Collaborative Relationships Among Couples: Frames of Interaction During Everyday Household Activities

The analysis of collaborative exchanges of couples during their household activities is at the core of this paper. Although the management of responsibilities around household tasks is a potential source of contention within the decision-making process about home activities, another complementary perspective considers practices of communication during household activities as ways to build or reinforce the family educational processes. Our goal is to capture these daily interactions as indicators of collaborative relationships among couples, exemplifying how communicative exchanges contribute to the creation of frames for family participation in routines. In the first part of the paper, a review of issues regarding the division of labor within the family setting will be introduced in order to examine how these aspects relate to the ongoing negotiation of responsibilities and expectations between women and men. Thereafter, the methodological design of the study will be presented, as well as the qualitative analysis of data based on the argumentative topic model. A discussion of participants’ responsibilities in household tasks will be presented as indicators of their collaborative relationships during everyday activities. Lastly, implications for family studies will be highlighted in order to illustrate how family members ascribe meanings during routines.