SEOUL: In many South Korean households, housework isn’t just about keeping things clean -- it’s also a common source of frustration, resentment, and, as new research suggests, mental health issues.
A recent study has found that when Korean husbands contribute more to household chores, their wives are significantly less likely to develop symptoms of depression.
In addition, a wife’s satisfaction with her husband’s participation matters just as much -- if not more -- than the actual time he spends on housework.
The study, published in Social Science & Medicine in October last year, followed more than 7,000 married women across Korea from 2014 to 2022.
The research findings revealed that for every additional hour a husband spent doing household chores, his wife’s risk of developing depression dropped by 12 percent.
The mental health benefits were especially noticeable on weekends, when the expectations for shared responsibilities tend to be higher as men are not required to be working.
Yet, the numbers alone didn’t tell the full story.
Even when husbands contributed more to housework, if their wives felt that these efforts were insufficient, any positive effects on their mental health evaporated.
Married women in Korea do over seven times more chores
The research, conducted by a team at Yonsei University College of Medicine, highlights a reality that many Korean women know all too well.
On average, married women in the study spent 2 hours and 37 minutes per day on housework.
Meanwhile, their husbands spent just 21 minutes -- a gap of more than sevenfold.
The article explains that despite decades of economic development and modernisation, highly patriarchal gender roles remain deeply ingrained in Korea.
Even among dual-income households, women continue to bear the bulk of domestic responsibilities.
While men are often expected to focus on their careers, women are still expected to manage housework and childcare, often on top of their own professional obligations.
The effects of this imbalance extend beyond mere inconvenience.
Researchers have long recognised that excessive housework, especially when combined with outside employment, can lead to chronic stress, fatigue and mental health problems.
This study provides some of the strongest statistical evidence yet that when men actively share the domestic load, women benefit -- not just in terms of workload, but also in emotional well-being.
Why doing more housework helps -- and why it’s not always enough
To assess the link between domestic labour and mental health, researchers tracked whether the women in the study developed symptoms of depression over time, using a widely recognised depression screening tool.
The results revealed a clear pattern: the more housework a husband did, the lower his wife’s risk of developing depression.
This trend was particularly strong on weekends, possibly because expectations for shared domestic work are higher when both spouses are at home.
Yet, the study also uncovered something even more revealing -- it wasn’t just about how much work a husband actually did, but about how his wife perceived his contribution.
Women who were satisfied with the quality of their husband's housework were significantly less likely to develop depression, even if their husbands weren’t doing that much.
Conversely, women who were dissatisfied with their husband’s efforts were 15 percent more likely to develop depression symptoms, even in cases where their husbands had technically increased their workload.
While the gendered division of labour in the household is an issue in many countries, South Korea’s situation is particularly stark.
According to OECD data, Korean men perform one of the lowest amounts of unpaid domestic labor among men in OECD member nations.
According to an OECD report from 2021, South Korean men spent an average of 45 minutes per day on unpaid care work.
In contrast, the OECD average for men was approximately 1 hour and 36 minutes per day. - The Korea Herald/ANN
