Why and how working women choose child care: A review with a focus on infancy

Over half of mothers of infants in the United States are employed outside t he home at least part-time, and most of these women must arrange for infant child care. Although many researchers have explored the effects of child c are on children's development, less is known about why and how working moth ers choose infant child care. Research in this area is greatly needed becau se high-quality, affordable infant care is not widely available in the Unit ed States at present. Thus, parents must carefully search for and select th eir child care arrangements-a task made more difficult for some parents bec ause of limited economic resources and low availability of high-quality car e arrangements in their area. A growing body of research has examined influ ences on mothers' child care choice behaviors. We review this research with in the context of a theoretical model that relates such behaviors to the en vironmental context (e.g., child care availability), maternal beliefs relat ed to child care (e.g., child care preferences), child factors (e.g., tempe rament), and demographic characteristics of the mother. We conclude with re commendations for future research in this area and a discussion of public p olicy considerations. (C) 1999 Academic Press.