I honestly believe this is what is known as the chaos of the forest before you emerge into the light. I have heard WAY too many people use this as proof of their nostalgic feelings about the “good old days” when women stayed home and kept house. If that error is made with progressives I’m not sure where I’m going to be able to turn.

I have felt this contradiction since having children. It’s a difficult place to be. As uncomfortable as it is sometimes, I agree with Makeesha and think I’m in a better place than my mother was at my life stage.
The thing about the amount of one-on-one time mothers today spend with their children is astounding. It explains the constant pressure I feel to be giving quality time to each of my girls, and the guilt I feel when I can’t.

I am curious about the research that was done on college age men and women.
College requires of women to use traditionally masculine skills and behaviors. I can understand that women would exhibit more masculine traits after college. I don’t think there would logically be much change for men until they have been married and have had children. The fact of having children creates a new kind of relationship for men within which they develop greater ability to nurture. i wonder if the results would be different for young men if they were measured after they had been parents.
Many young men i know are excellent fathers and learn to father very well.

I agree with you, Joanne. Colleges (and grad schools) require women to use masculine (and feminine) behaviors.
When I went to seminary, I took an instrument designed to measure my psychological/leadership maturity. On one item, I scored low….because I displayed more ‘masculine’ traits such as assertiveness than were expected for a woman. And I wondered – when are assertiveness and confidence masculine rather than human traits? This test was administered this century!
On the topic of men and nurturing, I’ve seen many young Christian men committed to having a relationship with their children, too…and it helps if both men and women encourage them to do this, because it can be hard for them culturally (in and out of the Church) to do this.