WELL-BEING AND MOTHERHOOD - EFFECTS OF PRESCHOOL AGE CHILDREN ON THE SATISFACTIONS AND LIFE EXPERIENCES OF WORKING WOMEN AND HOUSEWIVES

This paper examines the effects of preschool children on the quality o f life of housewives and working women. Two sets of multiple regressio n models are employed to (a) analyze the differential levels of satisf action of housewives and working women with and without preschool chil dren and (b) investigate the effect of the number of preschoolers on t he well-being of mothers. The findings show that married women with pr eschool children report significantly less life satisfaction than marr ied women without preschool children and that motherhood is equally st ressful for both housewives and working women who have preschoolers. A lso, an increasing number of preschool children seem to decrease the s atisfaction of mothers.