My That's English! revisited is a new section of the blog in which we look back at some of the most outstanding and popular entries so far. Today... War of the sexes.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and answer the questions below.
1 How many Americans fight over housework?
2 How many women feel they do all the housework?
3 What are typical chores that men do?
4 What effect does sharing the housework have on a marriage?
5 What pieces of advice does the psychologist give on how to handle housework? (She gives five)
6 Why should all the family get involved in the housework?
7 What is the least popular chore?
Male presenter: This morning on Today's relationships, the chore wars. There's a new survey that found that one out of every five Americans admits to fighting over housework with their spouse every month.
Female presenter: So how do you end this battle of the sexes. Psycotherapist and contributor Robbie Ludwick has some advice for keeping the peace. This is a universal problem, a lot of couples can relate to this and the survey was very telling.
Robbie Ludwick: Clr did a survey, and they were really the first to look at this problem, how are men and women different when it comes to cleaning, who cleans more and how do people really feel about it? And no surprise 69% of women feel that they did all of the house work or most of it and 53% of the men said no, I disagree, I really feel like I pull my weight.
Female presenter: Was that surprising?
Robbie Ludwick: No, because I think men are really doing a lot more than they ever did before, so to them, taking out the garbage and maybe picking up after the kids feels like they are doing half the work, but women are working outside the home, so there is this kind of idea shift that's going on.
Male presenter: And while these little fights can seem trivial, but they can actually be damaging to a marriage?
Robbie Ludwick: They can, because what the study also showed was women who felt that they were overburdened and taking on most of the responsibility really were angry with their husbands and not feeling as good about their marriages. But on the up side, women who felt that their husbands were helping and that things were fair and square really felt good about their relationship and this is something that comes up on a regular basis, one out of five couples on a monthly basis argue about it. It's reality.
Male presenter: So you say one of the things you should do is assign appropriate assignments.
Robbie Ludwick: Right. So what you want to do is don't go against the grain. If your husband likes doing the laundry, let him do the laundry, if you like cleaning the dishes, separate it along the lines where people are actually good…
Female presenter: Consider compliments.
Male presenter: Where?
Robbie Ludwick: You should all be complimenting. Nagging doesn't work, if your partner, let’s say, really one day cleans up the table, say thank you, that really meant a lot to me. Success builds on success. And that’s the way to really help somebody do more of what you want them to do.
Male presenter: And you said also baby steps, start small.
Robbie Ludwick: Right. It's overwhelming to clean a house, who wants to do it. Do it in five minute intervals, it's amazing what can get done in five minutes. And after a while you start to realize, well, we’re really cleaning up the space together, but if you start small it’s more manageable, less resistance.
Female presenter: And you get the kids involved?
Robbie Ludwick: I did this summer. If you make it a family activity, you can burn calories, it's something everybody does together and then you reward yourself after the fact with movies or a nice dinner out. But get everyone involved. Everybody's messing up so everybody should clean up.
Male presenter: I remember I'm saying to my mom, we should get a dishwasher, she said I've got six of them already. And one of the things you say, just do it.
Robbie Ludwick: Yeah. You're not going to like cleaning all the time. Clr also studied that cleaning the toilet is the least popular thing to do.
Male presenter: Really?
Robbie Ludwick: Big surprise there. But sometimes you just have to do it. A clean home has a better chance of being a happier home so you have to do things in life you don't want to do all the time, so just make yourself do it.
Female presenter: And it sounds like you should also come up with a plan for these things so that everyone knows up front what they're doing.
Robbie Ludwick: Don't surprise me with an assignment. Don’t compare, I did this, you did that. We have a personality quiz that you can get on Clr chorewars.com/, it's also on the todayshow.com site. So you can find out what is your cleaning personality and find a way to make that work in your house. Mine is a can-do. I took the quiz, I'm a can-do instead of a honey-do. Are you a honey-do or are you a can-do?
Male presenter: I'm avoiding you as a possibility. I'm hiding in the closet.
Female presenter: Avoidance is not the solution. You can take that cleaning personality quiz on our web.
Key:
1 one out of five
2 69%
3 taking out the garbage and maybe picking up after the kids
4 couples are happier
5 assign appropriate assignments; compliment; take baby steps; get the kids involved; have a plan ready
6 everybody's messing up so everybody should clean up
7 cleaning the toilet
