To assess equality between couple's roles within a family over time we must comprehend power distribution and human psychology that exists within a couple's relationship. We must do this in order to understand why each role has been distributed between the two partners the male and the female. And henceforth between comparison of older studies and newer studies we can derive a pattern of progression or regression in the equality among couples.
One of the roles that have been distributed between couples is household chores. Ann Oakley, a feminist (1975) came to the understanding that the housewife, a socialised role, was created by industrialisation. She discovered this when she researched middle and working class couples and their scale of equality; working class participants had less equality on average compared to middle class participants. This occurred as the higher the class the higher you are in the power hierarchy and those with power had the ability to make a better life for themselves and the people they cared about. The better the life the healthier the relationship, caused by positive and cooler mind sets, which then leads on to joint conjugal roles where neither partner wants to upset the happiness that exists between them. Also in the higher classes friendship circles are very close were all the husbands would socialise together and so would the wife's leading to joint conjugal roles Bott (1957). The working class participants as mentioned before had little equality even though the men could make the difference by refreshing otherwise standard attitudes of ignorance and influence of “the housewife”. The housewife being the idea that childcare and housework are defined as female roles (Item B). The power hierarchy triangle , using my chained analysis, can be used as a life standard scale then also a healthy relationship