Families of the lesbian baby boom: Parents’ division-oflabor and children’s adjustment

This study assessed lesbian couples ' division of labor, their satisfaction with division of labor and with their relationships, and their children's psychosocial adjustment. The 26 participating families were headed by lesbian couples, each of whom had at least 1 child between 4 and 9 years of age. Parents ' relationship satisfaction was generally high but was unrelated to measures of parental divi-sion of labor or of children's adjustment. Although both parents reported sharing household tasks and decision making equally, biological mothers reported greater involvement in child care, and nonbiological mothers reported spending longer hours in paid employment. Parents were more sat-isfied and children were more well-adjusted when labor involved in child care was more evenly distributed between the parents. The frequency of lesbian childbearing in the United States has been growing in recent years to such an extent that many researchers have referred to a "lesbian baby boom " (e.g., Pat-terson, 1992;Riley, 1988;Weston, 1991). From both theoretical and applied perspectives, the families of the lesbian baby boom are of considerable interest (Patterson, 1992, in press). Littl