Thesis (Ph.D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 271-288). / This dissertation addresses the problems and synergies of integrating paid work with other meaningful parts of life, and avoiding pernicious choices between work and family. To do so, I examine the very structure of work organization for professional and technical employees in small and medium-sized companies in a new, knowledge-based sector of the US economy. The research questions are: What dynamics at work, related to time, boundaries, and control of schedules and work process, influence satisfaction at work and home, commitment to the work organization, well-being and gender equity? Under what conditions are supportive "work-family" practices by firms, as experienced in a day-to-day context, associated with positive outcomes at home and work? The dissertation builds on relevant aspects of industrial relations, human resources, and work process research, and scholarship concerning families, gender, and work-family boundaries. Work scholarship is incomplete without a lens that incorporates the holistic lives and concerns of the people doing the work, and family scholarship is incomplete without serious consideration of the work structures that shape family schedules, resources, conflicts, and availability for caregiving. This dissertation uses both qualitative data from 80 interviews to get an in-depth picture of respondents' lives, and a broader quantitative analysis based on an original survey with 463 professional scientists and managers. These were gathered from biopharmaceutical employees in Massachusetts during 1996-99. From the interviews I find that flexibility at work, support at home, and control at work are the key factors that contribute to satisfaction outcomes given similar levels of demands. But these are not distributed evenly by gender, company, or level of job. The survey data show that it is not only the presence of workplace policies on work-family, but the employee's day-to-day experience of whether she is free to use the policies, that contributes to positive outcomes. I introduce a concept o "perceived usability" and use multivariate regression analysis to show it is linked to control of time, pace, and place of work, to organizational commitment and "integrated satisfaction." I find that gender is the strongest stress predictor in this sample. I find that biotechnology offers unusual opportunities for gender equity at work, but a combination of traditional managerial attitudes and inequity at home erects barriers to realizing this potential. In conclusion, I argue that we cannot effectively understand organizational life and work design without considering mutually interactive effects of home and family concerns. / by Susan Catherine Eaton. / Ph.D.

The large-scale entrance of women into the workforce over the past two decades has fundamentally changed the nature of work and family life. This trend has been associated with a constellation of emerging challenges and conflicts in balancing work and family spheres. Gutek, Searle, and Klepa (1991) developed two models for explaining work-family conflict. The Rational Model proposed that workfamily conflict is directly proportionate to the amount of time one spends in work and family activities. The Gender Role Model proposed that work-family conflict is moderated by gender role socialization, in that men are predicted to experience greater work-family conflict when family responsibilities interfere with their career, whereas women are predicted to experience greater conflict when their career interferes with their family responsibilities. To date, models of work-family conflict have been largely derived from White samples, and it has not been established that our models can be generalized across culture. Distinct cultural histories between Black and White women suggest potential differences in how work-family conflict is experienced across ethnicity.The purpose of this study was to test a measure of work-family conflict for invariance across ethnicity. Participants were 111 Black and 119 White, married, middle-income mothers with dependent children who worked outside of the home on a full-time basis. It was hypothesized that Gutek et al.'s (1991) measure of work-family conflict would demonstrate variance across ethnicity. The study further extended Gutek's research by hypothesizing that White women would experience greater work-family conflict when work interfered with family responsibilities than the reverse, and that Black women would be equally sensitive to interference with either domain. Results of a multi-sample confirmatory factor analysis failed to confirm the hypothesis of construct bias or the prediction that White women would be more sensitive to work interference with family life than the reverse. The results of this study supported the prediction that among Black women, there would be no differences in the relationship between family interference with work and work interference with family on total work-family conflict. Limitations of the present study and implications for future research were discussed. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

While there is a growing body of literature on the effect of unemployment on individuals, and their marriages and families, a paucity of research has focused on job insecurity, or employment uncertainty, as a stressor on employees and their families. In addition, research on women in the workplace is relatively new. The incidence and severity of personal stress among male (n = 79) and female (n = 53) employees is compared during a period of job insecurity at a small midwestern university. Patterns of marital and family functioning for both male and female employees during the period of employment uncertainty also are compared. No significant differences were found in either the incidence and severity of personal stress among male and female employees or in the way their marriages and families functioned during the period of job insecurity. / Master of Science

The current work-family literature strongly emphasizes the conflict between the multiple roles that workers and parents assume. This conflict literature leaves readers with the impression that individuals are experiencing stress to a level that detracts from their quality of life (Frone, 2003; Parasuraman, Greenhaus, & Granrose, 1992). A more balanced perspective recognizes both the disadvantages and the potential advantages of engaging in multiple roles. Recent evidence indicates that occupying the roles of worker and spouse/parent may also produce positive outcomes such as greater satisfaction in marriage and on the job (Barnett, 1998; Barnett & Garies, 2006). Greenhaus and Powell (2006) offer one theory that explains the positive interaction between work and family roles by introducing the concept of enrichment, a theory that explains why one role might improve the quality of life in the other role. Using a sample of intercollegiate coaches (N = 286) from institutions located in the United States, this study assessed the influence of work-family conflict and work-family enrichment in relation to occupational and life outcomes for college coaches. Levels of conflict in work-to-family and family-to-work were measured, as well as levels of enrichment in work-to-family and family-to-work. Multiple regression was utilized to analyze six conceptual models with gender, age of participant, the presence of children at home, work-family conflict and work-family enrichment as independent variables. The results indicated work-to-family enrichment ([beta] = .318) and family-to-work enrichment ([beta] = .257) were both significant predictors of life satisfaction (p < .01). Work-to-family conflict ([beta] = -.118) and family-to-work conflict ([beta] = -.269) were significant predictors of life satisfaction (p < .01). Likewise, work-to-family conflict ([beta] = .385) and family-to-work conflict ([beta] = .140) were significant predictors of career commitment (p < .01). Age was a significant predictor of career commitment (p < .05). The findings highlight the need for future theoretical models to include both work-family conflict and work-family enrichment as both contribute uniquely to career and life outcomes. Practical implications include educating athletic administrators of the benefits coaches may accrue as a result of being engaged in both family and work roles. / text

This thesis was to explore the relationships between occupational conditions and parental behaviors and values. The data set for this thesis were taken from the 1988 National Survey of Families and Households, which includes a national crosssectional sample of 13,017 primary respondents. The subsamples used here were limited to married or cohabiting white families with children under 18 years old. Pearson’s r and one-way analysis of variance were used to examine the zero-order relationships among all the independent and dependent variables. Multiple regression analyses were adopted to present the relative importance of independent variables in predicting different aspects of parental childrearing practices. Findings from bivariate and multivariate analyses show that different dimensions of work-related variables examined in this thesis, such as occupational socioeconomic status, work hours and schedules, job satisfaction and employment status, are associated with different aspects of parental behaviors and values. Gender is found to be a very important factor in predicting parental involvement, negative responses and values. In general, these work-related variables explain limited variance of parental child-rearing styles. Based on the findings of the study, implications for academic research on the relationships between parental behaviors and values and working conditions were also discussed in the thesis. / Master of Science

From our earliest history, gifted women from Sappho and Harriet Tubman to Eleanor Roosevelt and Nadine Gordimer have enhanced our lives through their gifts and accomplishments. Since many of these gifted women have succeeded in the face of almost insurmountable obstacles, it is often assumed that all gifted women will be able to achieve without outside help. However, many gifted women do not realize their potential and end up squandering their gifts in menial tasks, underpaid jobs, and unfulfilled lives. Thus, career development for gifted women is an essential task.For women who possess a variety of talents, one of the best ways to be fulfilled is through the balancing of multiple roles, such as family and work. Consequently, one aspect of career development, which is of great importance to gifted women in particular, is the decision about whether to engage in multiple roles and how to do so successfully. Since juggling multiple roles requires prior planning and serious commitment, one of the best ways to assist gifted young women in these tasks is to gain information about how the decision was made and determine their level of commitment to it. As with many career decisions, knowledge about, and encouragement for, particular choices may depend upon mentors and role models.Mentors and role models can be invaluable but their impact in helping with preparation for a lifestyle involving multiple roles is unknown. To determine who their mentors and role models are and how they affect attitudes toward multiple roles, 101 gifted high school women completed a demographics question and the Attitudes Toward Multiple Role Planning scale (ATMRP). Data were analyzed via frequency counts, chisquare, and MANOVA procedures.Contrary to expectations, study participants did not have significantly more role models than they did mentors nor was any one group mentioned most often as mentors and role models. As anticipated, most gifted young women did plan to combine family and paid employment in their lives. However, no significant group differences on the A'TMRP were found between those with mentors and role models and those without. Conclusions and implications are discussed. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

Workplace interventions provide a practical and important means of providing support for employees' work-family needs. However, work-family interventions are rare and are generally not thoroughly evaluated. The current study seeks to better understand the impacts of STAR ("Support. Transform. Achieve. Results."), the large-scale work-family intervention developed and implemented by the Work, Family, & Health Network (see Bray et al., 2013). Drawing on Conservation of Resources theory (Hobfoll, 1989), this study examines supervisors' participation in STAR through assessment of three primary supervisor-specific outcomes: training-related views and behaviors, well-being, and the work-family interface. The sample, consisting of 184 supervisors from 30 extended-care facilities throughout the northeastern United States, comes from archival data that were collected by the Work, Family, & Health Network. Results show a lack of support for STAR intervention effects on supervisor-level outcomes. Despite the lack of statistically significant effects on supervisors, it is important to note the lack of iatrogenic effects, indicating that participation in the STAR intervention did not harm supervisor outcomes. Implications, future directions, and limitations of the study are discussed.

As many Americans move away from the traditional homemaker-breadwinner family model, research on gender and work/family conflict has become increasingly important and the question of gender difference in experiences of work/family conflict continues to be relevant. While there is research that shows women tend to experience significantly greater work/family conflict than men, there are also studies that have shown little or no gender difference, and some that offer evidence that men are reporting more work/family conflict. This study contributes to the debate by examining gender and occupational prestige in regard to working parents' perceptions of work-to-family and family-to-work spillover, with a quantitative analysis of national probability sampled survey data from the General Social Survey's Quality of Working Life Module from the years 2006 and 2010. The findings indicate that fathers are reporting significantly more work/family conflict than mothers, and that higher prestige work is associated with greater work/family conflict, but occupational prestige has a gendered effect with work-to-family spillover and is found to be especially salient for fathers. Overall, this study demonstrates the need for policy-makers and employers to acknowledge men's parenthood. The findings are evidence that there is a need for incentivized paternity leave initiatives in the United States, as well as more universal employee work/life programs that address the barriers to fathers utilizing family-accommodating benefits.

Longitudinal data from 113 dual-career couples are used to explore the relationship between perceptions of marital equity and well-being and distress in marital, professional, and parental roles, how perceptions of equity change over time, and to examine efforts to restore equity. Differences in well-being and distress in roles are identified by gender and equity group. study results indicate that for both spouses, perceptions of inequity are associated with lower marital well-being and higher marital distress; however, under benefited wives reported higher professional well-being and under benefited husbands reported higher parental well-being. Couple perceptions of equity decreased between 1986 and 1990; under benefited husbands were more likely to use threats and bargaining to negotiate for relationship changes while wives sought counseling. Results demonstrate the importance of using multiple measures of well-being and distress and including gender and equity type in investigations of marital equity. / Ph. D.

The purpose of this research is to identify combinations of variables that most affect well-being among employed women. A hypothesized model of the stress and coping process examines the influence of situational demands on mediators, and mediators on well-being. Job and family strain, as well as coping resources such as spousal support, social support, and coping strategies were proposed to mediate between situational demands, represented by husband’s chore time, number of children, job flexibility, job hours, career stage, and job status and the outcome variable, well-being. Data from a national sample of 277 married, employed women representing dual-employed families were subjected to path analytic analyses using LISREL 7. Findings generally supported the proposed model. Results suggest that both role strain and coping resources mediated the stressor effects of situational demands on well-being. / Ph. D.