Sex
Reading these charts
When reading the charts in this publication:- solid bars have significant differences in time to at least one other group
- hatched bars have no significant difference to any other group
- missing bars mean that this value has been suppressed due to small numbers of responses for that breakdown
The charts used in this publication have accessibility options available including:
- zooming - to zoom in on a section of the chart click and drag the left mouse button over the area of interest, to reset the focus click the 'Reset Zoom' button
- HTML data tables, CSV data tables, and downloadable chart images which can be accessed through the context button in the top right of the chart
- keyboard navigation using the Tab key to cycle through elements of the chart, and the arrow keys to cycle through individual data points
1 Introduction
This section discusses how men and women spent their time in 2020. Respondents were asked the following question:
“What is your sex? This does not need to be the same as your birth certificate.” Respondents were given the options of Male or Female to choose from. This analysis includes 632 diary days from women and 468 diary days from men.
For ease of understanding, the following chapter discusses results in terms of differences between women and men instead of females and males.
2 Activity type
2.1 There were differences between women and men on time spent on paid and unpaid work, but not on free time or personal care
Figure 1: A bar chart showing average time spent on the different activity types by sex, Scotland, 2020
Women spent less time in paid work per day (2 hours and 4 minutes on average) compared to men (3 hours and 2 minutes on average). One third of women (33%) participated in paid work, compared to 43% of men.
However, women spent longer in unpaid work (4 hours and 31 minutes) compared to men (3 hours and 32 minutes). There were no significant differences between men and women in time spent on the overarching categories of free time and personal care.
3 Paid work
There were no differences between men and women on paid work when disaggregated by place of work, i.e. working from home or away from home. Differences between men and women remain for total paid work, as shown in Figure 1.
4 Unpaid work
4.1 Women spent more time on housework/cooking activities
Figure 2: A bar chart showing average time spent on unpaid work by sex, Scotland, 2020
When unpaid work was broken down by activity, women spent longer on housework/cooking (2 hours and 5 minutes) compared to men (1 hour and 12 minutes).
5 Personal care
There were no differences between women and men for time spent on personal care.
6 Free time
7 Did activity type
7.1 When only looking at those who did paid work, women spent less time in paid work and more time in unpaid work compared to men
Figure 4: A bar chart showing average time spent on the four activity types by sex, only including those who participated in the activity, Scotland, 2020
The differences between women and men for free time, paid work, unpaid work, and personal care when looking at only those respondents who did the activity were broadly the same as when looking at the whole sample (see Figure 1).
8 Did paid work
8.1 When only looking at those who did paid work, men spent longer on paid work away from home compared to women
Figure 5: A bar chart showing average time spent on paid work by sex, only including those who participated in the activity, Scotland, 2020
When only considering the proportion of the sample who engaged in paid work, men spent longer on paid work away from home (on average 6 hours and 58 minutes) compared to women (6 hours and 0 minutes).
9 Did unpaid work
9.1 When only looking at those who did unpaid work, women spent longer on housework/cooking than men
Figure 6: A bar chart showing average time spent on unpaid work by sex, only including those who participated in the activity, Scotland, 2020
The results for the proportion of the sample who did unpaid work were the same as those for the entire sample, discussed under section 4 on unpaid work.