ABSTRACT The aim of this paper will be to analyse changes in family and gender roles in Spain within the process of individualization in the European context. The focus is thus to evaluate the extent to which institutional factors (family policies) and individual factors interact in the development of cultural models that explain differences in preferences and family and labour strategies adopted by citizens. With the objective of determining to what extent a transition process towards an egalitarian family model is being made, socio-demographic factors that explain preference groups with regard to labour and family life-styles will be analysed in two countries with very different traditions of labour and family conciliation, such as Spain and Finland. Therefore, in a second part of the work, individual factors linked to population segments identified with the egalitarian model of family roles and with the traditional model of family in Spain and Finland will be clarified. This research has highlighted the fact that a difference between family life-styles is explained by variables such as education and marital status in Spain, whereas in Finland, analyses of segmentation have underlined that age is the best variable to explain differences regarding the desired role of females.