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nycdataviz t1_itsnyco wrote

There's actually multiple decades of evidence showing varying degrees of gaps between children who have a mother at home with them before the first 3 years, and those that don't. It's not like we haven't asked the question -- but the answer isn't one we want to hear. The cold truth of it is sitting in any number of econometrics and sociology longitudinal research studies.

Here's one article showing a clear effect, but knowing how emotionally salient this issue is you'll probably discard the robust evidence on some totally arbitrary reason you pull out of a hat.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378378207001089

The notion that a child doesn't positively benefit from being around its mother (and the inverse) in its first 3 years of life is preposterous.

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elizabeth-cooper t1_itt2z4i wrote

I can't access the whole study but the abstract says one month maternity leave, not full-time staying at home for three years.

Not preposterous at all, I'm going to bed now, I'll find you a study tomorrow.

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nycdataviz t1_itt3oyw wrote

You've misinterpreted that sentence and it applies exactly to what you're discussing. It's direct evidence.

It's indicating that children with mothers who have only one month of maternity leave fare worse, with the negative effect decreasing with more months of maternity leave. i.e. that motherhood contact matters, with effects up to 24 months, and the strongest effects up to 11 months.

Maternity leave duration, as a continuous variable in months, increased the risk of impaired performance on the MSD scale (OR 1.03; 95% CI 1.02, 1.05). Indeed, confirmation of this relationship was found when maternity leave duration was entered as a categorical variable (see Table 2) with the exception of the category for the longest duration of leave. The greatest association was found in the 1 to 11 months of maternity leave with the effect reducing as maternity leave duration increased.

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elizabeth-cooper t1_ituo2ru wrote

You can only have maternity leave if you have a job in the first place and intend to return to it. Not to mention that 11 months is less than one year. It's not three years.

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nycdataviz t1_itybg89 wrote

knowing how emotionally salient this issue is you'll probably discard the robust evidence on some totally arbitrary reason you pull out of a hat.

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elizabeth-cooper t1_itzmmbn wrote

You said three years, you cannot prove three years. I've looked and I cannot find any good quality studies about three years. I'm perfectly willing to accept one year.

>Look at the meta-analysis itself and you’ll come away with a different impression: “The associations between achievement and behavior problems and maternal employment are predominately nonsignificant, small even when significant, both positive and negative in direction, and moderated by both family and contextual variables.” Those variables include the family’s socio-economic status, whether the mother worked part-time or full-time, and most of all, the age of a child. In fact, one of the stronger findings was the “negative effects of employment for middle-class and 2-parent families and for very early employment (child’s first year).”

https://ifstudies.org/blog/what-the-mounting-evidence-on-working-moms-really-shows

Beyond one year is irrelevant. Possibly even less than that.

>The research team measured the cognitive ability of a large sample of preschool children and found a lower performance for 3-year-olds whose mothers were employed full time before their child was nine months of age.

>The study also found that there were other important contributions to the cognitive development of the child, such as the quality of child care, the home environment and the compassion and sensitivity of the mother and caregiver.

>The research team found that achievement level differences could be reduced for children with working mothers that were sensitive to their children's needs and for those that had better child care.

>The study also established that the negative impact of mothers working before the child is nine months old was greater for boys compared to their female counter parts.

>Mothers should cautiously interpret the study's findings before making a decision to work or not to work. There appears to be a measurable negative correlation between cognitive growth and development and full time working mothers, but there doesn't appear to be a major "cause and effect" relationship, according to the researchers.

>Furthermore, the research team failed to consider the income and education level of the children's parents. The omission of this important information could have skewed the research findings to some extent, but not significantly altered the findings of the study.

https://www.myheraldreview.com/a-closer-look-children-of-stay-at-home-moms-excel-at-three-years-of-age/article_aee05652-40aa-5d39-9888-c29bcb29589a.html

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nycdataviz t1_iu1zdyl wrote

knowing how emotionally salient this issue is you'll probably discard the robust evidence on some totally arbitrary reason you pull out of a hat.

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Sunmoonearth87 t1_itup5x1 wrote

Wow pointing to one study really seals the deal huh? Here’s a bunch of other research.

https://journalistsresource.org/economics/working-mother-employment-research/

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nycdataviz t1_itwxpae wrote

“Children of mothers who increased their employment status during children’s preschool years had over 2.6 times the odds of being overweight/obese at 7 to 11 years of age compared with children of nonworking mothers,”

From your own link. That’s an absolutely massive effect.

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Sunmoonearth87 t1_itx0gwu wrote

Lol. That is all you took out of all the links I provided? You are both sad and ridiculous. Let me go quit my job now because of the irreparable damage I might be doing to my kid, he may end up OVERWEIGHT.

Some of my absolute least favorite people are those who shame working mothers. I’m noping right the f$ck out of this here shitshow.

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