“THE SOCIO-PSYCHOLOGICAL IMPORTANCE AND IMPACTS OF CARE ECONOMY; POST-PANDEMIC (COVID-19) FINDINGS.”

Sundas Malik

Ph.D. Scholar In Department Of History And Pakistan Studies, International Islamic University Islamabad, Pakistan. (Sundasmalik92@gmail.com)

Hina Zahra

Lecturer in Department of Applied Psychology, National University of Modern Languages Islamabad, Pakistan.

Dr. Ahmed Hassan Jamal

Lecturer in Department of Business Administration, Allama Iqbal Open University Islamabad, Pakistan.

Ayesha Aziz

Visiting Lecturer Sociology and Psychology at Capital University of Science and Technology Islamabad, Pakistan.

Ayesha Tehreem

Visiting Lecturer in Department of Management Sciences at Capital University of Science and Technology Islamabad, Pakistan.

Xing Yu

Masters in International Relations, Department of Global Studies, Xian International University, Xian China.

ABSTRACT:

The “care economy” provides care and services to nurture, care, and upraise the current and future people. This sector recognizes the work of women as mothers, housewives, sisters, and other caregivers, which is anchored in their nature and propelled by love. Over time, this labor has gone from a hobby to a profession. In addition to the gender gap, care and domestic duties are assigned to those with fewer privileges and less recognition or reward, include domestic workers and informal childcare providers. This highlights the importance of public services, infrastructure, social welfare policies, and family responsibilities. Women spend more time on unpaid caregiving than males. Women in specific domains, socio-psychological, and cultural contexts spend a significant portion of their daily routines fulfilling community expectations related to their domestic and reproductive roles due to societal conventions that assign unpaid caregiving responsibilities mostly to women.

Keywords: women, care-economy, COVID-19