共働き夫婦

This study examines how dual-career couples cope with the care for sick children. I focused on the issue of usingexternal help for child care support. I investigated the extent to which they relied on friends, neighbors, clinicsand day care centers, members of family-support center and baby sitters for assistance. I conducted my questionnairesurvey in2009in the Tokyo metropolitan area of Japan. I studied582couples with children in day care. Thisstudy shows that the number of couples asking the wives'relatives for support for the care of sick children wasthe highest. The next highest was asking the husbands'relatives. Using clinics and day care for nursery care wasthird. The travel time to relatives'homes was positively related to the degree of asking external support for thecare of sick children. The degree of asking wives'relatives, the number of days that wives can take time off fromwork and wives'gender role attitudes were negatively related to the degree of asking for external support.