Study: When Household Chores Aren’t Equally Divided Among Newlyweds, Women Will Be Unhappy, Men Will Shrug Shoulders 

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So somehow we hadn’t seen this, but this spring, a bunch of researchers at the University of Illinois examined 220 couples who had been married for less than two years, asking them, basically, 1) how they perceived male and female household duties, and 2) how it has come to be that they actually divide those household duties. They found that:

• If the woman felt that the household duties should be shared evenly, and expected them to be shared evenly, and they weren’t, well, she did not like this one bit, and it negatively affected her marital satisfaction.
• Husbands just didn’t care much either way.

“For husbands, sharing household tasks isn’t as directly related to their satisfaction. Either they don’t perceive that there is a discrepancy or they have bought into the idea that the [housework] belongs to women,” {lead author of the study Brian G. Ogolsky} said.

And while this finding will doubtful to blow anyone’s socks off, it does stand to note, as Mr. Ogolsky did, that the takeaway here is that it’s all about expectations, no matter what you’re talking about (money stuff, kid stuff, where-you’ll-live-stuff), and that it’s best to hammer all of it out before marriage, that your newlywed days might be laundry quibble-free. Yes? Yes.

RELATED: Ladies, Just Do All the Housework Yourself and You Won’t Get Divorced, Says Study 

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