Abstract
Intensive motherhood has become a strong social norm for many, especially Western, countries. Intensive motherhood is defined as centered upon all-day, long-term, time and money consuming and/or intensive care by the mother focused on child needs.
Thanks to socialist era in the Czech Republic, intensive motherhood was established in special way (e.g. family law, expert discourse about "good motherhood" etc.). In this time we can see, that social norms about intensive motherhood manifest themselves in the actions of mothers in diverse social locations.
However, contemporary research demonstrates that women's ability to realize intensive mothering is affected by factors like their education, race, ethnicity, religion or socioeconomic status. The goal of this paper is to analyse intensive motherhood in the Czech context by focusing on such factors that influence the realization of intensive motherhood among today's mothers the most.
Based on 17 biographical interviews with current mothers, educational attainment has been identified as the strongest factor, shaping mothers' (a) approach to utilizing information on child care, (b) approach to paid employment and reconciliation of family and work, and (c) discussions of the financial, mental and emotional costs of intensive motherhood.