Researchers Home In on How We Use Our Time
Hello, is anyone home?
As daily life gets more complicated--gridlocked commutes, multiple car pools, dozens of errands--it seems as if we spend less and less time where we live.
Not really, says John P. Robinson, sociology professor at the University of Maryland and co-author with Penn State sociologist Geoffrey C. Godbey of “Time for Life: The Surprising Way Americans Use Their Time” (Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
We spend almost 16 hours in and around the home, according to the revised book, due out this year. The authors based their findings on surveys of a broad range of Americans--full-time workers, part-timers, homemakers and retirees.
The biggest change since Robinson’s first survey 34 years ago has been among women, tens of millions of whom now hold paying jobs. The homemakers of 1965 spent a whopping 20 hours and 36 minutes a day in the house, tending children, cooking, cleaning. Today, women at home spend slightly less time there, getting out four to 4 1/2 hours, said Robinson. Those in the work force spend eight hours or more in offices, shops and factories.
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How do the authors know all this? Because five and six years ago their surveyors asked 9,300 people--singles, couples, families and groups occupying everything from studio apartments to sprawling homes--exactly where in the house they’d been during the previous 24 hours.
Consider the specifics:
* 8 hours and 35 minutes in the bedroom, but not necessarily sleeping. While awake, we watch television, get dressed, exercise and even shine our shoes there.
* 3 hours and 23 minutes in the living room, family room or den--which have come to double as our main eating and lounging spaces. The anchor of that room, whatever we call it, tends to be electronic: TV, VCR, sound system and/or computer.
* 1 hour and 19 minutes in the kitchen. This may seem like a lot of time to people who rarely cook. On the other hand, 79 minutes is rather fleeting to those who labor over gourmet meals, pay bills, yak on the phone or do homework. And it includes cleanup time.
* 58 minutes moving from room to room, principally getting dressed but also pacing around with a portable phone or going up and down stairs.
* 29 minutes in the patio, garden or yard, mostly doing yard work.
* 27 minutes in the bathroom. This number might seem low if there are narcissists at home. Indeed, American Standard, purveyors of plumbing fixtures, contends we each average 35 minutes a day in the bathroom.
* 12 minutes in the dining room. Even people who have a formal dining room rarely use it, preferring the more casual family room or kitchen. Moreover, said Robinson, millions of Americans live in apartments that don’t have separate dining rooms.
* 8 minutes in the home office or study. This may stun workaholics, but such dedicated space is still a rarity in most American homes and apartments, he said. True, more people than ever are telecommuting or running small businesses from home, but they often set up shop in a corner of the kitchen, basement, bedroom or garage. Less than 3% of our total work time takes place at home, Robinson said.
* 5 minutes in the utility room or laundry room. Anyone with young children who does two loads of wash a day might think this sounds low, but even people with pleasant laundry rooms don’t stand around watching the spin cycle. In addition, many apartment dwellers rely on facilities elsewhere in the building or at a neighborhood Laundromat.
* 4 1/2 minutes in the basement. Unless this underground room is finished living space, most of us venture downstairs only to retrieve something from storage, check for flooding or do the laundry.
