
East And West ◽  
Underlying Processes ◽  
East West ◽  
Representative Samples

Abstract. We investigated consequences of priming East-West-German related self-knowledge for the strength of implicit, ingroup-directed positive evaluations among East- and West-Germans. Based on previous studies we predicted opposite effects of self-knowledge priming for East- and West-Germans. Since in general the East-German stereotype is regarded as more negative than the West-German one, bringing to mind East-West-related self-knowledge (relative to neutral priming) was expected to attenuate ingroup favoritism for East-Germans, but to increase it for West-Germans. After having fulfilled the priming tasks, participants worked on an IAT-version in which the to be classified stimuli were East- or West-German city names (dimension 1) and positive or negative adjectives (dimension 2). Results of Experiment 1 showed (a) that East- and West-German students implicitly evaluated their ingroups as more positive than the outgroups and (b) confirmedthe predictions of the priming influence. Experiment 2 replicated these findings with more representative samples from East- and West-Germany. The results are discussed with regard to underlying processes of implicit attitudes in intergroup contexts.

scholarly journals Müttererwerbstätigkeit in Ost- und Westdeutschland

2006 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 333-360
Author(s):  
Michaela Kreyenfeld ◽  
Esther Geisler
Keyword(s):  
Labor Force ◽  
West Germany ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
Educational Differences ◽  
German Microcensus ◽  
East And West ◽  
Using Data ◽  
East West

This article provides an overview on the labor force behavior of women with children in East and West Germany using data from the German Microcensus of the years 1991, 1996 and 2002. Besides the question of an East-West-convergence of behavior, we investigate educational differences in mothers’ employment behavior. Zusammenfassung Auf Basis der Daten des Mikrozensus aus den Jahren 1991, 1996 und 2002 gibt dieser Artikel einen Überblick über das Erwerbsverhalten von Frauen mit Kindern in Ost- und Westdeutschland. Neben der Frage der Ost-West-Angleichung stehen bildungsspezifische Unterschiede im Erwerbsverhalten im Vordergrund der Analyse.

scholarly journals Comparing the Post-War Germanies: Breadwinner Ideology and Women's Employment in the Divided Nation, 1948–1970

1997 ◽  
Vol 42 (S5) ◽  
pp. 175-196 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine von Oertzen ◽  
Almut Rietzschel
Keyword(s):  
West Germany ◽  
Female Employment ◽  
Striking Difference ◽  
Women's Employment ◽  
Women’S Employment ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
East German ◽  
East And West ◽  
Post War

In 1989, when Germany became reunified after forty years of separation, no one could overlook the fact that East and West Germany differed greatly with regard to the position of women. The most striking difference of all seemed to lie in the rates of female employment: 91 per cent of all East German women under the age of 60 were counted as being employed, compared to only 55 per cent in West Germany.

Terminal decline in well-being differs between residents in East Germany and West Germany

2016 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina Vogel ◽  
Denis Gerstorf ◽  
Nilam Ram ◽  
Jan Goebel ◽  
Gert G. Wagner
Keyword(s):  
Life Satisfaction ◽  
Natural Experiment ◽  
East Germany ◽  
Late Life ◽  
Well Being ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Individual Development ◽  
Age At Death ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
East And West

Lifespan research has long been interested in how contexts shape individual development. Using the separation and later reunification of Germany as a kind of natural experiment we examine whether and how living and dying in the former East or West German context has differentially shaped late-life development of well-being. We apply multi-level growth models to annual reports of life satisfaction collected over 20+ years since German reunification from 4,159 deceased participants in the Socio-Economic Panel ( NWest= 3,079, Mage at death = 73.90, 47% women; NEast= 1,080, Mage at death = 72.23, 48% women). We examine differences between East and West Germany in levels, rates of change, and onset of terminal decline in well-being and the role of age at death, gender, education, disability and time spent in reunification. Analyses revealed that West Germans reported higher life satisfaction than East Germans, and that these differences get smaller both with passing time since reunification and in late life. The gap between East and West Germany diminishes over the last 10 years of life by more than 25%. Taking into account key individual characteristics only slightly attenuated this pattern, with education and age at death moderating late-life well-being level and decline in East Germany. Our results are consistent with long-standing notions that contextual factors shape individual development and illustrate the plasticity of human development. After having experienced disadvantages in life circumstances for up to 40 years through living in East Germany, effects of this natural experiment diminish considerably with passing time since reunification.

scholarly journals Public Childcare Expansion and Changing Gender Ideologies of Parents in Germany

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gundula Zoch ◽  
Pia S. Schober
Keyword(s):  
Life Course ◽  
Attitude Change ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
Family Policy ◽  
West Germany ◽  
College Degree ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Gender Ideologies ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Life Course

This study investigates whether the expansion of public childcare in Germany has been associated with an individual-level change in parents’ gender ideologies. We extend the literature by developing and testing a theoretical framework of the short-term impact of family policy institutions on attitude change over the life course. The analysis links the German Family Panel pair-fam (2008 to 2015) with administrative records on childcare provision at county-level and applies fixed-effects panel models. Our findings show that the childcare expansion has been associated with moderate changes towards less traditional gender ideologies only among mothers in West Germany and mostly so among mothers without a college degree. Surprisingly, in East Germany, we found tentative evidence of more traditional gender ideologies among mothers without a college degree as the childcare reform unfolded. The results provide evidence that policy reforms may alter gender ideologies also in the short-term over the life course.

scholarly journals The expansion of low-cost, state-subsidised childcare availability and mothers’ return-to-work behaviour in East and West Germany

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gundula Zoch ◽  
Irina Hondralis
Keyword(s):  
Return To Work ◽  
Maternal Employment ◽  
Family Policy ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Second Child ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
Level Data ◽  
East And West

This study investigates whether increased availability of low-cost, state-subsidised childcare for under-three-year-olds in Germany is associated with shorter employment interruptions amongst mothers. By focusing on a major childcare reform in East and West Germany, we examine the effect in two contexts that differ markedly in the acceptance and use of formal childcare and maternal employment. We combine rich longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (2006 to 2014) with annual administrative county-level data on the availability of low-cost, state-subsidised childcare, estimating event history models. The results indicate that increased childcare availability for under-three-year-olds reduces mothers’ employment interruptions, particularly after a second childbirth, and increases the probability of returning to part-time or full-time employment as opposed to marginal employment. Furthermore, increased availability of low-cost, state-subsidised childcare increases mothers’ likelihood of returning to employment in the second year after childbirth, when paid leave entitlements expire and the availability of childcare becomes important. However, our results are only statistically significant for West German mothers and only after the birth of a second child. The study extends the literature on women’s return-to-work behaviour by providing evidence on the medium-term impact of family policy on the duration of mothers’ employment interruptions.

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