Sorbus aucuparia, followed by Rosa and Vaccinium oxycoccos. Wartime books had fewer taxa with less variety, with a clear preference for staple food and substitutes, while post-war books promoted desserts and alcoholic drinks.In the Soviet Union, wild food played a secondary role in diet (as cultivated species dominated). Yet the authorities eventually acknowledged their importance as diet diversifiers and a safety reservoir, and started to promote their use through various means, including publishing books on the use of wild food plants. These government publications appeared during a specific time, and therefore, we mapped all centralized publications in order to understand the dynamics of the promotion of wild-plant-related knowledge. For deeper analysis, we selected a sample of 12 books promoting wild food plants, and compared the taxa and uses represented in these works, which fall into two key periods: during World War II (1941–1943) and after the war (1953–1989). A total of 323 plant taxa belonging to 69 plant families were named, of which Rosaceae had the highest number of proposed food uses, prompting the reader to explore the use of borderland species. Most diverse food uses were attributed to  Wild food plants  have been and still are a part of local diets all over the world ,2,3. WhiKnowledge of the use of plants has historically been acquired through trial and error and subsequently circulated through oral and written communication between generations, keeping use associated with local flora. Wild plants constitute a significant food resource, especially in places highly vulnerable to climate change or military conflicts, although displacements of people erode local ecological knowledge which negatively contribute to food security ,8,9. WilThe USSR, as a country, encompassed several climatic and geographical zones with numerous ecological regions. The flora of the Soviet Union consisted of more than 17,000 higher plant species belonging to more than 160 families . World WEarly Soviet policy promoted the development of individual non-Russian linguistic and cultural groups . StartinIn June 1941, war began in the territory of the Soviet Union after an attack by Nazi Germany. That same year, the 872-day siege of Leningrad (present-day Saint Petersburg) began, which caused disruption to all supplies, including food. Inevitably, this led to official reductions in the rations of ordinary citizens ,28. DuriAfter the war, most KBI staff previously involved in military actions returned to work. Initially, they mainly published delayed books and materials. Пo следам Рoбинзoна” (“In Robinson’s footsteps”) was the earliest of the post-war books studied [Verzilin’s 1946 book “ studied . At that studied , where h studied ,34,35, rRegardless of their legacy, no attempts have thus far been made to understand the extent to which the use of wild food plants was popularized ,37,38 onThe precise temporal and geographical scope of our novel study allowed for extensive analysis to understand the ways in which wild food plants were presented as resources to the population. Therefore, the aim of the study was to provide an overview of popular books about the use of wild plants for food, centrally published in the Soviet Union. To this end, the following specific objectives were set:(i)to select a representative sample of books that promoted the use of wild food plants in the Soviet Union;(ii)to identify the most widely promoted taxa in them, and discuss their methods of preparation and food uses;(iii)to describe the most relevant changes in knowledge circulation potentially occurring within the 70-year period (1921–1991).There were no centralized publications on wild food plants until 1941. For the purposes of analysis, we identified seven books and brochures published during the war period (between 1941 and 1945) and five books published after the war (1946–1989) . The selA total of 2895 detailed use records (DUR) were identified, reflecting the use of 323 plant taxa belonging to 69 plant families. Of the 323 plant taxa, 77 (23.8%) were promoted by three or more different authors. After generalization, the analysis yielded 42 proposed food use categories from the 1098 food uses originally proposed by the authors.Across all 69 reported families, the number of proposed food uses ranged from one to 31 per plant family. The top eleven plant families by the number of proposed food uses are shown in As illustrated above, members of the family Rosaceae had the highest number of generalized proposed food uses among all plant families in the sources studied, with 31 uses. Next, with 27 proposed food uses, there was the Asteraceae family, followed by Ericaceae (21).Then, the number of proposed food uses of plants was analyzed. Sorbus aucuparia had the highest number of proposed food uses, with 19 uses, followed by Rosa and Vaccinium oxycoccos, with 18 proposed uses each. Next, Arctium, Prunus, Vaccinium myrtillus, and Vaccinium vitis-idaea were third, with 16 uses each.Out of the 77 taxa that were reported by three or more different authors, The plant families were also analyzed, using RAWGraphs, on the basis of DURs to track the diversity of use and the comparative number of records .Processed as a preparation method accounted for 28.8% of plant species named by at least three authors . In addiThe top three food uses identified in the literature were: as a main dish, as a snack, and in a salad  . A fairlAegopodium podagraria, Urtica, Chenopodium, Rumex acetosa), while the post-war period promoted actively fruiting taxa . Of all promoted taxa, only 82 were shared between the two periods. Notably, among the most promoted taxa in either period, only three taxa overlapped   .Morus and Borago officinalis). While the majority of the presented taxa are native, the few introduced taxa are represented unevenly in the two periods. During the war, only seven non-native taxa where introduced, while the post-war period contained 35 introduced taxa, many of them native to southern parts of the Soviet Union. Two non-native taxa in the northern part of the Soviet Union overlapped for both periods  for which the exact use mode was not specified. For the war period, such non-specified taxa were often presented with indications of their vitamin and mineral content, while in the post-war period mainly various subspecies and less-common taxa were mentioned, including 13 non-native taxa. Interestingly, ime book  as a souThe number of taxa discussed in the books was higher during the post-war period . A total of 41 generalized use modes of plants were reported during the post-war period, while only 28 were mentioned during WWII. Additionally, four selected food uses were analyzed to compare the results for the wartime and post-war periods .The DURs related to the main dish category were higher for the period during WWII, while in the post-war period desserts, substitutes, and alcoholic drinks dominated .Rosaceae led the ranking by a significant margin, followed by Asteraceae and Ericaceae. These results are consistent with the results of field research: Rosaceae and Asteraceae were found to be frequently used by respondents in Europe , includiSorbus aucuparia, Rosa, and Prunus, which are among the top five plant taxa. Notably, only one member of the family Asteraceae (genus Arctium) was found on the list of plants with the highest number of proposed food uses. This can be explained by the fact that the family Asteraceae has a large number of plant taxa (28) which, although not included in the top list, leads to a large number of different food uses as a whole , where the forementioned plant taxa are the dominant shrubs [The list of the top thirteen plants with the most proposed food uses includes seven members of the family Rosaceae, including hole 27, . The abuis-idaea . This ret shrubs ,64, and Arctium). The fruits were suggested to be used as snacks and condiments and for making recreational tea, jam, pies, desserts, various fruit drinks, marmalade, alcoholic drinks, etc. The top three plants all have fruits or berries. The genus Sorbus (mainly represented by Sorbus aucuparia) is largely present in the Northern Hemisphere [Vaccinium oxycoccos, V. myrtillus, and V. vitis-idaea, which also grow in the Northern Hemisphere [Prunus found in northern temperate regions [Almost all of the top thirteen plants were fruiting plants , accounting for 28.8% of all plants . Parts oA fresh method of consumption was also very frequently suggested for wild plants (26.9%), which mainly included use as a snack or salad. For some green parts and fruits (berries), the recommended use in raw form can be explained by the fact that it is the easiest way to obtain the necessary nutrients and vitamins. Some studies, however, have shown that the stability of vitamins, and thus their accessibility for an organism before and after processing, depends on both the plant species and the geographical location . Preserved, as a preparation method, was intended to conserve the plant for storage and future use, avoiding its spoiling. Typical methods of preserving wild food plants in the books of the Soviet Union included fermentation, lacto-fermentation, salting, drying, and storing with sugar. Preserved plants were used as condiments and desserts, and to prepare main dishes and soups, various salads, drinks, and recreational tea.The three most commonly suggested food uses were main dishes, snacks, and salads . This maOn average, the number of plant species proposed for food use in the USSR during World War II was almost half the number of plant species recommended for use during the post-war period. This difference is related to the specificity of wartime books, some of which were solely dedicated to plant species from the Leningrad region or those potentially available in besieged town settings. Similarly, the number of proposed food uses of wild plants was found to be more than 46% higher for the post-war period compared to the wartime period. Moreover, during WWII, wild plants were not often used as desserts due to the more acute problem of basic food shortages, which also explains the dominance of the main dish category of staple foods, which was necessitated by wartime demands. Similarly, alcoholic drinks like wine, beer, and vodka were not a top priority during the war: 4 DURs for the wartime period compared to 134 DURs in the post-war period. Numerous plant parts were mentioned by the authors as substitutes for vegetables or spices during both periods. During the war, substitutes were reported for 22 DURs, which is significantly higher compared to the dessert and alcoholic drink categories. This was also due to the food supply crisis and the need to promote possible food substitutes that could be found in the forest or marshes close to home.On average, the number of plants described for food use in the studied sources increased as the years progressed. One possible explanation for this trend is that over time, with the development of botany and science in general, scientific knowledge about the chemical composition and practical uses of certain plants for food increased . AdditioFrom the analysis of book knowledge circulation in the USSR (1941–1989), we can observe the fluctuating interest in promoting wild food plants by Soviet scholars. The high number of books published during the siege of Leningrad was clearly motivated by specific needs, while in the period from 1946 to 1968, only the updated prints of one single book were published, and so this latter period we can consider quite a barren one. The last 22 years of the Soviet Union saw the publication of six original books. We can note an increase in taxonomic species and uses of wild plants during the studied period (except for the two last books), as well as the growth of diversity. It is important to add that the books published in Leningrad during the blockade were most likely not distributed widely throughout the country, and thus did not have much influence on the books published towards the final years of the Soviet Union.In the context of this study, wild food plants are plant species that were signaled as such by the authors of the books we studied.The lack of accepted botanical nomenclature in the literature led to an additional analysis that entailed the use of the Plants of the World Online database (POWO)  and plan2 [The Soviet Union covered an area of 22,402,200 km2 . Figure The territory of the USSR stretched over different climatic zones  and variAccording to statistical data, the overall population of the Soviet Union was 195.4 million in 1941, dropping sharply to 170.5 million in 1946 as a result of WWII . Based oA preliminary search of the available literature on wild plants used for food purposes in the USSR was carried out using the National Library of Russia , the Natдикие съедoбные растения СССР” (“wild edible plants of the USSR”), “дикoрастущие пищевые растения CCCP” (“wild-growing food plants of the USSR”), “cъедoбные дикoрастущие растения СССР” (“edible food plants of the USSR”). The primary selection was based on the time period, region, and language of the source. Books in the national languages of the various Soviet republics, other than Russian , were excluded. A thorough review of the available books on wild plants used for food purposes in the USSR was conducted. Keywords used in the search included terms such as: “Примитивные спoсoбы выпечки хлеба в пoлевых услoвиях” (“Primitive ways of baking bread in the field”) [The sources selected were mostly scanned copies of books in electronic format. Some of the books were hard copies, which were then digitized for analysis by scanning. All the books retrieved were reviewed as possible sources of data. In addition, in order to facilitate the analysis of the most influential books in terms of potential readership, sources with a circulation of more than 3000 copies were highlighted. The next criterion concerned the content of the books. Books focusing on specific topics regarding the use of wild plants were excluded from the selection  ).Of particular interest were books from the World War II period published between 1941 and 1945. Seven books from that period were included in this study, including Keller , Bosse , KorchagMicrosoft Excel 2016 and Microsoft Power BI Desktop 2022 were used to analyze the obtained data.The database containing information on the  was creaFor the purposes of this study, the information obtained was further processed by structuring and assigning new generalized categories. The original preparation methods were grouped into broader categories: processed, fresh, preserved, dried, or roasted and used as a coffee substitute.dessert or another category). In addition, when the plant was used as a substitute for vegetables or spices in soups or main dishes, it was classified as a substitute because it was important to examine how books of the time presented information on food and vegetable substitutes due to the lack of a regular food supply.The primary categorization of uses taken from the books was too broad to allow comparison between the written sources, and therefore the data were further generalized. For example, berries consumed fresh were described in the database as a snack  was excluded from the estimate of the number of plant taxa prepared using a specific method. This category was found to be common to many plant taxa .In order to more effectively assess the most frequently proposed food uses, categories, of which there were a large number, that contained 10 or fewer plant taxa were grouped into the others category. The plant species reported by the authors were analyzed according to the number of sources mentioning the plant. In those cases where the name of the plant was explicitly mentioned by the author , a binomial name in Latin could be assigned to it. In other cases, the plant was identified to the most precise possible level (often to genus).When a plant with a generic name was reported to have a proposed food use by three or more authors, the genus was left unchanged. Similarly, when a plant with a binomial name was reported to have a proposed food use by three or more authors, the binomial name of the plant was used for the analysis. An analysis of the number of recorded plant species was carried out to compare the two periods of interest: during WWII (books published between 1941 and 1943) and after the war (sources from the period 1953–1989). The calculation included all plants mentioned in the books, including those that had no specific use indicated. In addition, due to the availability of data from four editions of Verzilin’s book ,33,34,35Sorbus aucuparia, followed by Rosa and Vaccinium oxycoccos. Wartime books had fewer taxa with less variety, with a clear preference for staple foods and substitutes, while post-war books promoted desserts and alcoholic drinks.In 12 books selected from 24 books centrally published during the existence of the Soviet Union, 323 plant taxa belonging to 69 plant families were promoted. The Rosaceae plant family had the highest number of proposed food uses, prompting the reader to explore the use of borderland species. The most diverse food uses were promoted for In the circulation of book knowledge, wild plants were considered an important but rather underutilized resource with great potential for consumption as food. In Soviet territories, wild plant use knowledge was particularly relevant during times of food shortages caused by economic, political, and social factors. Therefore, the production of new books was probably an attempt of ostentation of wild food diversity of Soviet Union and, above all, the result of increasingly clear centralization as one of the dimensions of general Russification.The impact of war and politics on book knowledge circulation of wild food plants and their uses is still of particular research interest today. Many wild plants in the studied data sample were recommended as substitutes for other products or ingredients, correlated with food supply problems in the USSR. On average, wartime books had fewer wild plant species recommended for consumption and less variety in the food uses proposed compared to post-war books, which is related to not only the need for staple foods (such as main dishes) during the war, but also the specificity of the literature and the lack of resources for printing.The popularization of wild food plants in the Soviet Union during World War II and later when the economy started to collapse may have had an influence on the circulation of knowledge regarding the use of wild food plants, especially in the last decade of the Soviet Union, contributing to the centralization of knowledge production. This combination of findings provides some support for the conceptual premise that future studies on the current topic are needed. Additional study with a greater focus on the actors involved in book knowledge circulation is suggested. In order to establish if there is a correlation between actual use and a homogenization effect, a comparison with field studies conducted in regions potentially covered by the distribution of books is advisable.


Superlinear scaling results in crises called ‘singularities’, where population and energy demand tend to infinity in a finite amount of time, which must be avoided by ever more frequent ‘resets’ or innovations that postpone the system's collapse. Here, we place the emergence of cities and planetary civilizations in the context of major evolutionary transitions. With this perspective, we hypothesize that once a planetary civilization transitions into a state that can be described as one virtually connected global city, it will face an ‘asymptotic burnout’, an ultimate crisis where the singularity-interval time scale becomes smaller than the time scale of innovation. If a civilization develops the capability to understand its own trajectory, it will have a window of time to affect a fundamental change to prioritize long-term homeostasis and well-being over unyielding growth—a consciously induced trajectory change or ‘homeostatic awakening’. We propose a new resolution to the Fermi paradox: civilizations either collapse from burnout or redirect themselves to prioritizing homeostasis, a state where cosmic expansion is no longer a goal, making them difficult to detect remotely.Previous studies show that city metrics having to do with growth, productivity and overall energy consumption scale  This information is said to be ‘functional’ in that it allows the living system to survive over time through a combination of homeostatic mechanisms and autocatalytic behaviour e.g. –3). Henc. Henc3])Similarly, evolution has been characterized by a series of innovations in the units undergoing selection, energy transduction and information processing. Szathmáry & Maynard-Smith  argued tAdvances in information processing and energy transduction reinforce one another autocatalytically: a greater ability to learn engenders exploration and innovation that opens new free energy resources; greater free energy resources allow for the transition to new information-processing paradigms. These evolutionary leaps sometimes involve the creation of new levels of biological organization and hence new units of selection, e.g. endosymbiosis, multi-cellularity and the formation of social colonies.. 1.2When optimization processes form tight positive feedback loops, the rate of innovation and discovery (and the concomitant demand on energy resources) can quicken dramatically. We see this in the trajectory of human society since the emergence of the ‘dataome’. The dataome encompasses the external recording and processing of information  as well as the coevolution of those infological organisms atop of a collection of biological organisms, and it may represent the most recent major transition in information processing—one that we are not only witnessing but also partaking in today .The acceleration of the dataome was intimately tied to the Agricultural Revolution: an energy transition from hunter–gatherer societies to farming, enabled by innovations such as animal husbandry and pottery e.g. ,8). Toge. Toge8])In some ways, a city is a superagent composed of individual human agents analogous to a multi-cellular organism that is a superagent composed of individual cellular agents. Both collectives support the differentiation of individual agents (often phrased as a ‘division of labour’), and in both cases, individual agents may come and go while the whole superagent retains its identity. However, there are some key differences between these two organizational structures of life that have been quantified in part thanks to advances in network and complexity science (e.g. ).. 1.3et al. ).material specifics of life on Earth may be historically contingent, the general principles of life should be universal. Life requires information storage (perhaps not with DNA), free energy transduction (perhaps not with ATP) and a way to assimilate environmental substrates into useful metabolic intermediates (perhaps not with RuBisCO)—but once life discovers how to perform these tasks, such abilities will be strongly selected for and hence persist through time.Such irreversibility is evident in the ‘core algorithms’ of life on Earth that we observe to stretch back, largely unaltered, in deep time . Exampletiming of such innovations may be stochastic, once they do emerge, they are likely to persist because they become integrated into the positive feedback between information processing and energy transduction described in §1. Hence, we can consider exo-evolutionary trajectories that are similar to our own in that they are governed by the same physical constraints and information–energy feedbacks that have propelled biological evolution on Earth. On these alien worlds, perhaps societies composed of interacting agents will emerge and be subject to the same governing principles as human civilization, even if they do not share our particular material or historical details. At some point in their evolutionary path, societies will likely invent and intertwine themselves with dataomes of their own and may therefore self-organize into a globally connected state characterized by scaling laws with an exponent β > 1.Similarly, we can consider higher order features of life—including endosymbiosis, multi-cellularity, language and the creation of a parallel living system in the dataome—to be features locked in by evolution. Although the exact . 2.3In the scenario laid out above, a global civilization will march towards a singularity where energy resources can no longer sustain the trajectory of unbounded growth. To reiterate, a singularity occurs for trajectories that are headed towards a state of infinite population and energy usage in a finite amount of time. While new energy resources may be discovered, briefly raising the ceiling for total energy consumption, new energy resources cannot sustain a superlinear system indefinitely due to the finite time scale associated with the singularity. Thus, in our view, the important question is not whether new energy resources can be found, but whether innovations (perhaps in energy efficiency or distribution) can reset the system's trajectory by altering the parameters in the growth equation (equation (1.1)). Thus, in this section, we centre our argument around relevant time scales.tcycle, decreases over time; in other words, these adaptations must occur at an ever-increasing pace.As with individual cities, the collapse or regression of planetary civilizations can be momentarily avoided by innovation-related resets that only delay the inevitable. The time scale between resets that must be achieved to maintain viability, tcycle may become sufficiently short that it exceeds the civilization's time scale for innovation, tinnovate. Perhaps this occurs when tcycle ≪ tindividual's lifetime, or the system's learning time scale . If just one cycle is missed, a regression to a weaker mode of activity will likely occur.Eventually, β > 1 , ∑tcycle is a divergent sum, so in theory, a civilization can stay viable forever so long as it meets every single singularity with a reset. However, harmful fluctuations—both external and internal—can threaten the system's stability.For 2 > For instance, notable abandoned cities of the ancient world—Angkor, Babylon, Chichen Itza and Pompeii, to name a few—demonstrate that many major early cities succumbed to external fluctuations , internal fluctuations (e.g. deforestation or overpopulation) or a combination of the two e.g. –38). Mod. Mod38])2, due to the energy expansion of oxygenic phototrophy; anthropogenic climate change, driven by the energy expansion of fossil fuels; and the threat of nuclear winter, enabled by the energy expansion of nuclear fission. Informational expansions may also induce catastrophic fluctuations, such as an internet-induced ‘misinformation catastrophe’ in which agents lose their ability to distinguish truth from fiction because innovations in telling truth from lies do not keep pace with the rate at which misinformation becomes more sophisticated. While disease and physical crime may be less malignant in a virtualized global city, viral misinformation and cybercrimes may take their place. Finally, the emergence of any module that produces dissipation and autocatalysis without contributing to homeostasis and learning is a dangerous form of ‘sublyfe’ )et al. )Assuming that the burnout hypothesis is true, a civilization's path to homeostasis may come in other forms than a cognitive choice. In other words, a conscious awakening, as described in §3, may not be strictly necessary to achieve longevity. Perhaps reorientation towards homeostasis may happen by ‘accident’ or even be a feature of a deterministic trajectory. In one speculative scenario, virtual spaces  may absorb most, if not all, of the cognitive attention of humanity. When biological agents become physically and mentally immersed in the dataome, civilization might turn ‘inward’ to serve the dataome's priorities, whose persistence could be maintained without unbounded growth.Life as ‘persistence’ is one view that underwrites the free energy principle , namely, that life will exhibit a tendency to minimize surprise under internal model predictions of external environmental states . Under tHow might one imagine testing the asymptotic burnout and homeostatic awakening hypotheses? The most conclusive evidence would take the form of exo-anthropology—the direct observation of extant or extinct exo-civilizations. However, this is not likely to be achieved with present or near-future technologies. Ironically, if the burnout–awakening hypothesis is true, exo-anthropology might be an extraordinarily rare activity across the cosmos, limited to instances where civilizations can identify the signs of burnout or awakening on neighbouring planets that host(ed) life, or the post-burnout remnants of a prior civilization on their planet .The burnout–awakening hypothesis does not preclude the remote detection of exo-civilizations, be they approaching burnout or post-awakening, via planetary-scale technosignatures. Such technosignatures include electromagnetic transmissions , industrial changes to atmospheric chemistry, the construction of artificial structures in space and the complexity of planetary time series measurements –75.most detectable exo-civilizations, as they would be altering their environments and dissipating free energy in a wildly unsustainable manner—fluctuations on the planetary scale that exhibit the largest signal-to-noise. This presents the possibility that a good many of humanity's initial detections of extraterrestrial life may be of the intelligent, though not yet wise, kind. Observing such burnouts (provided humanity is long lived enough to do so) would provide potential confirmation of part of our hypothesis. On the other hand, persistent civilizations that transition through homeostatic awakening may be difficult or impossible to detect. If so, this would be sympatico with Karl Schroeder's recasting of Arthur C. Clarkes’ ‘technology looks like magic’ proposition: ‘Any sufficiently advanced civilization will be indistinguishable from Nature’ [In fact, civilizations that are near burnout may be the  Nature’ ,77.universal trajectory for life in the universe, it is critical to know whether humanity is in danger of suffering from an asymptotic burnout. We hope that future work will test the assumptions outlined above. Specifically, we encourage the collection and analysis of global datasets to quantify how growth, productivity and other social metrics have changed over time. Informational innovations—from printing to radio to the internet—have allowed for faster and more widespread social interactions with less of a need for temporal and spatial synchrony between agents. Can different scaling laws be identified for different stages of dataome evolution? Can modern civilization be treated like one global city driven by virtual social interactions? At what scales do resources become constraining and could yet unrealized energy transitions liberate a civilization from burnout trajectory? We also encourage theoretical work to complement these empirical analyses. A deeper theoretical understanding of the dynamics that determine the value of β may reveal suggestions for how we can enact a fundamental change to our ‘way of life’ that helps us consciously avoid self-induced collapse.Regardless of whether the burnout–awakening hypothesis does or does not describe a


Smartphone applications (apps) are thought to be an adequate instructional strategy not only to improve the quality of the teaching in physical education (PE), but also to effectively promote leisure-time physical activity (PA) of adolescent students in this context. Although the use of smartphone apps has been generalized in PE, little is known about the curricular approach of smartphone apps to be implemented by teacher to teach specific curricular contents in PE lessons. Therefore, the aim of this research was threefold: a) to conduct a systematic search for smartphone apps focused on PA and sport; b) to assess the features, content and quality of every included smartphone app; and c) to analyze the relationships between every selected app and the secondary PE curriculum. Systematic searches were completed on Google Play Store from January 2021 to March 2021. Apps were included when they met: main goal focused on PA and sport; permitted use by underage; they are free; user scores of at least 4. The app selection process was carried out by several reviewers and concordance measures were estimated. Additionally, an app quality assessment was independently conducted by three reviewers. A total of 18 apps focused on PA were included. Particularly, eight apps were suitable for fitness, health and quality of life curricular content; two for sports content; four for body expression content; and four apps for outdoor PA content. The mean quality score was 4.00. Apps could be helpful for teachers to implement the secondary PE curriculum and effectively promote PA among adolescent students. The digital technology  has been incorporated as key elements into every sphere of our society such as health, work and education  in Google Play Store between 12th January 2021 and 31st March 2021. The identification of apps was performed using the following search terms: “physical education”, “physical activity”, “health”, “fitness”, “sport”, “body expression”, “corporal language”, “dance”, “outdoor physical activity”. Search terms were entered into the Google Play Store in isolation or in different combinations based on Boolean logic .The apps selection process was developed in two phases. In the first phase and after removing duplicates, apps were retrained and registered in a database when they met the following criteria: a) they were written in Spanish or English (description and application), and b) they had the main goal focused on PA promotion. Apps could be used in isolation or in combination with an external device  or a back-office system, for instance, to communicate with a PE or PA professional. This first phase was carried out by two reviewers (R3 and R4) who individually evaluated the names and descriptions of the apps against these two criteria using a checklist . To solve disagreements, a consensus meeting was held between both reviewers and the main author of this research. The apps identified in this first phase were, then, included in the second selection phase. In this phase, a second set of inclusion criteria was established to identify the apps that would be included in this study. They would be included when: a) their use is allowed to underage; b) they are free  , established after the analysis of the Spanish secondary PE curriculum  index. Consistent with Landis and Koch , there iFigure The total MARS mean score was 4.00 (SD = 0.50) out of 5  for the totally of apps included in this research. The dimension with the highest score was subjective quality , followed by functionally , aesthetics , information quality , and engagement .The 18 apps that met the inclusion criteria were organized according to the four content blocks present in the Spanish secondary PE curriculum: 1) fitness, health and life quality, 2) games and sports, 3) body expression, and 4) outdoor PA  and the respective PA recommendations established by the WHO ; and conMore effort is needed to incorporate components that are more likely to influence PA behavior change, which is ultimately what they were developed for, while maintaining good functionality. Educational administration and developers should collaborate to provide self-monitoring and social comparison in students to enhance a comprehensive, competency-based education. In summary, this study seeks to advance research on the use of apps in PE, focusing on its link with the curriculum contents.


Additionally, when these laser-based technologies are coupled with tests provocative to the microcirculation  is relevant to account for variations in blood pressure, we question how CVC can be higher than the flux expressed as perfusion units (PU) in Table 3. Indeed, CVC is calculated as the flux (PU) divided by mean arterial pressure (mmHg). Therefore, it is impossible due to the division of a positive number by another positive number ≥1 (CVC = PU/mmHg). In addition, the authors discuss the “mean statistical power” for the intraclass correlation coefficient. The statistical power is the probability that a test correctly rejects the null hypothesis when the alternative hypothesis is true. It is useful to calculate sample size before the study begins, based on one hypothesis. Whether “mean power” is useful is not clear. However, it would be useful to have an indication of the precision of the estimates from this sample size by providing 95% confidence intervals. Although the authors stated that these were calculated, we were unable to find them.flow , but arbitrary PU, often referred to as flux, which does not permit direct comparisons between technologies.There is also confusion within the manuscript regarding imaging techniques, “laser-Doppler speckle contrast imaging” does not exist. Laser speckle contrast imaging is not based on the Doppler effect, these are two distinct techniques. There is also some inconsistencies in the terminology (flow versus flux). Indeed, these laser-based techniques do not provide a measure of Overall,


Mothers tended to be responsible for most of the  caregiving and domestic tasks during the COVID-19 pandemic while simultaneously having to pursue their work duties. Increased role conflicts, parenting stress, and exhaustion predict adverse mental health. We aimed to examine how women referred to and made sense of dominant gender norms in their arrangements of pandemic daily life and how these beliefs impacted their maternal self-conception. Qualitative interviews with 17 women were analyzed through the lens of “intensive mothering” ideology and “ideal workers” norms, emphasizing notions of maternal guilt rising from a perceived mismatch between the ideal and actual maternal self-conception. We found that mothers' notions of guilt and their decreases in health link to dominant discourses on motherhood and intersect with “ideal worker” norms. As such, these norms amplify the burden of gendered health inequalities. The non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) to contain the spread of the COVID-19-pandemic have unprecedentedly impacted the lives of families with (young) children. Closings of schools and childcare facilities, restrictions on leisure activities, and requirements to work from home called for the re-organization of household tasks, work, and childcare. Mothers tended to be responsible for most caregiving and domestic tasks before the pandemic, and their burden increased during the pandemic . Evidencmommy mystique  children to care for at home abruptly aggravated the anyhow “fragile façade of separation that allowed women to be mothers at home and transform into professionals at work” . This simystique  or motheod myths . It is tod myths , 14 and od myths –17.intensive mothering ideal by sociologist Sharon Hays  stimulation, and the idea that being simultaneously a caring and working mother is incompatible.In the Global North, the dominant ideology of mothering “that all women are disciplined into and judged against” has first been described as ron Hays  and recuron Hays –21. Intend norms . IntensiEssentialism assumes that mothers are the most central, critical, and responsible caregivers for the child's development and wellbeing. This, in reverse, justifies blaming mothers for their children's adverse behaviors or developments. Fulfillment implies that mothers are at all times satisfied and pleased by their children and their role as a parent, and are not experiencing negative emotions or doubts. Intensive mothering expects mothers to foster their children's cognitive, physical, and social development and organize an environment that is conducive to learning, known as intellectual stimulation. The child's (presumed) needs and wishes are superior to the mother's, leading to child-centered routines and interactions. This approach is pictured as challenging in the sense that it is natural and plausible for mothers to feel exhaustion, yet not leading to question the intensive mothering norms. Last, the intensive mothering norms ideologically separate mothers from continuing or taking paid professional work. The underlying belief is that children are so special, pure, and innocent that they deserve to spend their time in the private family sphere in the presence of their mothers , yet, constantly referring to ideals of “intensive mothering” . As suchAt the same time, the ideologies of “ideal worker” and “ideal parents” find their counterparts in welfare states' policy measures that support a stereotypical male worker model employed in full-time work over his adult life span on the one hand, and the promotion of a part-time work model for the female primary caretaker on the other hand. The still existing gender pay gap and the gendered distribution of high and low-paid occupations foster parents' negotiations about who is the primary caretaker  and who reduces their own paid work  . In Germintensive mothering to better understand how the societally dominant mothering approach comes into play in the specific situation of a worldwide pandemic causing substantial changes in families' lives. As the ideal workers' ideology dominates work-related norms and identities in the Global North, we are additionally interested in how the women refer to and make sense of these norms in their interviews. Coming from a public health background, we aim to understand better maternal vulnerabilities in terms of emotional disbalance, feelings of guilt or shame, and mental health in relation to their living experiences as mothers and workers.During the upswing of the first COVID-19 wave, the closings of schools and childcare facilities abruptly placed families into a context of highly diverging demands  that had to be met contemporaneously and concurrently in time and space . Women, via email (n = 550) in mid-April 2020 and about 6 weeks later through a reminder to increase participation. The participants were invited to take part in a quantitative online survey (n = 124), qualitative email interviews (n = 17), or both (n = 17). The study has been approved by the Ethics Committee of Bielefeld University (Ref. 2020-059).The “Family study” is a COVID-19-specific follow-up of the BaBi birth cohort study established in 2013 in Bielefeld, North-Rhine Westphalia, Germany . The Babvia semi-structured, in-depth email interviews  and feelings and experienced ambivalences connected to the participants' role as mothers.The second wave included questions on the family members' health and wellbeing as well as the share of responsibility in seeking pandemic-relevant information, implementing personal protective measures, and child-orientated communication about the pandemic situation. The third wave finalized this process by asking about views on the future.essentialism and fulfillment, challenging, child-centeredness, and  stimulation) and the “ideal worker norm” . We refrained from using the “challenge” element as an independent coding and analysis unit since the notion of challenge is running through all others aspects of the intensive mothering. The interview passages sharing the same code were carefully re-read, compared, and juxtaposed, aiming to identify shared meanings and similar (just as disparate) ways of how motherhood and work ideals channeled and became present in the women's self-conception and approaches to work and childcare. From this circular data analysis and coding process, we derived the themes presented in the results section.In previous publications on Family study findings, we explored the data through classic content analysis , 41. DurDrawing on theories for directed analysis presents a caveat, namely a tendency to identify evidence supporting the theory rather than deconstructing it . Being mTo synthesize our theory-guided data analysis and place it in the context of the pandemic, we further examined our findings, looking for variations in expressions of maternal self-conception  and its potential relations to maternal guilt (or the absence thereof). We reflected on whether the abrupt changes in daily life have impacted maternal self-conception and, if so, how those shifts related to “intensive mothering” ideology or “ideal worker's norms”.n = 9) had two children under 18 years living in their household, whereas five women had three or more children, and three women had one child. Most children visited childcare facilities before the onset of the pandemic. Only one child was in so-called “emergency childcare” during the early phase of the pandemic . Four other families used emergency childcare when the access criteria were extended (n = 12) working full-time. Overall, most interviewees drew lines of comparison between the time before the pandemic and their present situation. All women experienced significant changes in their daily lives due to the NPIs, with two trends emerging: one group expressed a positively perceived deceleration of life, while another group felt extremely stressed due to the absence of facility-based childcare and the continuation of their work duties. As to be expected, the latter group experienced a deterioration of wellbeing and mental health. In contrast, the women in the first group felt relaxed and were grateful for the extra quality time with their families.Seventeen women participated in the email interviews. Our sample is characterized by highly educated, white middle-class, cis-gender women, all living with their male partners. Most women  and “continuous responsiveness” (n = 4) were identified for essentialism. Feeling like a “better mother” (n = 6) and “fulfillment outside of mothering” (n = 1) refer to the narrative of fulfillment, whereas “pedagogical parenting” (n = 5) reflects the idea of stimulating the children's cognitive development. Expressions of strong child-centeredness were labeled as “completely aligned with children's needs” (n = 2), and the juxtapositions of mothering and working (in-home office) was visible in five interviews. Three of these felt that they could do no justice to either of them, whereas two interviewees did not experience contradictions between their identities as mothers and workers.We find miscellaneous references to the intensive mothering beliefs of essentialism, fulfillment, stimulation, child-centeredness, and the intersections of mothering and working. Both the themes “essentialist maternal identities” . Just as for Jane, Vanessa perceives herself as the parent that takes up most of the emotional and relational aspects of parenting:“Even though my partner is currently at home more often than I am and is, therefore, more often available for the children (…), I more often take over the ‘emotional' tasks  because the children (and my guilty conscience as a mother) ‘demand' this (…)” .Vanessa is aware that their share of (parenting) tasks is unevenly distributed. Yet, she feels ambivalent since, as opposed to her mind, her “feeling” says that the division is justified or that [she] should rather take on even more tasks.” . Asked about the drivers of this ambivalence, she critically evaluates her essentialist self-conception:“(…) my ambivalence has primarily something to do with the demands I put on myself as well as dysfunctional assumptions ” .intensive mothering ideology comes into play in determining Vanessa's and Jane's mothering practices while at least partly contradicting their attitude.While for Vanessa and Jane, their greater involvement in absorbing their children's emotional needs is perceived as unfair, they admit that they feel a great sense of responsibility that leads to more involvement compared to their partners. Here, essentialism as part of the In contrast, Karen presents an essentialist idea of motherhood in unity with her maternal self-conception. She strongly values how much her younger children enjoy staying at home because, in her idea, this constantly provides them the feelings of nesting, familiarity, and safety and advances her children's developmental growth .Hanna, who deliberately chose to be a stay-at-home mother to her five children, shares the love and fulfillment that Karen has articulated. She clearly expresses her satisfaction with the fact that her and her partners' pre-pandemic lifestyle and role-sharing seamlessly fit the pandemic situation as “what [she holds] in values and [has] practiced before is now coming to fruition”:“We don't have to make an excessive adjustment: being a mother at home with the children, living with them and providing a reasonable daily structure, values, encouragement and relationship skills” .She derives her approach to mothering as a higher divine order that corresponds to her Christian religious beliefs:“We are of the opinion and have also made the experience that life itself and especially life in partnership and family ‘works' most healthily, satisfactorily, happily and effectively when it is lived within the framework of a certain ‘order' .Hanna's values firmly attach to a religious and essentialist interpretation of ‘intensive mothering' that she understands as being present and sharing life with her children, guiding them through childhood, and imparting her beliefs and norms into their lives.As the ideal of being the primary carer is an integral part of a the “intensive motherhood ideology,” the concept of ongoing maternal responsiveness corresponds to this as an interactional counterpart. Due to the juxtaposition of working, self-care, and childcaring during the lockdown, most mothers in our sample experience the expectation of continuous responsiveness as a burden. For Kate, who has now been working and caring for the kids at home for around 9 weeks, chronic migraine attacks have increased to twice a week; she feels exhausted and has developed gastrointestinal problems. She states the relevance of self-care for her health and wellbeing. She connects her current lack of self-care to the assumption that “mothers must always be responsive” . Even if she rests for just a moment, her children cannot comprehend the fact that she is unavailable as they have never learned that she as a mother might be nearby but not approachable:“And even when I take time, I often get (..) interrupted because ‘mothers always have to be approachable'. Even though we have explained to our 5-year-old that mom wants to be undisturbed from time to time, he can't understand why he shouldn't address me when I am in the house after all.” .Where Kate experiences a deterioration of her physical health, Hanna notices slight decreases in her wellbeing by the fact that she is permanently present to and requested by her children. Just as Kate, she longs for a break from the continuous expectation of maternal responsiveness that reflects her reality during the pandemic. Jane, who is currently pregnant, perceives the situation as “extremely strenuous” and straining the relationship with her children. She feels that she can neither do justice to her children, as she gets quickly irritated and then reacts inappropriately or in an unfair manner, nor to her unborn child, as she does not find time to brace herself for birth and engage with her baby. She would feel relieved having “more me-time not just being a mother.” Asked about whether she feels more balanced than in the past, she replies that “overload, anger, sadness, and a guilty conscience have clearly increased,” making her feel ashamed and greatly dissatisfied as she currently experiences herself as “a mother, which [she] actually do[es] not want to be at all.” .Julie feels challenged by the intersection of work and care duties. She thinks she would be a “better mother with more freedom to take care of the children” with fewer time constraints. Still, she also indicates that she “[misses] the time without the children, whether concentrated at work or actually alone at sports .” .We find that essentialism as a crucial element of the intensive mothering ideology is present in our data in how mothers perceive themselves as the most critical and responsible parent for the positive development of their children and in the actions they took to fulfill this ideal.not performing their mother role.All women feel challenged by the  expectation of constant maternal attention and responsiveness they need to direct toward their children. Kate reflects how societal expectations are present in her own family dynamics while (apparently) feeling the dilemma of fulfilling these expectations at the expense of her own health. Before the pandemic started, she seemed to have established an equitable share of time for “mothering” and time for herself that is now off balance. Still trying to meet the ideal of being present and available impacts her wellbeing negatively and makes her question her mothering qualities. Jane and Julie, in contrast, make more explicit representations of feeling guilty about their current performance as a mother in depicting their actual self as non-ideal. Interestingly–and in contradiction to the ideal mothering norms of prioritizing the children's needs over the mothers' needs–Kate, Jane, Julie, and Hanna clarify (either explicitly or implicitly) that first of all, they have needs that do not equal to them being mothers  and that meeting those needs contribute to their wellbeing and emotional balance. It seems that they perceive a discrepancy between their “ideal” and the “actual” mothering self because of a lack of time in An approximation to the mothering ideal of fulfillment in their parental role was found in other interviewees, for example, with Tina. As all leisure activities have been canceled, Tina feels relieved due to the absence of afternoon appointments and fills this gap with fun activities like biking, hiking, or building a tipi, making her feel like a “better mother”:“I can perform the role better. I feel like I can do more justice to being a mom. I didn't expect to enjoy all this free time with the kids so much.” .Similar to Tina, Hanna and Eve see a connection between their emotional wellbeing and the quality of interactions with their children. Eve states that she has become “more patient and therefore more emotionally stable” because spending time and playing with her children does her good and makes her feel “emotionally re-charged” . Hanna reflects that her having more leisure time leads her to view her “children better in their peculiarities and developments” . Just as Hanna, Karen and Lea feel profound gratitude about the closeness they currently sense with their children. Karen is grateful for the fact that she can spend “so much time with [her] children and see exactly how they develop “. Besides her essentialist view on her providing the best conditions for her children to develop and grow, she is also completely fulfilled with and merged into her role as a mother:“I love being a mom, and I also love being a mom around the clock all the time, like I am now in this exceptional situation” .Lea reflects that she can respond better now to some needs: whenever she feels challenged by her children, she reminds herself “that this time is also finite and that [she] can see it as a gift” .Dana and her child were in mother-child cure when the NPIs were implemented; subsequently, she spent a few weeks at home. Therefore, she had a long break off work, which often made her “feel that [she] was doing little that was meaningful” as she didn't enjoy spending most of her time exclusively with her son and “had the impression that [she] couldn't meet his needs” . Now, that she continues to work and her son attends the “emergency” childcare, she feels emotionally more balanced because of the “change in daily structure” and the “task” she now has . However, she still struggles with the sentiment of not meeting her sons' needs adequately, and, along with this, is very concerned about how she will manage two children in the future. Having her child in childcare again seems to be a relief to her as she believes that he is in good hands and receives stimuli that positively foster his development . In her interview, Dana refers to a lot of situations where she enjoyed time with her son and family. Still, she does not relate to the ideal of being “fulfilled” through mothering, nor is she essentializing it. Instead, she locates her sense-making into her working identity and expresses how her work obligations positively influence her wellbeing.Vanessa worries about whether she can do justice to promoting her children's needs so they do not miss out . Hanna expresses her feeling of being responsible for the children's stimulation by saying that now, her children have fewer out-of-home activities, she must increasingly “provide sufficient activity opportunities (...)” . Sofie, whose older child is in distance learning, but does not receive material from the school, feels liable for preparing teaching material and additionally enhancing her younger daughter's cognitive progress by providing “interesting exercises, puzzles or painting tasks so that she does not feel neglected” . Kate feels extremely challenged by needing to perform as a teacher to her child as it opens a role conflict between her being a mother and a ‘teacher'. Yet, she considers it her mission to motivate her child, although she lacks “the pedagogical and didactic skills to always act correctly according to the situation” .Intellectual stimulation in the sense of actively organizing an environment that fosters the child's development presents another element of ‘intensive mothering ideology'. Kate, Sofie, Vanessa, and Hanna share the attitude of being responsible for their children's development by providing the required tools and learning material. While these women at least subliminally present the efforts as an additional task and somewhat a burden, Helen is enthusiastic about doing more educational work, especially “rules” and “rituals” , for which before the pandemic, she only found time marginally or during weekends.The analysis of the data material shows that these mothers refer to the “intensive mothering” ideal of stimulation in their educational efforts. The pandemic has re-turned this responsibility into the mothers' sphere of action as school, kindergartens, and afternoon activities have been canceled. In filling this gap, only Helen seems to rise and come closer to her “ideal” of mothering.The motherhood ideal of child-centeredness reflects itself into planning routines, activities, and daily tasks around the (presumed) needs of the child, while the parent's needs fade to the background. Eve reveals in her interview a strongly child-centered approach to parenting, whereby she consistently speaks of herself and her husband (‘we'). She describes how the closure of childcare facilities has led to the fact that they can fully accommodate their children's wishes and needs now:“We were able to respond directly to our little daughter's wish–to become diaper-free. There was no time pressure at all. It did her an incredible amount of good. Also, it was last week when she was ready to give up the pacifier. We have time to be there for her, to accompany her.” .Eve's use of terminology refers to her parenting approach of planning around the needs and wishes of her children. This child-centeredness is evident in her description of the pandemic-related changes as well:“Everyday life was completely decelerated. No kids' gymnastics for the big one, no kids' gymnastics for the little one, no music classes, and no more appointments. In general, you simply have time for your children. Nothing is more important” .Although she says that there now is nothing more important than the time they spend with their children, her descriptions of the pre-pandemic daily life were just as child-centered since she mentioned activities exclusively for her children. The organization of everyday life around children's needs and desires continues in Eve's presentation of their day structure: all household duties, including shopping, cleaning, and cooking, happen during the children's sleeping time, whereas during the daytime, she and her partner fully concentrate on their children's wishes. A comparable child-centered parenting approach was found in Karen, whose children freely decide which parent takes up care duties for them unless her partner is in a video call and therefore, she is the only one available .“Our two youngest (4 and 2 years old) are still diapered and want their dad to take over when he is home. Our children decide for themselves who they need something from (…)”. .An inherent element of the ‘intensive mothering ideology' is presented in the idea that children deserve the presence of their mothers throughout the day, reflecting the traditional notion of women being responsible for the home and men being the breadwinners. As such, this ideal can evoke feelings of guilt or insufficiency for those alternating between the working and the family sphere. Of our participants, six out of 17 women worked at least partly in home office due to the pandemic and had not done so before. Vanessa states that the current situation leads to feeling overwhelmed and not enough, as she more strongly than ever thinks that she is not doing justice to her job- and mothering-related tasks . The feeling of overload is similarly experienced by Julie, who expressed high stress as she is “torn between raising children and home office and still can't really do justice to either side” . Bianca deals with exhaustion and guilt as she needs to prioritize her work over her son:“This is strenuous so that I am often very exhausted after work (...). During working hours, I often have a guilty conscience, because I would like to take care of my son more” .Because of having to perform simultaneously as mothers and workers, Vanessa, Bianca, and Julie face a role conflict in deciding which of the competing demands to prioritize. Experiencing this stalemate makes these women feel doubtful, failing, and guilty.A different situation is presented by Helen and Sofie, who emphasize how privileged and thankful they are for having a house, garden, and flexible working options. The different expectations toward their “mothering” and their “working” identity are experienced as less conflicting and easier to reconcile. Due to her management position, Sofie can bring her children to the office whenever she needs to be there and work from home the rest of the time. This flexibility allows her to split up her work into reasonable time slots and, in parallel, spend time with her children . Helen and her partner also work flexibly from home and enjoy having additional time as a family. Both women neither articulate feelings of guilt or self-doubt related to their mothering, nor do they feel overly stressed. The “intensive mothering” norms that propagate an incompatibility between being a “good” mother and participating in the labor market do not seem to affect their maternal self-conception.n = 3), second, (failing to) constructing the “ideal worker self” (n = 1), and third, framing the homemaker-self within the “ideal worker” ideology (n = 1).As alluded to in the previous paragraphs, we will now turn to how some interviewees implicitly referred to the “ideal worker ideology.” In five interviews, we identified three different types of references to this ideology: first, constructing the male partner as “ideal worker” .During those 3 weeks, Mary was entirely responsible for her child, and now, that her child is back in kindergarten, she is back to work. Interestingly–and matching the male “workers ideal,” it seems unquestionable that Mary (as the mother and the one in part-time occupation) is the one taking days off from her work and returning to work now that childcare is secured again.Such maintenance of the male ideal worker is also apparent in Lea's interview. Lea fully has her husband's back so he can pursue his work during regular hours. In contrast, she shifts her working hours into the early mornings, late evenings, the nap times of her younger child, and the weekends. She states that occasionally it puts pressure on her to only have disrupted time slots to work, yet she does not see a realistic possibility to change the current arrangement:“In particular, I find the home office sometimes burdensome, because my husband works his 100% job at his desired time (…). I work reduced (…) hours (60%) and make sure that I always find time slots for it or work on the weekend. Sometimes I find that unfair (…). I would like my husband to also work on one day of the weekend and, for example, on two evenings, so that I could also work during (…) the morning. But because of his work or the (…) video conferences with colleagues, this is not so easy to implement” .Due to her part-time employment compared to her husband's full-time job, Lea justifies and creates the conditions for his continuation of regular working hours. By doing so, she maintains her husband's ideal worker status at the expense of her own work-related needs. Due to her position as a teacher, Lea will soon be allowed to use the childcare facilities. Just like Mary, Lea justifies her children returning to kindergarten with the increase of time that she will have to spend in presence at school:“In May [2020], the situation will probably change a bit, as I will then have more attendance time at school again. Our children will then (have to) visit the emergency care of the daycare center for these times since we cannot organize the care otherwise.” .Both women justify the return of their children to childcare facilities exclusively by the changes in their own work conditions. For their partners, nothing substantially (except for now working remotely) seems to have changed: their working hours are still during the day and predominantly uninterrupted. This shows that the worker ideology not only leads to the prementioned continuation of their husbands as “ideal workers” but also how they recur to this ideology by axiomatically taking the additional care hours into their sphere of responsibility by taking days off (Mary) and shifting work to the children's sleeping times (Lea).Kate reports a similarly disproportionate distribution of care work at her expense. While her husband works in “home office from early in the morning until the evening, [she is] from 8:30 to 14:30 (…) in the home office, while in parallel being responsible for [her] daughter's schoolwork, entertain [her] son and [conjuring] up a lunch” . She feels hugely stressed by the multiple and competing demands she currently experiences:“The multi-load due to home office, homeschooling, lack of daycare, the extra demands on the household , the extra demands on shopping (When does it make sense in terms of time? Who looks after the children during this time?...) puts an extreme strain on me. I feel like I can't get everything organized anymore” .She narrates that even before the pandemic, her husband's job was busy, while she “only” worked part-time and “in this respect” not “yet found it unfair to be more burdened by childcare and household chores.” Since the pandemic evolved, she alone had to “compensate for the closed daycare and schools” and all “new and additional tasks” landed on her back, which she considers unfair, burdensome, and frustrating. In accordance with Mary's and Lea's partners' situation, Kate's partner continues to perform as the male ‘ideal worker', neither having to deal with care responsibilities during his working hours nor having to piece time slots together for work. Although Kate perceives their current daily arrangement as strenuously challenging and unjust, she does not scrutinize the ‘male' workers ideology as such. Instead, she adheres to it and therefore contributes to its maintenance. She relocates the problem of conflicting roles and responsibilities that she must comply with (and fails to fulfill according to her interpretation) back to her area of responsibility:“At the moment, however, I'm asking myself whether I can keep this up for much longer and whether this balancing act is even worth it. Professionally and socially, you don't get any recognition for taking on the extra burden. Occupational development opportunities after becoming a mother are non-existent! After all, you are only available part-time and therefore only to a limited extent. No question - I still liked my job. But now the burden is simply too great. Why should I continue to take it on?” .This statement not only reveals her professional self-conception as not having the same “market value” after becoming a mother but also how she (and society) still perpetuate the gender system of domesticity, including its three assumptions .In contrast to the previously displayed interviewees, Julie explains she and her partner (more or less) equally share the additional care effort. As both work remotely during the days, they established fixed times where one of them can work without interruption , and the other tries to work while having the main responsibility for the household and being present for the three young aged children. The division of care responsibility between Julie and her partner during the pandemic did not arise naturally. Instead, Julie claims that:“In the second or third week of the lockdown, there was a major discussion because my mountain of tasks had steadily increased, while my husband continued to follow his usual activities, but from my point of view was better able to ignore the extra workload than I was. Since then, our split has been mostly fair – it's a very difficult situation for all of us, but I feel we are currently a good team” .While Julie initially took up the pandemic childcare burden, she does not refer to the male “ideal worker” construct to justify this disparity. Instead, she traces it back to her husband's character traits (“ability to ignore”). Yet, the “worker ideal” is also present in her interview, but in relation to herself and her employer.Julie feels highly stressed by the lack of flexibility exhibited by her employer. Although she and her colleagues are well-equipped for home-office, the company allowed remote work during the first weeks of childcare closings only “against crediting of days off” . In exchange for working from home, she agreed upon fixed times of availability for calls with her team leader. These times are congruent with the slots when her husband takes the primary responsibility for their children. However, Julie claims that these agreements are “torpedoed (…) by [her] employer, by the fact that no consideration is given to [her] working hours and [she] then (…) answer[s] calls while building Lego (…)” .The times she agreed upon with her team leader “are not taken into account when scheduling appointments,” so they conflict again with her family responsibilities. Also, the company forced employees to take 2 weeks off in April. Julie perceived this solicitation as even more stressful because of the vacation covers she eventually had to take over as “systems had to continue to be maintained, and projects were not stopped” . For her, the extra workload coming from colleagues being on leave was simply not manageable, which is why she took her vacation as“single days to reduce the weekly working time and thus to be able to finish work a little earlier every day - since this hardly worked and thus I only turned days off into  overtime, I am currently no longer willing to use this approach.” .Julie's detailed account of the company shows how the “ideal worker” ideology is placed upon the employees, even if they find themselves in a family-to-job compatibility crisis. The company's lack of concession is based upon the assumption that “ideal workers” prioritize their work obligations above the rest of their life. By claiming that Julie is no longer willing to assimilate herself to the company's approach, she breaks with the worker-roles expectations laid upon her. She therefore constructs her company as maintaining the “ideal worker norms,” expecting their employees to adhere to this norm regardless of their personal situation. In this light, Julie constructs herself as not being able nor willing to meet the “ideal worker norm” and (as quoted before) at the same time perceives herself as ‘not being a good enough' mother.Hanna enjoys “being at home, freely dividing [her] time, and using [her] skills and strengths to benefit [her] family,” whereas her husband “enjoys his work and is happy in the provider role” . Accordingly, she claims that they are both satisfied “with this division/role sharing” which is “based on [their] beliefs about how [they] want to live [their] lives (…).” She pictures the gendered division of roles between them as the most functional, satisfying, and healthy system for their partnership and family. While her husband “takes the overall responsibility” and presides over the family quasi-like the “chairman of the board who is responsible and accountable,” she perceives her role as the co-leader and manager of the operative businesses of all family-related tasks and responsibilities . The families' role representation, accountabilities, and task division described by Hanna seamlessly link to terminologies and phrasing of corporate governance and management: she organizes, manages, and holds all the strands of the family together, while he represents the family to the outside world. The business metaphor continues in her self-representation as a mother managing the daily lives of her children during the pandemic:“Due to the fact that the children have fewer playdates (…), I have to increasingly provide for activities (…). I spend a higher proportion of time in organizing new games, researching craft ideas, coordinating tasks and reward system.” .Hanna feels challenged by the fact that the noise level is continuously high and says that encountering these situations requires “a more targeted use of soft skills from her” . She also experiences the effect of daily routine, and notices that her self-discipline has declined due to fewer external pressures. This manifests in the organization of upcoming events or appointments “like hosting guests for a birthday, doctor's appointments, play dates” but also in daily chores . Skipping daily structures and being more relaxed about the household organization she interprets as a sign of her “laziness” and a “source of danger,” and therefore redirects her focus back to herself, the one responsible for ensuring a functioning family life .Hanna's and her partner's roles and task divisions conform with traditional gender norms and the gender system of domesticity. Interestingly, Hanna constructs and depicts her stay-at-home mothering and homemaker obligations in a narrative congruent with the ‘ideal worker' ideology adapted to her care-work: she is fully devoted to her job, has her areas of duty clearly in mind, leads and manages while making the best use of her skills, aiming to ensure the functioning of her family, even though this costs her strength. Hanna is not complaining about her children or her duties, even though she experiences the continuous “standby mode,” and lack of pauses during the pandemic lockdown as challenging. She reacts by bringing forward the need to more consciously use her abilities (“skill sets”) to manage strains. Throughout the interview, Hanna barely mentions conflicts between her partner's occupational work duties and her duties as a stay-at-home mother. Instead, the challenges she perceives exclusively originate from an extension of her regular job as the primary care person for her children. While Hanna's and her partner's traditionally gendered role division corresponds with the ideal workers ideologies basic assumptions , she is not explicitly perpetuating this image in her interview, but rather holistically lives it without experiencing the burden of being torn between the two ideals of being a “good mother” and “good worker.” Nonetheless, she fills the “idealized mother norms” through an ‘ideal-workers ideology' within her self-conceptions as a stay-at-home mother and homemaker.intensive mothering and ideal worker ideology are common among mothers in our sample when sharing their experiences in times of the early COVID-19 pandemic, albeit in varying nuances. Many of the participants refer to these societally dominant mothering narratives implicitly but also explicitly in some cases. Aiming to understand better how the pandemic-induced changes in daily life affect mothers' self-conception, expressions of maternal guilt and wellbeing, we identify three groups of women. Across the above themes identified, we also focused on statements that reveal how mothers construct their “actual selves” against an “ideal self,” including their notions of maternal guilt.Our findings indicate that narratives of enhancement in maternal-self-conception as these mothers seem to achieve their internalized conception of ideal mothering. They blossom and enjoy the everyday life changes that accompanied the early phase of the pandemic. The deceleration in daily routines positively affects their mothering as they spend more time with their children, feel closer, and have grown together as a family. These positive changes affect their maternal conception in a way that makes them feel better about fulfilling their mothering role. Their interviews are phrased in an enthusiastic and balanced tone, even when mentioning challenging situations. Overall, they articulate a high sense of wellbeing and satisfaction in the absence of any statements that can be traced back to feelings of maternal guilt.The first group, composed of three working mothers , shows an continuation of maternal self-perception showing high convergence between their pre-pandemic and pandemic times notions of motherhood. Remarkably, this group is composed of the homemakers and the unemployed women. Despite strenuous circumstances, they have overall adapted smoothly to the situation. Their self-conception as mothers has not been queried as they experience (more or less) a continuation of their pre-pandemic routines. This stability can possibly be traced back to a high level of self-efficacy that was particularly present in these women's deliberately chosen parenting approach and their value system. A continuation of maternal self-perception could also be seen in a mother (Dana) whose biggest challenge was the lack of work-related tasks, which coincided with the closure of the kindergarten. In her interview, she does not articulate a substantial discrepancy between her ‘ideal' and her ‘actual' mothering beliefs. Instead, she positively values her identity as a worker, where she seems to experience (more) self-efficacy.The second group of women  is characterized by a The third, and largest group of mothers Dana, Julie, Bianca, Kate, Vanessa, Jane, who are all working, experiences a clear deterioration in maternal self-conception. This is specifically the case for those who experience growing discrepancies between their actual self and mothering ideals, stating that they feel (more) challenged, overloaded, emotionally strained, exhausted, or physically stretched. Their expressions reflect not only poor wellbeing and mental health but also insecurities, feelings of failure, or maternal guilt concerning their performance as mothers. Some show high awareness about how (destructive) societal norms influence their mothering ideals . For these women, their currently low maternal self-esteem evolved in the context of the pandemic-induced changes, especially as most now work in home offices with no childcare. It is striking to see how outer stressors  elicit role conflicts and strains and accumulate in feelings of maternal guilt.ideal worker norms, we identify three types through which the ideal worker construction is evident in the self-and partner conception and at least to some extent channeled through intensive mothering norms. Whereas, the first type maintains the male ideal worker by not posing any additional care burden on the partners working time , the second type is characterized by the female failure to meet the ideal worker norms due to the employers' inflexibility and lack of consideration for the family-specific peculiarities during the COVID-19 pandemic (Julie). Last, one woman's construction of her homemaker self can be interpreted as an inherent adaption of the ideal worker ideology within the domestic ‘female' sphere while at the same time protecting the ideal worker status of her husband (Hannah).Using the theoretical lens of intensive mothering norms. Also, we have shown how the ideal workers' norm can intersect with and build upon the intensive mothering ideology and conceivably amplify the burden of experienced gender inequality for women in our sample. For one group, the internalization of these norms imposes a harmful self-evaluation and a deterioration of maternal self-conception. In contrast, another group apparently seems to have reduced the gap between their “actual” and their “ideal” self. Although the latter seems positive at first glance, this evolution should not disguise that it might be the effect of the NPIs themselves  that makes these women feel like “better” mothers now, whereas the intensive mothering beliefs may remain as influential as before due to their dominant, hegemonial and gender-unequal character. The aim here is not to judge the group of women who experience a (positive) continuation of maternal self-conception throughout their deliberately chosen  family models, but rather to question why  working mothers get judged by society, in their relationships, and not least by themselves.In our analysis, we see that motherhood myths persist and are experienced as burdensome when working-, childcare, and family-related responsibilities were all transferred into the private space due to pandemic measures. We were able to make visible that mothers' notions of guilt can be linked to dominant gendered discourses on motherhood, specifically the Our findings align with studies that showed how the NPIs affected mothers disproportionately since they were placed at the “pandemic frontline” , 43, 44.So far, studies have aimed at quantifying the burden imposed on mothers by the pandemic, e.g., the number of hours spent at home and in paid employment , or the n = 17), does not claim to give representative findings nor allows us to draw general statements. Despite this limitation and the fact that the development of our interview guide was not informed by theoretical considerations specifically targeting “intensive mothering beliefs” or “ideal worker norms” , we believe that our approach allowed to highlight crucial points of tensions in maternal self-conception that are likely to be exacerbated during the pandemic.The qualitative study design allowed an in-depth analysis of the heterogeneous experiences of a rather homogenous group of women in terms of relationship and (high) socioeconomic status, ethnicity, age of children, place of residence, and NPIs. As the implications of the pandemic are highly context-specific, women with more diverse backgrounds and occupational statuses would possibly bring to light other stressors  and diverging references to intensive mothering norms than our sample. For example, the experiences of single mothers   may diffBy using email interviews, we tried to give the participants as much autonomy as possible to answer our questions without disrupting their daily routine. Also, email interviews encourage the participant to reflect on and actively create thought processes as the interview takes place anachronously. However, they also require the participants to have certain reading and writing abilities and relatively easy access to an electronic device. Our sample only includes women who could respond to our survey and email interviews, potentially excluding those who felt even more challenged and stretched during the early pandemic phase. Most women in our sample were working from home and, as such, represented a relatively privileged group. The participants' response behavior varied as some replied to our questions in a survey-imitating manner (short answers) instead of narrating their thoughts. About 25% of the interviewees dropped out after the second wave of responses (not replying to the third round of questions). A certain drop-out was expected, which is why we mitigated this risk by asking the most fundamental questions in the first and second rounds of emailing.We elaborated on the role of two influential and mutually reinforcing discourses, namely the “intensive mothering ideology” and the “ideal worker ideology.” How mothers justify their thoughts and actions by referencing these discourses shows how strongly social norms affect patterns of actions and self-conception and how their  partners and employers contribute to shaping those norms. It is relevant to investigate further the role of gendered norms on  health and wellbeing and challenge unequally distributed expectations and responsibilities in the work- and family sphere.The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, upon request.This study was reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee of Bielefeld University (Ref. 2020-059). The patients/participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study. Written informed consent was obtained from the individual(s) for the publication of any potentially identifiable images or data included in this article.SB-Z conceptualized the qualitative part of the Family study with CM and LW, and wrote the first draft of the paper. VN coded and analyzed the data with SB-Z. CM, LW, and OR provided substantial feedback on different versions of the manuscript. All authors contributed to the final draft. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.The present study has been conducted by the Gender Epidemiology Junior Research Group, funded by Bielefeld University. We acknowledge the financial support of the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the Open Access Publication Fund of Bielefeld University for the article processing charge.The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.