This book explores the way male and female roles are being redefined in the family setting. Women’s entry to the world of work has forced a rethink on the share-out of domestic duties and, most particularly, has brought about a transformation in men’s relationships with their children and the home. The authors of this study provide a cartography of these changes in Spanish families, presenting a multiple typology of the early 21st century household.

The sociological research on which the book is based used exploratory techniques of a qualitative nature (discussion groups and in-depth interviews) to discover the interests and concerns of young Spanish men and how they look at fatherhood. This last topic, the authors contend, is the key to today’s changing families: a new way of exercising and experiencing the role of father which, in a small but growing number of cases, includes men returning to the home.Later studies may choose to quantify the extent of the changes documented in this publication, whose authors are Inés Alberdi, Professor of Sociology at the Complutense University of Madrid, and Pilar Escario, psychologist and president of the social research institute ADVIRA.