With the contemporary influx of women into the workforce and the resulting prevalence of dual-career families, relocation has become a traumatic family issue. In utilizing primarily the theoretical tenets of family stress theory, the purpose of this study was to examine the influence of family strains, family hardiness, family coherence, and coping response upon the quality of life and marital satisfaction of dual-career couples who did and who did not utilize trailing spouse job assistance in making their most recent relocation. A survey research design was employed which utilized a nation-wide sample of recently relocated dual-career couples (n = 122). T-test statistical analyses were employed to test mean differences while restricted and saturated path analyses were utilized to examine theoretical tenets. Results indicated that there were no significant differences between relocating dual-career couples who did and did not utilize trailing spouse job assistance in their quality of life, marital satisfaction, coping response, hardiness, coherence, and level of vulnerability. Quality of life for dual-career couples who used trailing spouse job assistance in the restricted and saturated path analyses was not predicted by any variable. However, for dual-career couples who did not use trailing spouse job assistance, marital satisfaction was predictive of quality of life in both restricted and saturated causal models and level of vulnerability predicted quality of life in the saturated model. Furthermore, restricted path analyses indicated that for dual-career couples who utilized trailing spouse job assistance, coherence and coping response were predictive of marital satisfaction while for dual-career couples who did not employ trailing spouse job assistance, hardiness was predictive of marital satisfaction. Saturated path analyses for both groups replicated / the findings of the restricted path analyses and in addition, demonstrated that vulnerability was predictive of marital satisfaction. Since these findings suggest that the limited services provided by current trailing spouse job assistance programs may be inadequate, further support in relieving relocation stress and facilitating family coping strategies is recommended. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 53-07, Section: A, page: 2561. / Major Professor: Carol Anderson Darling. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1992.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_76682 |
| Contributors | Robbins, Thomas Dewey., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 222 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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