“He told me, ‘Work is more important than family. Hands down,’” Carlson said. “I disagreed with him and that’s when he started talking about what it takes to be a great manager. And told me that he has kids, and that he missed out on a lot of things. That I need to make a decision if I want to work in his district.”

Looking at how many women are working is important because not too long ago, few were able to work outside the home at all. Though women were called to the factory floors during World Wars I and II, they mostly kept out of the labor force. And those who did work were relegated to such traditionally “female jobs” as teacher, nurse or secretary.

With women already earning just $0.87 to every $1 earned by men, with much of that gap attributed to women spending time out of the workforce to raise children, Kershaw said the policy as it stands could reinforce gender imbalance in some professions. Studies show that longer parental leave, especially for longer than one year, “corresponds with reinforcing occupational segregation and ultimately a gender earnings gap for women,” Kershaw said.

It is possible parents use more spatial language with boys because boys play more with blocks and building sets, which are spatial activities. Parents could also be providing boys with more opportunities for spatial play because of unintended stereotypes that suggest boys are better at those activities than girls. Whatever the reason, there is a point at which boys are exposed to more spatial language. Pruden says more research is needed to fully understand why this is happening.

Washington state’s recently passed parental-leave law could be a step toward enabling women with young children to remain in the workforce. The law, which takes effect in 2020, provides for 12 weeks of paid leave for each parent after a child is born, adopted or placed with a family. Though not as generous as Germany’s family-leave benefits, the new state law incorporates a key factor that the Germans also added relatively recently — incentives encouraging fathers to take family leave. Washington will offer the same paid leave to men as to women.

A recent survey by recruitment expert Hays revealed that Australian men are reluctant to take full parental leave because they worry about negative impact.

Since starting the campaign, people have left messages of their own experiences like, “I believe in Equality and kids need fathers too.”, and “Not every dad is the main earner and not every mum wants to stay at home! The law should be equal”.