Motherhood during the COVID-19 pandemic: the significance of coparenting in explaining mothers’ marital satisfaction and life satisfaction

Despite the currently observed changes in the way women and men engage in family roles, mothers continue to play the key role in the care and upbringing of children. Therefore, their well-being seems to have special significance for the functioning of the whole family system. In view of the requirements that mothers had to meet during the COVID-19 pandemic, the authors decided to check what factors were significant in explaining their satisfaction with life and marriage. Special attention was devoted to coparenting, which, according to the literature, can be a valuable resource, making it possible to cope with family stressors more effectively. The study included 375 mothers, who were married and took care of at least one child aged 7–12 years. Coparenting was measured using the Coparenting Relationship Scale (Więsyk et al., 2024), while satisfaction was assessed using the Satisfaction With Life Scale (Diener et al., 1985) and the Marital Satisfaction Scale (Norton, 1983). It was expected that a higher quality of coparenting was associated with higher marital satisfaction (H1) and with higher life satisfaction (H2). Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that coparenting was the key predictor explaining mothers’ life satisfaction and marital satisfaction. It was found that coparenting quality was particularly significant in explaining marital satisfaction and that the strong relationship between these two variables could be described using the mechanism of spillover.