Changing political knowledge during pregnancy, childbirth and early parenthood

This paper investigates how mothers' and fathers' knowledge about current political events changes during the earliest stages of parenthood - from the pregnancy until the second year after giving birth. We use a unique five-wave detailed longitudinal data collection of parents (N = 3,554), the Swedish Pregnancy Panel, to follow expecting parents and their partners. We find that general knowledge about current political events is lower after giving birth than during pregnancy. Contrary to our expectations, the gap between mothers and fathers is smaller later in the process than early on. Conversely, for some topics, most significantly for welfare topics, both mothers and fathers learn more as the parental process develops. Furthermore, hypothesized mechanisms are partially confirmed where a higher level of parental identity coincides with a larger gap. Time constraints are also confirmed in part. However, both these mechanisms seem only to apply to women. We end the paper by engaging in a discussion about a lifelong process of socialization with adult experiences.