Time budgets of the mothers of pre-school children: An analysis of mother-child joint activities

The objective of this research was to describe how a group of mothers of pre‐school children spend their days in relation to the index pre‐school child and in general. We examined time use by means of the Yesterday's interview for Mothers of Pre‐schoolers (YIMP), a semi‐structured interview, with 31 mothers recruited from mother and toddler groups. Detailed time budgets were obtained on three full days covering the content, duration and environmental context of mother‐child joint activities. Reading was the most common joint activity. A substantial proportion of activities took place outside the home. Research implications in relation to the environmental context of joint activities are discussed.