This meta-analysis is a review of the literature examining the relations among stressors, involvement, and support in the work and family domains, work-family conflict, and satisfaction outside of those domains. Results suggest that a considerable amount of variability in family satisfaction is explained by work domain-specific variables, whereas a considerable amount of variability in job satisfaction is explained by family domain-specific variables, with job and family stress having the strongest effects on work-family conflict and cross-domain satisfaction. The authors propose future directions for research on work and family issues focusing on other explanatory mechanisms and moderators of cross-domain relations.

Work and family satisfaction and conflict: a meta-analysis of cross-domain relations.

This article describes the work-family interface and proposes a conceptual model that links the work-family interface to work, family, and individual outcomes through several mediating mechanisms. First, the work-family interface is related to a cognitive assessment of work-family conflict, role balance, or role enhancement. This relationship may be moderated by social categories and coping resources. The assessment of conflict, balance, or enhancement can result in either work-family role strain or work-family role ease. Then, depending on the extent of strain or ease, individuals and families pursue various work-family adaptive strategies designed to improve or facilitate adjustment to various aspects of the work-family interface. The success of these strategies is indicated by the extent of perceived work-family fit. Work-family fit is related directly to work, family, and individual outcomes. Last, work-family adaptive strategies are proposed to have feedback effects on the work-family interface. The ...

Linkages Between the Work-family Interface and Work, Family, and Individual Outcomes An Integrative Model

Work–life issues have important implications at both organizational and individual levels. This paper provides a critical review of the work–life literature from 1990 onwards through the lens of diversity, with a particular focus on disparities of power induced by methodological and conceptual framings of work and life. The review seeks to answer the following questions: What are the gaps and omissions in the work–life research? How may they be overcome? To answer these questions, the review scrutinizes blind spots in the treatment of life, diversity and power in work–life research in both positivist and critical scholarship. In order to transcend the blind spots in positivist and critical work–life research, the review argues the case for an intersectional approach which captures the changing realities of family and workforce through the lens of diversity and intersectionality. The theoretical contribution is threefold: first, the review demonstrates that contemporary framing of life in the work–life literature should be expanded to cover aspects of life beyond domestic life. Second, the review explains why and how other strands of diversity than gender also manifest as salient causes of difference in experiences of the work–life interface. Third, the review reveals that social and historical context has more explanatory power in work–life dynamics than the micro-individual level of explanations. Work–life literature should capture the dynamism in these contexts. The paper also provides a set of useful recommendations to capture and operationalize methodological and theoretical changes required in the work–life literature.

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Work–Life, Diversity and Intersectionality: A Critical Review and Research Agenda

The overarching purpose of the study was to investigate the role of three types of social support (i.e., spousal, childcare, and organizational support) in relation to work–family conflict (WFC) in dual-earner families with children ages 0–6 years. The relationship of WFC to psychological well-being and well-being in the domain of family was explored. Finally, the relationship of spousal support to psychological well-being and marital satisfaction was examined. A total of 434 participants (237 mothers, 197 fathers) in dual-earner families in Turkey with at least one preschool child participated in the study. The relative impact of childcare, spousal support, and organizational support on WFC and outcome variables was tested simultaneously for both men and women through structural equation modeling. Spousal support was related to WFC for women, whereas both spousal and organizational support were related to WFC for men. WFC had a negative relationship with psychological well-being, marital satisfaction, and parental role performance for both men and women. Implications of the results in relation to changing gender roles in a cultural context that is characterized by high collectivism and low gender egalitarianism are discussed.

Relative Contributions of Childcare, Spousal Support, and Organizational Support in Reducing Work–Family Conflict for Men and Women: The Case of Turkey

Using data from China, Kenya, and Thailand, we investigated the moderating effect of transformational leadership in the relationships between family-friendly programs (childcare and work flexibility benefits), organizational commitment, and work withdrawal. Results supported the moderating effect of transformational leadership in the relationships between work flexibility benefits and both organizational commitment and work withdrawal, and between childcare benefits and work withdrawal. Theoretical contributions as well as practical implications are discussed.

Family-friendly programs, organizational commitment, and work withdrawal: the moderating role of transformational leadership

Selected social-psychological processes within the family were examined as potential mediators of the relationship between work-family conflict and marital adjustment among career men and women in the United States. Seventy-nine men and 198 women who were professionals in psychology participated in the study. A path-analytic model was used to test two specific family variables–perceptions of equity in spousal home division of labor and perceptions of spousal social support–as potential mediators of the proposed negative relationship between work-family conflict and marital adjustment. Spousal social support and equity in spousal home division of labor played an important, albeit small, mediating role in the negative relationship between work-family conflict and marital adjustment for men and women. Contrary to expectations, gender exhibited no overall indirect effect on marital adjustment.

Family Variables as Mediators of the Relationship Between Work-Family Conflict and Marital Adjustment Among Dual-Career Men and Women

This study examined the relationships among gender, coping, and anticipated work-family conflict for career-bound men and women. 256 university students enrolled in a university in northern Louisiana participated. Multivariate and univariate analyses were used to examine (a) potential gender differences with respect to anticipated work-family conflict and work-family coping mechanisms and (b) the role coping processes may play in mediating the relationship between gender and anticipated work-family conflict. The results indicated significant differences between the sexes with respect to anticipated work-family conflict as well as to expected use of various coping strategies to manage anticipated work-family conflict. Contrary to expectations, coping strategies did not mediate the relationship between gender and work-family conflict. The issue of coping as a mediator variable as well as the study's primary implications for students and professional educators are addressed.

Gender differences and similarities in coping responses to anticipated work-family conflict '

In this study the associations between perceptions and use of time and experiences of family-work spillover for 277 men and women involved in dual careers were analyzed. Implications for research on work and family are discussed.

Family-work spillover in dual-career couples: a comparison of two time perspectives

Previous research in work-family conflict focused on current conflict and yielded contradictory findings. The present study is among the first to examine the relationships among sex, measures of sex role and of anticipated work-family conflict. Anticipated conflict was measured using a modified version of the Interrole Conflict Scale. In a sample of 256 university students, men more than women anticipated greater career conflict. Pieck's 1977 hypothesis of “asymmetrical permeability” was posited as a potential explanation for this finding. The expected relationship between sex-role orientation as measured on the Bern Sex-role Inventory and work-family conflict was not obtained.

Kim A. Burley

Papers

Family Variables as Mediators of the Relationship Between Work-Family Conflict and Marital Adjustment Among Dual-Career Men and Women

Gender differences and similarities in coping responses to anticipated work-family conflict '

Family-work spillover in dual-career couples: a comparison of two time perspectives

Surprising Initial Findings regarding Sex, Sex Role, and Anticipated Work-Family Conflict