If you’re responsible for the mental load in your home and feel that burden isn’t understood, supported or recognised, this article is for you.<\/p>\n
Because the mental load is invisible and constant cognitive and emotional labour involved in managing a household or family life, it can be hard to quantify.<\/p>\n
All that organising, planning and remembering isn’t a “normalised form of work”, even though it’s relentlessly present, explains Allison Daminger.<\/p>\n
She’s a sociologist and assistance professor at the University of Wisconsin, who in 2019 identified four clear stages of mental work related to household responsibilities.<\/p>\n
“While cognitive labour or the mental load is definitely hidden, relative to physical chores, I wanted to try to bring it into the light so we can see it and talk about it.<\/p>\n
“And to do that, we needed a really precise definition.”<\/p>\n
What are the four stages of cognitive labour?Weaponised incompetence ended Adelle’s marriage<\/a><\/p>\n After three decades of living with weaponised incompetence, the final straw was coming home from holiday without a single picture of myself in our camera roll.<\/p>\n Ms Daminger’s research<\/a> focuses on cognitive labour, which she says overlaps with the mental load, but isn’t quite the same.<\/p>\n “I define cognitive labour as a set of mental processes aimed at figuring out what the family requires, what it owes to others, and how best to ensure that both requirements and obligations are fulfilled.<\/p>\n “Put in much simpler terms, it’s like project management for the household.”<\/p>\n Basically, cognitive labour is the “thinking part” of the mental load, but the mental load also covers emotional labour<\/a>, such as regulating our own emotions as well as managing the emotions of others in our household.<\/p>\n The four stages of cognitive labour Ms Daminger identified are:<\/p>\n Anticipating a need: what’s coming up that we need to plan for, deal with, or otherwise address?Identifying options: what are the different ways we might reasonably meet this need?Deciding: which option are we going to go with?Monitoring: did this decision get executed successfully, and did it resolve the underlying issue?<\/p>\n Lyn Craig, a professor of sociology and social policy at the University of Melbourne, says breaking down cognitive labour in this way helps to recognise it as work.<\/p>\n “If I was someone’s secretary \u2014 this [work] is exactly what I am paid to do.<\/p>\n “It’s worthwhile to count the planning and organising of the project management aspect that isn’t evident when just asking people \u2014 what were you doing all day?”<\/p>\n The stage where men most often contribute<\/p>\n While Ms Daminger’s research found mothers did more in all four stages, particularly more of the anticipation and monitoring work, there was one stage where men were more active than others: decision making.<\/p>\n “Male and female participation in decision making, arguably the cognitive labour component most closely linked to power and influence, is roughly equal,” the research states.<\/p>\n Basically, fathers are informed when it comes to making a call, but it’s the mothers that do the groundwork to get them there.<\/p>\n “There is quite a lot of preliminary work that goes into presenting someone with options they could decide between,” Professor Craig says.<\/p>\n She says while it may be about power, including male partners in decision making is also about managing emotional labour.<\/p>\n “If we take on a play date for Joey, how will that affect getting Susie to soccer, and that will have an implication for Mark [husband] as well \u2014 which do you prefer Mark?<\/p>\n “It’s not like sharing the load really, it’s more like an extra part of the emotional labour \u2026 working out how [the decision] it will affect him and his emotional needs.”<\/p>\n Rightly or wrongly, Professor Craig says it’s “sensible” for a woman to include men in decision making because they will have to deal with his reaction if he’s inconvenienced by the decision.<\/p>\n “It’s emotional management.”<\/p>\n Mental load inequity is more common in heterosexual relationships, with research showing same-gender couples more often divide the cognitive labour according to each other\u2019s strengths, preferences and changing needs<\/a>.<\/p>\n Have you tried evening out the mental load in your household? What worked \u2014 if anything? Share with us.<\/a><\/p>\n How carrying the load impacts women<\/p>\n Mothers “don’t get a complete break”, says Professor Craig, which can lead to stress, overload and exhaustion<\/a>.<\/p>\n Research shows women are more likely to include children in their leisure time, while men are more likely to have child-free leisure<\/a>.<\/p>\n And even if women are not physically with the children, “they are concerned about them\u2026 hoping dad’s outing Is going well and he remembered to pick up the sandwiches,” says Professor Craig.<\/p>\n Ms Daminger says her research showed women often felt like “they had a million things happening at once”.<\/p>\n