10.1177/0730888404266349WORK AND OCCUPATIONS / August 2004Bakker, Geurts / WORK-HOME INTERFERENCE
Toward a Dual-Process Model
of Work-Home Interference
ARNOLD B. BAKKER
Utrecht University
SABINE A. E. GEURTS
University of Nijmegen
This article introduces the dual-process model of work-home interference (WHI), which claims
that job characteristics can be categorized in two broad categories, job demands and job
resources, that are differentially related to job-related outcomes and WHI measures. The model
proposes that job demands are primarily related to feelings of exhaustion, whereas job resources
are primarily related to work-related flow. The central hypothesis of the current study among
1,090 employees was that exhaustion and flow, in turn, are related to negative and positive WHI,
respectively. A series of structured equation modeling (SEM) analyses provided strong evi-
dence for the dual-process model of WHI. The implications for WHI research and practice are
discussed.
Keywords: work-home interference; exhaustion; flow; recovery
A
growing number of individuals is challenged to combine substantial
domestic responsibilities and work obligations (Allen, Herst, Bruck, &
Sutton, 2000; Bond, Galinsky, & Swanberg, 1998). This challenge may
become a stressor when “role pressures from the work and family domains
are mutually incompatible in some respect” (Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985;
p. 77). For example, research by Galinsky, Bond, and Friedman (1993) indi
-
cates that a considerable proportion of employed parents (i.e., 40%) experi
-
ences problems in combining work and family demands, often referred to as
work-to-family conflict or negative work-to-home interference. In contrast
345
Authors’ Note: This research was supported by the Netherlands Organization for
Scientific Research (NOW; grant 580-02.202) as part of the concerted research action
Fatigue at Work. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to
Arnold B. Bakker, Utrecht University, Dept. of Social & Organizational Psychology,
P.O. Box 80.140, 3508 TC Utrecht, the Netherlands; e-mail: A.Bakker@fss.uu.nl.
WORK AND OCCUPATIONS, Vol. 31 No. 3, August 2004 345-366
DOI: 10.1177/0730888404266349
© 2004 Sage Publications
with the general belief among practitioners, empirical research has consis
-
tently shown that work demands are far more likely to interfere negatively
with domestic obligations than vice versa (e.g., Burke & Greenglass, 1999;
Leiter & Durup, 1996). Frone, Russell, and Cooper (1992) found that “work
interfering with home” (WHI) was reported 3 times more often than “home
interfering with work” (HWI) by male and female employees (see also Bond
et al., 1998). In addition, a recent meta-analysis including 67 studies (Allen
et al., 2000) shows that negative WHI is associated with serious conse
-
quences, including depression, psychosomatic complaints, and reduced mar
-
ital satisfaction. This article focuses on WHI in light of this relatively high
prevalence of negative WHI, and its potential relevance for understanding
employee well-being.
Work-family studies have related WHI to several antecedents and psycho
-
logical well-being and have increased our understanding of the phenomenon.
Nevertheless, research within this field is characterized by two main limita
-
tions. First, research has focused almost exclusively on the negative impact
of work on the home situation. However, several scholars have argued that
workers may also benefit from combining “work” and “family” and
that these benefits may outweigh the costs (e.g., Hochschild, 1997;
Kirchmeyer, 1993). There is indeed ample empirical evidence for this con-
tention. For example, Crosby (1982) found that married employed women
with children were more satisfied with their jobs than single employed
women or married employed women without children (see also Bersoff &
Crosby, 1984). In addition, Barnett’s (1998) review shows that full-time
workers experience better health than their reduced-hours counterparts.For
example, in a classic longitudinal study, Moen, Dempster-McClain, and Wil-
liams (1992) showed that occupying multiple roles in 1956, participating in
volunteer work on an intermittent basis, and belonging to a club or organiza
-
tion were positively related to various measures of health in 1986. In addi
-
tion, a longitudinal study in the United States showed that White married
women who decreased their labor force participation from full-time to low
part-time or homemaker reported a significant increase in distress symptoms
over a 3-year period (Wethington & Kessler, 1989). Conversely, those
women who increased their labor force participation from homemaker or
part-time worker to full-time worker reported a significant decrease in
emotional distress (see also Barnett & Gareis, 2000; Herold & Waldron,
1985; Verbrugge, 1989).
Second, work-family researchers have not based their hypotheses about
negative WHI on strong conceptual frameworks (cf. Grandey & Cropanzano,
1999). Where conceptual frameworks are used, researchers relied mainly on
role stress theory (Kahn, Wolfe, Quinn, Snoek, & Rosenthal, 1964), postulat
-
346 WORK AND OCCUPATIONS / August 2004
ing that participation in one role makes it more difficult to participate in
another role (Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985). From this perspective, however,it
remains unclear how negative WHI should be embedded in the stressor-
strain relationship. Negative WHI is often considered a potential source of
stress that, in addition to other potential stressors, will have adverse effects on
health and psychological well-being, resulting in, for example, poor physical
health, depression, or anxiety (e.g., Burke, 1988, 1993; Frone et al., 1991,
1992, 1997; Kinnunen & Mauno, 1998).
Rather than as a “stressor,” negative WHI is also often considered a stress
reaction (i.e., strain), particularly caused by work-related stressors (e.g., high
quantitative workload; Burke, 1988; Frone et al., 1992; Grzywacz & Marks,
2000). Furthermore, various studies have provided evidence for a mediating
role of negative WHI in the stressor-strain relationship. For instance, a Dutch
study among four independent samples provided evidence for a mediating
role of negative WHI in the relationship between workload and general
health indicators (Geurts, Kompier, Roxburgh, & Houtman, 2003). Another
study among medical residents revealed that various stressors (e.g., an unfa-
vorable working time schedule) were important antecedents of negative
WHI, which, in turn, was associated with psychosomatic health complaints
and sleep deprivation (Geurts, Rutte, & Peeters, 1999). In a similar vein,
Parasuraman, Purohit, Godshalk, and Beutell (1996) found that male and
female entrepreneurs who experienced work-role overload reported higher
levels of negative WHI, which, in turn, was related to their general life stress
(for similar evidence, see Stephens, Franks, & Atienza, 1997). Taken to-
gether, previous studies have produced mixed findings, suggesting that WHI
may be conceived as a stressor, a strain, or an outcome of strain. These find-
ings emphasize the importance of using a clear theoretical framework
(Grandey & Cropanzano, 1999).
The current study was designed to overcome these two limitations. First,
the current research does not focus exclusively on negative work-to-home
interference but on the possible positive impact of work on the home situa
-
tion. Second, our hypotheses are based on a strong conceptual framework,
integrating theoretical notions from the job demands-resources model and
the effort-recovery model.
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
A central proposition of the job demands-resources (JD-R) model
(Bakker, Demerouti, De Boer, & Schaufeli, 2003; Demerouti, Bakker,
Nachreiner, & Schaufeli, 2001) is that work characteristics can be organized
Bakker, Geurts / WORK-HOME INTERFERENCE 347
in two broad categories, namely, job demands and job resources. Job de
-
mands refer to those physical, psychosocial, or organizational aspects of the
job that require sustained physical and/or mental effort and are, therefore,
associated with certain physiological and/or psychological costs. Examples
are a high work pressure (i.e., high work pace and tight deadlines), high phys
-
ical or emotional demands, and role conflicts. Job resources refer to those
physical, psychosocial, or organizational aspects of the job that may be func
-
tional in meeting task requirements (i.e., job demands) and may thus reduce
the associated physiological and/or psychological costs—and at the same
time stimulate personal growth and development. Resources may be located
in the task itself (e.g., performance feedback, skill variety, autonomy; cf.
Hackman & Oldham, 1976), as well as in the context of the task, for instance,
organizational resources (e.g., career opportunities, job security) and social
resources (e.g., supervisor and coworker support).
In addition, the JD-R model proposes that employee health and psycho
-
logical well-being is the result of two relatively independent processes
(Bakker, Demerouti, De Boer, et al., 2003; Bakker, Demerouti, Taris,
Schaufeli, & Schreurs, 2003; Demerouti, Bakker, Nachreiner, & Schaufeli,
2000; Demerouti et al., 2001). In the first process, particularly the demanding
aspects of work (e.g., work overload) lead to constant overtaxing and in the
long term to health problems (e.g., chronic fatigue, burnout). In the second
process, the availability of job resources may help employees to cope with
the demanding aspects of their work and simultaneously stimulate them to
learn from and grow in their job, which may lead to motivation, feelings of
accomplishment, and organizational commitment. Theoretically, the JD-R
model can be considered an elaboration of the more classic demand-control
(D-C) model (Karasek, 1979), in which autonomy can be considered a
resource that enables workers to cope with a high workload.
The effort-recovery (E-R) model (Meijman & Mulder, 1998) can be used
to illustrate the mechanisms that may underlie the two processes just
described. According to this model, the quantity and quality of recovery
plays a crucial role in the first process. When during a certain amount of time
no or little appeal is made to the psychobiological systems that were used for
task performance, these systems will stabilize at a specific baseline level, and
individuals will recover from the load effects that have built up during task
performance. Although daily work usually involves loads that are not neces
-
sarily harmful, they recur day-after-day and consequently function as a per
-
manent source of tension. If opportunities for recovery after being exposed to
a high workload are insufficient, the psychobiological systems are activated
again before they had a chance to stabilize at a baseline level. The person, still
in a suboptimal state, will have to make additional (compensatory) effort.
348 WORK AND OCCUPATIONS / August 2004
This may result in an increased intensity of the load reactions, which, in turn,
will make higher demands on the recovery process. Thus, an accumulative
process may yield a draining of one’s energy and a state of breakdown or
exhaustion (e.g., Sluiter, 1999; Ursin, 1980). Under unchanged conditions
these symptoms may develop into manifest health problems (cf. Kompier,
1988; Sluiter, 1999).
According to the E-R model, the willingness to put effort into the tasks
may be crucial to the second process. Following the E-R model, work envi
-
ronments that offer many resources (e.g., performance feedback, autonomy,
and possibilities for professional development) may foster the willingness to
dedicate one’s abilities to the task and yield positive outcomes; that is, under
the latter conditions, the probability that energy will be produced rather than
consumed and that tasks will be completed successfully increases. This
means that employees have the opportunity to develop their skills and may
find satisfaction through their work activities. Because of the mobilization of
energy (and the related reduced need for recovery), people will start the next
working day in an optimal condition. Over time, this process will result in
increased motivation and organizational commitment (cf. Hackman &
Oldham, 1976).
The central idea of job demands that require too much effort, the lack of
job resources to fulfill the job requirements, and the “spillover” of negative
load effects that have built up during working hours to the nonwork situation
makes the theoretical perspective offered by the JD-R model and the E-R
model relevant for studying negative WHI. Moreover, this theoretical frame-
work might also be fruitful for studying positive WHI. The existence of
resources that enable individuals to deal with the demanding aspects of their
job and simultaneously increase their willingness to do so may be associated
with positive load effects that have built up during working hours and may
spill over to the nonwork domain. From this theoretical perspective, WHI can
be defined as an experience that is implicated in the process whereby work
-
ers’ functioning and need for recovery in one domain is influenced by load
effects that have built up in the other domain. In this article, we focus on the
impact of negative and positive load effects that have built up at work on
one’s (energetic) state at work and eventually on one’s functioning and need
for recovery in the nonwork domain.
TOWARD A DUAL-PROCESS MODEL OF WHI
The current research proposes and tests a dual-process model of WHI in
three different occupational groups in the Netherlands. The central assump
-
Bakker, Geurts / WORK-HOME INTERFERENCE 349
