Men report doing more at home than they likely do in Armenia and Georgia

[Note: This article first appeared in OC-Media.]

In Armenia and Georgia, traditional gender roles continue to define the division of labour within families. Although a few tasks are within men’s domain and a few others are more or less equally shared, for the most part, women hold the primary responsibility for household duties.

However, men and women also have different perceptions of how much work each are doing: data from a UN Women survey on women’s economic activity and engagement in the informal labour market suggests that men tend to overestimate their own household contributions relative to women’s.

Most Armenians and Georgians see household tasks as divided according to standard gender roles. As shown below, when asked who in their household was mainly responsible for certain tasks, people said that cleaning, cooking, and laundry are often done by women. More Georgians than Armenians said that men share the responsibility of childcare with women: 28% of Georgians said that both male and female household member are responsible for childcare, compared to 12% of Armenians.


Men tend to have fewer household duties. Among the long list of household tasks asked about, ‘Repairing things around the household’ is the only activity for which men are primarily responsible. Grocery shopping is the only household activity with a distribution perceived to be near-equal. The only other task where there is a relatively higher number of shared responsibilities is related to ‘Taking care of other family members’, although the task is still mostly performed by women. These percentages are similar across Armenia and Georgia.



However, men and women also have different perceptions of how household labour is split— and the data suggests that men tend to overestimate the relative share of their contributions. Across a wide range of household tasks, men are more likely than women to report that duties are shared equally. Women, on the other hand, are more likely to report that tasks are their responsibility. This gap is larger in Georgia, where men report more involvement in household labour than in Armenia.

The perception gap is more striking for the activities in which men reported higher levels of equal involvement. For example, as we see below, 20% of Armenian men and 40% of Georgian men said that childcare duties were shared equally, while only 7% of Armenian women and 18% of Georgian women agreed. Regarding grocery shopping, 57% of Armenian men and 57% of Georgian men said that men and women were equally responsible, while only 39% of Armenian women and 42% of Georgian women agreed.


This is not unique to Armenia and Georgia: it’s consistent with trends from other contexts showing that even when both parents work outside the home and aspire towards an equal division of household labour, in practice, women usually still end up doing more. Surveys from the US show that although men are doing more in the house than ever before, they still do not do as much housework or childcare as their partners. Despite this, men are more likely to say that duties are shared equally.

Indeed, in Armenia and Georgia, when asked about the actual time people spent on tasks, women were likely to report higher average hours for most tasks. While men and women reported roughly equal time spent grocery shopping, and men spent more time fixing things, the amount of time required for these tasks was much less than women reported spending on childcare, cooking, or cleaning.


So how do men and women feel about this? Despite these differences, most people in Armenia and Georgia said they expressed satisfaction with their household labour division.  Only 6% of Armenian men, 10% of Armenian women, 5% of Georgian men, and 9% of Georgian women said that they were either ‘dissatisfied’ or ‘very dissatisfied’ with the breakdown of labour in their household.
Gender stereotypes appear deeply rooted in labour distributions in families in both countries. Women bear primary responsibilities for most household activities, while ‘repairing things around the house’ is the only predominantly male activity. Even when men think they are sharing household duties, in practice, women are still likely to be doing more.

This article was written by Meagan Neal, an International Fellow at CRRC-Georgia, and Kristina Vacharadze, CRRC-Georgia’s Programmes Director.

The data used in this article are available at CRRC-Georgia’s Online Data Analysis tool. 

The views presented in this article are the views of the authors alone and do not represent the views of UN Women. 

Happiness in Azerbaijan

Happiness is one of many indicators of well-being. On July 9, 2011 the General Assembly of the UN adopted a resolution which declared, “happiness as a universal goal and aspiration [that] embodies the spirit of the Millennium Development Goals”. In response, the UN organized a high level meeting on happiness in April 2012, and in 2013 the UN declared March 20th as the International Day of Happiness. To enhance the connection between happiness and sustainable development, the UN supported the publication of the World Happiness Report in September 2013. The report measured happiness in 156 countries by examining six variables: GDP per capita, life expectancy, social support, perceptions of corruption, prevalence of generosity, and the freedom to make life choices. The report ranks Azerbaijan 116^th out of 156 countries, and notes that Azerbaijan has had a negative shift between 2005-2007 and 2010-2012. 

                                        Comparing Happiness: 2005–07 and 2010–12. World Happiness Report 2013.

The annual Caucasus Barometer(CB) asks, “How happy would you say you are?” on a 1 to 5 scale where 1 means extremely unhappy and 5 means extremely happy. The data shows that the level of reported happiness in Azerbaijan has gradually increased from 2010 to 2012, yet it remains lower than in Armenia and Georgia.

CRRC-Azerbaijan's 2012 survey on Social Capital, Media, and Gender asked the same question and showed that 19% of Azerbaijanis between 18 and 35 years old say they are extremely happy relative to those over 56 years old who say the same (9%).

Settlement type also matters. More people in the capital and urban areas say they feel happy -points 4 and 5 combined  (62% and 65%, respectively) compared to those who live in rural areas who say the same (46%).

The correlation between education and happiness can be contentious. British economist and co-editor of the World Happiness Report, Richard Layards, excluded education from the list of factors that might have an effect on happiness. However, data from the Social Capital, Media, and Gender survey shows that there is a strong connection between education and happiness. 93% of people with a Master's degree and above are more likely to describe themselves as happy in Azerbaijan, and this percentage declines as the level of education declines.

For more data on happiness in Azerbaijan please visit the CRRC dataset.

International Day of Happiness

This year an International Day of Happiness will be celebrated for the first time on March 20th. In 2012, the United Nations (UN) declared this day to be an official holiday to highlight the importance of happiness as a fundamental human aim and to call upon countries to approach public policy in ways that improve the well-being of their citizens. This aim was inspired by the Gross National Happiness Index which was developed in Bhutan to measure prosperity by gauging its citizens' happiness. The index measures the average economic, environmental, physical, political and social wellness of Bhutanese society based on survey data. Although this specific index does not exist in other countries, several surveys worldwide have asked how happy people consider themselves to be.

The annual Caucasus Barometer (CB) asks people in all three countries of the South Caucasus, “How happy would you say you are?” The results reveal that Azerbaijanis have consistently evaluated their level of happiness lower than Armenians and Georgians within the past 3 years, although it has increased from 2010 to 2012. The level of happiness in Armenia has also slightly increased from 2010 to 2012, whereas in Georgia it has remained higher than in the other 2 countries. 

 This question was asked on a 1 to 10 scale where 1=Not happy at all and 10=Very happy. 

The results shown here combine the responses for items 8, 9 and 10 on this scale.

Some think happiness is a result of high economic performance. Yet, this is easily refuted by looking at the Gallup’s 2012 list of “happiest nations” in the world which is topped by several relatively poor countries in South America and South Asia. Additionally, this analysis gives insight into people’s expectations about their well-being and finances in the coming year. This measure is called “Net Hope on Economy”. In 2012, Gallup asked 1,000 people in 54 countries if they feel that the next year will be a year of economic prosperity, economic difficulty or remain the same. Net Hope on Economy was calculated by deducting the percent optimistic (hopeful about economic prospects in 2013) from the percent pessimistic (those who see greater economic difficulty in 2013). The results show that Georgians rank #1 and Azerbaijanis rank #2 on this list of 54 countries, with the highest hopes of economic prosperity for 2013. Armenians ranked #22 with slightly more pessimists than optimists.  

Source: WIN-Gallup International Association,

Global Barometer of Hope and Happiness, December 30, 2012

The CB 2012 also asks about future economic expectations, but specifically regarding children. Georgians, Armenia and Azerbaijanis were asked, “Do you think your children will be better off or worse off financially than you are when they are your age?” The results reveal that between two fifths to two thirds of people in the South Caucasus are optimistic. Georgians are the most positive, followed by Azerbaijanis and Armenians whose results are closer to each other.  

In this blog we aimed to show the pursuit of new measures of well-being and happiness. Some movements have embraced new ways of measuring prosperity through happiness or future expectations, thus showing that economic indices are not solely important. 

On the occasion of the first International Day of Happiness, we wish everybody to live up to their expectations and to achieve the underlying meaning of this day. 

Access the full Gallup report here and the CB 2012 here for more information on this data.