Work-Life Balance

Two-Earner Families on the Rise

(Moen, 2001)

In 2011married-couple families

with both parents working

= %

(Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2012)

58.5

today, almost two-thirds of mothers of preschoolers, and even more

strikingly, married mothers of children under age 1, are in the work force”

(Moen, 2001, Para. 12).

the proportion of working mothers of young children has more than

quadrupled . . .

“Not only has the number of women in the labor force tripled in the last 40 years,

Time Crunch• “Parents of both sexes are spending

an average of ten or twelve hours less per week with their children than they did in 1960” (“Working family,” 1998).

• “Forty-two percent of working parents are spending less time with their spouses” (“Working family,” 1998).

What is Spillover?

SpilloverHome Work

Stress and conflict at home, including stressful parent-child interactions

• Greater irritability and impatience• Lower energy levels • Impaired attention span• Poor health outcomes• Poor organizational commitment• Poorer job performance• Job dissatisfaction• High rates of staff turnover

(Sanders, Stallman, & McHale, 2011)

SpilloverHome WorkPositive family events and absence of stress and conflict at home

• Improved job performance• Increased job satisfaction

(Sanders, Stallman, & McHale, 2011)

SpilloverHome WorkMore ineffective parenting practices Work-related stress

(Sanders, Stallman, & McHale, 2011)

Work Challenge Level & Parenting

Work Challenge Level, Complexity & Variation

Low High

Parenting Style Harsher discipline

• Greater parental warmth• More responsiveness• Higher quality

explanations provided to children

*Note: Research differences exist by gender of parent and child.*Time urgency at work does not correlate with parenting style.

(Greenberger, O’Neil, & Nagel, 1994)

Manage Work-Home Demands• Reduce personal stress• Improve parent-child relationships• Improve work capacity

(Sanders, Stallman, & McHale, 2011)

References• Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2012). Employment characteristics of families

summary. Retrieved from http://www.bls.gov/news.release/famee.nr0.htm • Greenberger, E., O’Neil, R., & Nagel, S. (1994, November). Linking

workplace and homeplace: Relations between the nature of adults’ work and their parenting behaviors []. Developmental Psychology, 30(6), 990-1002. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.30.6.990

• Moen, P. (2001). The career quandary. Retrieved from http://www.prb.org/Publications/ReportsOnAmerica/2001/TheCareerQuandary.aspx

• Sanders, M. R., Stallman, H. M., & McHale, M. (2011, August). Workplace Triple P: A controlled evaluation of a parent intervention for working parents. Journal of Family Psychology, 25(4), 581-590. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0024148

• Working family value factoids. (1998). Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/livelyhood/workingfamily/familytrends.html