Household

Concerning the household part, several questions were asked to the subjects of the
questionnaire. They were asked about the number of persons in the household and the
following chart represents their responses:

Figure 1- Chart showing number of persons in a household

As it can be seen, the majority, 42.5% of respondents have 4 members in their families
followed by 30% having 5 members. This shows the trend of the nuclear family emerging, the
nuclear family consisting of parents and children (2 generations only) and usually consisting
of around 4 members. Here one can see that there is very little number of families with more
than 5 family members .This increase in number of nuclear families is due to several reasons.
For instance, people are finding feeding more people more difficult due to an increase in cost
of living, there is an increase in conflicts between other family members in the extended
family and also there is a greater need for privacy.

Next the subjects were asked about who the breadwinner of the family is.

Figure 2- Pie chart showing breadwinner of household

As it can be seen from this pie chart, the majority affirmed that the father is the breadwinner
of the household. This is one of the reasons for the small number of members of the nuclear
family since only one member is responsible for feeding the family, leading to a decreased
financial power. However this way of questioning is quite limited since the option of both
mother and father being the breadwinner that is both working is not included. Hence one
cannot deduce exactly if only the father is financing the family needs.

If one goes by the logic that the family member earning the higher amount of money is the
breadwinner, then one can deduce that the father receives a higher salary in most cases than
the mother. Hence one can say that in the Mauritian society, higher level jobs are still male
dominated.

After that the household income amount was asked to the subjects and is depicted in the
following chart:

Figure 3- Chart showing monthly income in household

The 2 ranges of income which the majority confirmed were earned were Rs 10 000-Rs
25000(38.8%) and Rs 25000- Rs 50000(33.8%)

As one can deduce, the income of the average Mauritian does not exceed Rs 50000. Given the
increasing cost of living, such as basic needs cost, cost education and entertainment, people
are finding it harder to make a living and hence are opting of smaller families as it has been
seen before and are moving away from the extended family so as to reduce the responsibility
of the elderly on them.

Also due to higher level of qualifications needed for high level jobs, the majority are not
being able to cope with the bulk of studying needed and ending up with a lower level job with
average salary. The increase in the retirement age is causing a lot to become unemployed who
have to satisfy themselves with low paying jobs while others have to wait more to get
promotion and access to the jobs held by the ageing working persons.

Next, it was asked who does the household task. 85% responded that the mother does the
tasks and 47.5% affirmed the father. Subjects were allowed to choose more than one member.
The following chart shows the result:

Figure 4- Chart showing who is/are responsible for household tasks

As it can be seen, in most household the mother does the household tasks but in a significant
number of household namely 47.5% which is nearly half of the households, the father also
contributes to the tasks. This shows that women are being helped more by their husbands in
doing household chores. This is because more and more women are working and are having
less time for these tasks. 47.5% of men is doing and helping with these tasks and not more
since as it has been seen before, the number of women being breadwinner (earning the higher
pay as was assumed) are less that men and it is those women who are more busy at their
workplace and finding less time for these tasks and require more assistance from their
partners. The rest of women have average and low-level jobs and are able to cope with doing
the household tasks.

Finally the participants were asked about a pre-set description of their parent and it yielded
the following results:

Figure 5-Chart showing description of parents by repondents

The 2 large majority of respondents affirmed that their parents were permissive (41.3%) and
authoritative (48.8%).

This clash between attitudes is due to many reasons. For instance, many parents, especially
older ones still stick to traditions and religious beliefs and oppose modern permissive culture.
The younger parents are more accustomed to this new culture and understand it better and
hence allow more freedom to their children. This difference in age group tends to cause a
difference in attitudes.

Also, parents living in regions of high crime and drug abuse rate tend to be more authoritative
and do not allow too much freedom to children for fear of being subject to dangers around.
The crime and drug abuse rate is not uniform across the country, hence resulting in a
difference in attitudes of parents across it.