Reading The Literature on Female Labor Force Participation Rates with Content Analysis

Abstract

This study aims to examine the literature on female labor force participation rates through qualitative content analysis. Data samples include international scientific research articles from the Scopus data base for (2000-2023). Data were collected by transferring the articles to the MAXQDA 2020 software and coding the themes with the software. Expert control used to ensure the reliability of the research. Our study allowed us to see the changing dimensions of the subject in the articles examined. The focus points were based on the research method used in the publications, theoretical framework, increasing FLFP and its reasons, reasons for the decrease, the direction and size of the variables affecting FLFP changing over time, starting from the date of publication. When the reasons for the increase in women's participation in the workforce are examined, it is seen that factors such as education, increased childcare opportunities, age factor, adaptation to home technologies, women being married and wages are effective, respectively. Accordingly; the "wage factor" is not as obvious as it is thought in the increase in women's participation in the workforce. When the reasons for the decrease in women's participation in the workforce are examined, it is seen that there are fertility, alcohol consumption and transportation problems. It is seen that these obstacles are gender-related, psychological and economic. Therefore, it is a very important finding of our study that gender-related, psychological and economic factors should be improved in order to increase women's participation in the workforce. For the policy makers, it is possible to see which aspects of the issue are prominent in different countries. In this way, comparisons between countries can be made easier. It helps to create policy recommendations by taking into account the strengths and weaknesses of women's participation in the workforce at national and global levels.