Good Daughtering: The Invisible Labor of Daughters and Reframing Family Roles

Overview

Dr. Allison Alford reframes the work of being a daughter as 'daughtering', a lifelong set of tasks, emotional labor, thinking, and identity work that often remains invisible in families. The interview at Speaking of Psychology explores how this labor shapes women's health, relationships, and sense of self, how it changes across the lifespan, and how families can renegotiate boundaries to sustain care and fulfillment.

Key themes include the sources of daughtering (family messages, media, peers), the role of birth order, the impact of distance and technology, and the evolving opportunities for agency and change. The discussion also highlights the contrast between hedonic happiness and eudaemonic meaning, offering practical strategies for communicating needs and distributing caregiving more equitably across generations.

Introduction: Reframing the work of being a daughter

In this episode of Speaking of Psychology, host Kim Mills speaks with Dr. Allison Alford, a clinical associate professor at Baylor University’s Hankier School of Business, about a concept she calls daughtering. Alford defines daughtering as the multi-faceted labor adult daughters contribute to family life across the lifespan, extending far beyond the visible acts of caregiving for aging parents. She emphasizes that daughtering includes instrumental tasks, emotional labor, cognitive planning, and identity work. Her aim is to illuminate these often invisible processes to empower women and families to sustain connection without sacrificing well-being.

"Only the doing is visible, and the other ones are invisible." - Dr Allison Alford

What is daughtering? A four-part model of labor

Alford describes daughtering as comprising four interrelated kinds of work. Doing work refers to tangible tasks that keep family processes moving, from scheduling doctor visits to coordinating transportation or performing practical caregiving when a parent is ill. Feeling work captures the emotional management of disagreements, soothing pain points, and maintaining emotional climates within the family. Thinking work involves the mental labor of planning for contingencies, worrying about the future, and making space in one’s life for potential crises. Being work encompasses identity work—how a daughter represents her family, preserves or adapts family traditions, and imagines her role as a daughter both in interaction and when alone with her own thoughts.

As Alford notes, “the doing is visible, but the other kinds of work are often invisible,” which makes daughtering easy to overlook until burnout or resentment surfaces. This framework helps explain why many women feel a persistent obligation to show up in a particular way within their families, while their own needs go unacknowledged.

Learning to daughter: How social meaning and media shape expectations

The podcast delves into how daughtering is learned. Meaning is constructed through early family dynamics, media representations of parent–child relationships, and peer norms. Often, explicit training in being a good daughter is not provided; instead, girls observe, internalize, and imitate the patterns they see in multiple generations of family life. Alford argues that these implicit messages contribute to the invisible labor of daughtering and may also underlie cycles of guilt and self-doubt when boundaries are challenged.

Agency grows when problems are named. If a person can identify the burnout signals and articulate what is not sustainable, she can begin to set boundaries and negotiate new arrangements with siblings, partners, and parents. This process is central to the arc of Alford’s forthcoming book, Good Daughtering: The Work You’ve Always Done, the Credit You’ve Never Gotten, and How to Finally Feel Like Enough.

"Birth order is not actually predictive of who might do what." - Dr Allison Alford

Birth order and eldest-daughter syndrome: reality vs. stereotype

The host raises the idea of “eldest-daughter syndrome” and asks whether birth order predicts caregiving patterns. Alford responds that while many women who are eldest daughters report strong daughtering tendencies, the research does not support birth order as a universal predictor. Instead, the most reliable predictors of caregiving patterns are geographic proximity to the parent and financial resources to provide support. This nuanced view helps validate women who have felt stereotyped by elder-daughter narratives while avoiding overgeneralization. She draws a critical distinction: the question of eldest-daughter “stuff” refers to relationships among siblings, whereas daughtering refers to the ongoing relationship between adult daughters and their parents.

Alford also notes that differences across families—such as immigrant backgrounds or multigenerational households—can intensify the expectations placed on certain daughters, but birth order alone does not determine who bears the load. This insight invites a more contextual, relational approach to understanding family labor and how it evolves with time.

"When daughtering and the needs of our parent are made more visible, we can wrap our mind around what can I do, what can I not do, and what am I willing to take under my control?" - Dr Allison Alford

Sons, sunning, and the evolving gender landscape

The discussion turns to the counterpart role for sons and the social expectations around male caregiving. Alford introduces the concept of sunning, describing how men often undertake caring or connecting actions, yet society tends to celebrate these acts differently. The key difference, she notes, is that sons are not traditionally expected to perform social support in the same sustained way as daughters. When men do engage in caregiving, their actions are often publicly praised, which can perpetuate gendered double standards.

Generational shifts point toward more equitable sharing of social reproductive labor. Alford cites works such as Fair Play by Eve Rodsky as practical tools to help couples negotiate responsibilities. She also emphasizes the importance of recognizing the broader family network—grandparents, aunts, uncles, and in-laws—as critical to the “3rd shift” labor described by Arlie Hochschild, beyond the nuclear unit. The overarching message is that family care is a collective responsibility that benefits all members and the larger community.

"Sons are not expected to call up their parent and say, How was your week at work? ... Sons are not expected to do that or to have an Inclination toward that." - Dr Allison Alford

Distance and technology: Daughtering across spaces

Distance presents new challenges and new forms of connection. In a study of women across state lines, the labour of daughtering persisted even when physically apart. Distant daughters often substitute face-to-face visits with thoughtful messages, gift boxes, and regular phone calls, while sometimes contributing financially. Technology expands the repertoire of dottering to include digital niceties and remote care planning, which can preserve emotional ties while reducing the intensity of in-person engagements. Alford describes one participant who sends part of her paycheck to her mother as a form of care across distance, illustrating how labor can be metabolized into different kinds of support.

"Resources are finite, and I must distribute them across the people I care about very thoughtfully and very carefully." - Dr Allison Alford

The hedonic and eudaemonic dimensions of daughtering

Throughout the interview, Alford highlights a tension between hedonic happiness, which centers on pleasurable, lighthearted moments, and eudaemonic happiness, which is tied to meaningful contribution and a sense of having lived well. For many women, daughtering yields deep meaning (a sense of being a good daughter and contributing to the family legacy) but not constant hedonic pleasure. The solution, she argues, involves creating spaces for hedonic moments within family life and cultivating a narrative that celebrates both the everyday acts of care and the meaningful aspects of being part of a family. Boundaries become essential to preserve both types of happiness, allowing care to feel joyful rather than draining over time.

"hedonic happiness is the zing of fun, and many women are not accessing it regularly with their adult parents." - Dr Allison Alford

What’s next: research, impact, and practical guidance

Looking ahead, Alford describes a lifespan approach to daughtering research and expresses a commitment to broad accessibility. She envisions expanding cross-cultural studies, advancing longitudinal designs, and translating findings into actionable guidance for everyday women. Her aim is to equip readers and listeners with language to discuss daughtering, tools to reframe expectations, and strategies to distribute caregiving more equitably across siblings and generations. The ultimate goal, she suggests, is to help families enjoy their connections and reduce burnout, enabling women to feel like enough in their roles as daughters and family members alike.

"The best way forward is to discuss it, share it, and then limit it." - Dr Allison Alford

Conclusion: A call to action for trusted science in everyday life

The episode closes with an invitation to bring scholarly insight into the lived experiences of ordinary women. Alford’s work seeks to democratize knowledge about daughtering by moving beyond academic audiences and into the daily practices of families. By naming invisible labor, acknowledging diverse contributions, and encouraging boundary-setting grounded in care, she believes we can reimagine what family life looks like in a way that benefits everyone involved.

Listeners are guided to the Speaking of Psychology website for more episodes and to engage with resources that help translate research into practical strategies for families navigating the complexities of daughtering.