Chapter One Background To The Study

CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

Ive learned that you cant have everything and do everything at the same time (Winfrey, 2003).
The words of one of the worlds most successful women likely resonate with all of us who desire
to achieve success and effectively manage lifes competing roles. Work is one competing role that
is both important and demanding. One study found that 78% of U.S. employees reported that
work was among the three most important things in their lives (England & Misumi, 1986). Only
7.2% of the U.S. sample stated that work was the least important thing in their lives. In a survey
assessing the meaning of work for senior managers, middle managers, supervisors, and
professional employees, U.S. employees indicated the absolute importance of working as 5.58 on
a 7-point scale (Lundberg & Peterson, 1994). Not only is work an important life role, it requires a
large amount of time. In a managerial stress survey, 1,152 participants from English-speaking
Anglo countries (Australia, Canada, England, New Zealand, and U.S.) reported working an average
of 49.3 hours per week (SD = 8.2 hours; range = 30-80 hours). Almost 30% of the labor force works
49 or more hours per week (U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2000). In
addition, working 50+ hours per week is often necessary for employees in management and
professional positions who desire promotion (Bailyn, 1993; Kanter, 1977). For many people,
family is also an important and demanding life role. In Lundberg and Petersons (1994) study,
family was ranked as the single most important life role for U.S. employees. In addition to being
important, family responsibilities are very demanding. Women seem to be more affected by
family care responsibilities than are men, as women report doing 65-80% of the child care (Sayer,
2001) and more than 70% of high burden elder care (National Alliance for Caregiving and
American Association of Retired Persons, 2004). For example, women complete an average of 3.5
hours of childcare per workday and men perform an average of 2.7 hours of childcare per workday
(Bond, Thompson, Galinsky, & Prottas, 2002). Other 1 research shows similar trends, as fathers
and mothers, respectively, report working an average of 50 and 80 hours per week in employment
(outside of the home) and household work (Cowan, 1983). These demands are even greater for
employees with young children. For example, employed mothers of children under age three
reported working 90 hours per week on child care and outside employment duties (Rexroat &
Shehan, 1987). With such great demands at work and at home, it can be difficult to balance family
and work responsibilities or to have everything and do everything at the same time (Winfrey,
2003). One way to balance the demands of work and family roles is to assume the one partner
as full-time breadwinner, one partner as full-time homemaker family type. In this family type,
one partner assumes the majority of the family responsibilities and the other partner assumes the
financial responsibilities. However, fewer than 3% of U.S. families fit the father as breadwinner
and stay-at-home mother mold (Gilbert & Rader, 2001). Instead, most modern families take
different forms. Many families include two parents who are employed outside of the home. In
fact, in 2003, 60.7% of married couples with children younger than 18 years old were dualearner
families (U.S. Census Bureau, 2005). In other families, one parent handles the family and work
responsibilities without the help of a partner. For example, in 1999, in 20.1% of families with
children younger than 6 years old and 22% of families with children between 6 and 17 years old,
the child (children) was (were) living with one parent who was in the labor force (U.S. Census
Bureau, 2000). When both parents are, or the sole household parent is, employed, this creates
challenges in balancing the demands of work and home life. In fact, 40% of employed parents
report that they experience work-family conflict at least some of the time (Galinsky, Bond, &
Friedman, 1993). Work-family conflict (WFC) is a type of interrole conflict in which 2 role pressures
from the work and family domains are mutually incompatible to some degree (Kahn, Wolfe,
Quinn, Snoek, & Rosenthal, 1964; Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985) If not remedied, WFC can lead to
problems in both the work and home environments. For instance, individuals with higher levels
of WFC have experienced lower family satisfaction (Beutell & Wittig-Berman, 1999; Carlson &
Kacmar, 2000; Carlson & Perrew, 1999), lower job satisfaction (Boles & Babin, 1996; Boles,
Johnston, & Hair, 1997; Carlson & Perrew, 1999; Good, Sisler, & Gentry, 1988; Kossek & Ozeki,
1998), lower life satisfaction (Beutell & WittigBerman, 1999), lower quality of family life (Higgins,
Duxbury, & Irving, 1992), and poorer physical health (Frone, Russell, & Cooper, 1997) than those
with lower levels of WFC. WFC has also been associated with negative workplace outcomes, such
as intention to quit (Burke, 1994; Good, Page, & Young, 1996; Good et al., 1988) and increases in
workplace absenteeism (Goff, Mount, & Jamison, 1990). Social support has been related to lower
WFC (Carlson & Perrew, 1999; Goff et al., 1990; Nielson, Carlson, & Lankau, 2001). Thus, social
support is a tool that individuals can seek in their quest to have and do everything. However, no
studies were found that directly examine differences in the amount of social support that
colleagues provide to employees who juggle work and family roles. To demonstrate the need for
research examining difference in received social support, I will first review the WFC literature,
including its antecedents and outcomes. Next, I will discuss how social support reduces WFC and
its negative outcomes. Then, I will describe the influences of gender role expectations and family
responsibilities on employees workplace experiences and outcomes. Specifically, I will discuss
research that shows that parents are perceived as less agentic and committed to the job than
nonparents (Fuegen, Biernat, Haines, & Deaux, 2004), that parenthood negatively impacts
employed women, but not employed men (Cuddy, Fiske, & 3 Glick, 2004; Fuegen et al., 2004),
that employed women are viewed more negatively than employed men when they behave
assertively (Costrich, Feinstein, Kiddler, Marecek, & Pascale, 1975; Eagly, Makhijani, & Klonsky,
1992), and that employed mothers are viewed as bad mothers if they choose to work (Gorman
& Fritzsche, 2002). I will demonstrate how attribution theory and expectations about employed
parents suggest that employees (especially female employees) who report family interference
with work are likely to receive lower performance evaluation ratings and less social support than
employees who do not report family interference with work. Then, I will report the findings of my
laboratory-based experiment that investigated workplace outcomes (performance evaluations
and social support) for individuals who would benefit by receiving help. In this experiment, I
assessed the impact of an individuals gender, control over the reason for needing help, and
whether the need for help was self-related or childrelated on performance evaluations and the
degree to which these individuals received social support from teammates. After reviewing the
findings, I will discuss the implications and potential applications of these results.
Well-being of the
Work family conflict
employee
Family demands

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CHAPTER ONE

BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

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