Overtime and Quality of Working Life in Academics and Nonacademics: The Role of Perceived Work-Life Balance Rita Fontinha University of Reading Simon Easton and Darren Van Laar University of Portsmouth While academic jobs generally provide a good degree of flexibility, academics also tend to work extra hours which can then lead to a poorer work-life balance. In this study, we compare academic versus nonacademic staff and anticipate that academics will generally report a poorer quality of working life, a broad conceptualization of the overall work experience of employees. Second, we investigate whether the negative relationships between being an academic and quality of working life variables are made worse by working extra hours, and moderated by the perception of having a balanced work-life interface. Our sample consisted of 1,474 academic and 1,953 nonacademic staff working for 9 higher education institutions (HEIs) in the United Kingdom. Data were analyzed via structural equation modeling. Results showed that academics tend to report a poorer quality of working life than nonacademics within HEIs, and this is exacerbated by their higher reported number of extra hours worked per week. The work-life balance of employees was found to moderate the negative relationships between academics (vs. nonacademics) in variables such as perceived working conditions and employee commitment. We additionally found curvilinear relationships where employees who worked up to 10 extra hours were more satisfied with their job and career and had more control at work than those who either did not work extra hours or worked for a higher number of extra hours. These results extend previous research and provide new insights on work-life balance among academics and nonacademics, which in turn may be relevant for the well-being practices of HEIs and wider HE policymaking. Keywords: quality of working life, academics, working overtime, work-life balance Academic jobs used to be considered privileged roles associated with relatively low stress levels in a sense that they provided flexibility, autonomy and job security after tenure was achieved. However, this general assumption has been changing over the past 20 years, with increasing productivity demands, not only in terms of research, but also in terms of teaching and administrative activities (Kinman, 2014). This relates to institutional reforms that higher education institutions in many OECD countries have been experiencing, which have led them to a more market-oriented perspective (Whitley & Gläser, 2014). The increased productivity demands have been associated with high reported stress levels among academics (e.g., Catano et al., 2010; Coetzee & Rothmann, 2005; Kinman, Jones, & Kinman, 2006; Tytherleigh, Webb, Coo- per, & Ricketts, 2005; Winefield, Boyd, Saebel, & Pignata, 2008), and there is evidence that academics feel their stress levels are increasing (Kinman & Wray, 2016). High levels of stress, in particul.

1. Overtime and Quality of Working Life in Academics and
Nonacademics:
The Role of Perceived Work-Life Balance
Rita Fontinha
University of Reading
Simon Easton and Darren Van Laar
University of Portsmouth
While academic jobs generally provide a good degree of
flexibility, academics also tend to work extra
hours which can then lead to a poorer work-life balance. In this
study, we compare academic versus
nonacademic staff and anticipate that academics will generally
report a poorer quality of working life, a
broad conceptualization of the overall work experience of
employees. Second, we investigate whether the
negative relationships between being an academic and quality of
working life variables are made worse
by working extra hours, and moderated by the perception of
having a balanced work-life interface. Our
sample consisted of 1,474 academic and 1,953 nonacademic
staff working for 9 higher education
institutions (HEIs) in the United Kingdom. Data were analyzed
via structural equation modeling. Results
showed that academics tend to report a poorer quality of
working life than nonacademics within HEIs,
and this is exacerbated by their higher reported number of extra
hours worked per week. The work-life
balance of employees was found to moderate the negative
relationships between academics (vs.

2. nonacademics) in variables such as perceived working
conditions and employee commitment. We
additionally found curvilinear relationships where employees
who worked up to 10 extra hours were
more satisfied with their job and career and had more control at
work than those who either did not work
extra hours or worked for a higher number of extra hours. These
results extend previous research and
provide new insights on work-life balance among academics and
nonacademics, which in turn may be
relevant for the well-being practices of HEIs and wider HE
policymaking.
Keywords: quality of working life, academics, working
overtime, work-life balance
Academic jobs used to be considered privileged roles associated
with relatively low stress levels in a sense that they provided
flexibility, autonomy and job security after tenure was
achieved.
However, this general assumption has been changing over the
past
20 years, with increasing productivity demands, not only in
terms
of research, but also in terms of teaching and administrative
activities (Kinman, 2014). This relates to institutional reforms
that
higher education institutions in many OECD countries have
been
experiencing, which have led them to a more market-oriented
perspective (Whitley & Gläser, 2014). The increased
productivity
demands have been associated with high reported stress levels
among academics (e.g., Catano et al., 2010; Coetzee &
Rothmann,
2005; Kinman, Jones, & Kinman, 2006; Tytherleigh, Webb,

3. Coo-
per, & Ricketts, 2005; Winefield, Boyd, Saebel, & Pignata,
2008),
and there is evidence that academics feel their stress levels are
increasing (Kinman & Wray, 2016). High levels of stress, in
particular distress (e.g., Le Fevre, Matheny, & Kolt, 2003) are
an
important element within an individual’s overall quality of
work-
ing life. Quality of working life can be defined as the broadest
context in which an employee evaluates their work experience
(Van Laar, Edwards, & Easton, 2007) and comprises multiple
factors. These different factors will be the specific outcome
vari-
ables in this study. We will focus on the quality of working life
of
academics versus nonacademics in nine British universities as
the
overarching outcome in our research model.
First, we anticipate that when compared to nonacademics, aca-
demics would have more demanding jobs because of the
diversity
of tasks and the number and quality of expected outputs of their
work (e.g., Kinman, 2014). For this reason, academics are likely
to
perceive a poorer quality of working life and in particular to
report
higher levels of stress at work (SAW), lower levels of control at
work (CAW), have a less favorable perception of their working
conditions (WCS), have a poorer job and career satisfaction
(JCS),
have lower levels of commitment to the organization (ECO) and
have lower levels of general well-being (GWB).

4. Second, we assess the way in which the reported weekly number
of extra hours worked and individual perceptions about how
their
organization promotes their work-life balance can act as
modera-
tors in the relationship between role (academic vs.
nonacademic)
and SAW, CAW, WCS, JCS, ECO and GWB. In particular, we
assume that a high number of extra hours worked will enhance
the
negative relationship between being an academic (vs. nonaca-
demic) and quality of working life outcomes, whereas perceived
promotion of work-life balance by the higher education
Institution
(HEI) would buffer these negative relationships.
This study has three important contributions for existing re-
search on academics and nonacademics in HEI:
Rita Fontinha, Henley Business School, University of Reading;
Simon
Easton and Darren Van Laar, Department of Psychology,
University of
Portsmouth.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to
Rita
Fontinha, Henley Business School, University of Reading,
Whiteknights,
Reading, UK RG6 6UD. E-mail: [email protected]
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9. y.
International Journal of Stress Management © 2019 American
Psychological Association
2019, Vol. 26, No. 2, 173–183 1072-5245/19/$12.00
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/str0000067
173
mailto:[email protected]
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/str0000067
(a) Previous research has compared academics with nonacadem-
ics in relation to a number of areas: stress, commitment to and
from the organization, physical health, psychological health
(Tytherleigh et al., 2005), psychological strain and job
satisfaction
(Winefield et al., 2003). We now aim to extend this body of
research by considering a different overarching measure -that of
quality of working life.
–(b) There is an important body of research on working extra
hours (e.g., Coetzee & Rothmann, 2005; Court, 1996; Kinman et
al., 2006; Kinman & Wray, 2013) and on work-life balance
(e.g.,
Currie & Eveline, 2011; Doherty & Manfredi, 2006; Kinman &
Jones, 2008; Noor, 2011; Pillay & Abhayawansa, 2014; Pillay,
Kluvers, Abhayawansa, & Vranic, 2013) among academics.
How-
ever, we are among the first to consider the way these two
variables might interact with role (academic vs. nonacademic)
in
its relationship with the different factors within quality of
working
life. This is of particular relevance as it allows us to explore

10. different patterns of role and working extra hours, and role and
work-life balance, providing a more thorough analysis of the
antecedents of various factors affecting quality of working life.
This represents the second major contribution of our paper.
(c) The third and last contribution of this study relates to the
exploration of the role of working extra hours on the different
factors within quality of working life. In particular, we test
curvi-
linear relationships between number of extra hours worked per
week and JCS, WCS, CAW, absence of SAW, ECO and GWB in
order to explain unexpected direct relationships found in our
structural model.
Academics’ Versus Nonacademics’ Quality of
Working Life
The broadest context in which a person evaluates or considers
their personal situation has been termed their Quality of Life
(Felce & Perry, 1995). Thus, the quality of working life of an
individual can be conceived of as the broadest context in which
an
employee evaluates their work experience (Elizur & Shye,
1990).
While early conceptualizations of quality of working life sought
to
identify global definitions and create all-encompassing models,
Taylor, Cooper, and Mumford (1979) were among the first to
suggest that quality of working life might vary between
organiza-
tions and employee groups. It was perhaps because researchers
sought to understand quality of working life in various
professions,
countries and cultures that an ever-growing list of possible sub-
factors were identified (Van Laar et al., 2007).

11. The development of models of quality of working life has led to
focused research on factors specific to each theory, but other
researchers have continued to explore the broader concepts of
quality of working life in the applied setting, exploring more
complex relationships between selected factors, mediators and
outcomes (e.g., work by Denvir, Hillage, Cox, Sinclair, & Pear-
main, 2008). A measure of quality of working life used in more
than 30 countries, the ‘Work-Related Quality of Life Scale’
(WRQoL), was used in the present study (Easton & Van Laar,
2012; Fontinha, Van Laar, & Easton, 2016). This scale contains
six
factors: individual’s perceptions of whether their organization
pro-
vides them with a balanced home-work interface (HWI)—this
will
be an independent variable in our model named work-life
balance;
perceptions about the physical working conditions available
(WCS); job and career satisfaction (JCS); perceptions regarding
the level of control over decision making at work (CAW); levels
of
stress, or its absence, at work (SAW); and general well-being
(GWB). A seventh factor, which assesses level of employee
com-
mitment to the organization (ECO) has been used in ongoing
research and development of the WRQoL Scale, and is also used
here (Fontinha et al., 2016). We focus on these dimensions, the
dependent variables in our model, in order to characterize the
quality of working life of academics and nonacademics working
in
nine HEIs in the United Kingdom.
Numerous studies have reported that academics consider their
work stressful (e.g., Catano et al., 2010; Coetzee & Rothmann,
2005; Kinman et al., 2006; Tytherleigh et al., 2005; Winefield

12. et
al., 2008), and there is evidence that they feel stress levels are
increasing (Kinman & Wray, 2016) in association with changes
in
the University sector (Whitley & Gläser, 2014). This increase in
reported stress appears to be associated with reported distress at
levels which exceed many other occupational groups (Edwards,
Van Laar, Easton, & Kinman, 2009; Winefield et al., 2008).
These
high stress levels among academics may be a response to
different
work-related aspects, as suggested by the Job Demands-
Resources
(JD-R) model (Demerouti, Bakker, Nachreiner, & Schaufeli,
2001). The JD-R model posits that work overload, among other
factors, can adversely affect physical and psychological well-
being, whereas sense of control at work and social support
enhance
productivity [by way of improved motivation, according to
Schaufeli and Taris (2014)]. We follow the same rationale in
this
study, conceptualizing stress as a response to specific work-
related
stimuli (demands). However, we go further by considering
multi-
ple factors that compose one’s quality of working life as
outcomes
(stress being one factor within quality of working life).
A substantial increase in the number of nonacademic staff
employed by universities across the world has been recently re-
ported (Larkins, 2014). There has been little attention paid to
the
working experience of nonacademic staff (Johnsrud, 2002), but
there do appear to be differences between the two staff groups
as

13. regards experience of working in the university sector, as
indicated for example in an Australian study wherein 74% of
nonacademic staff reported overall job satisfaction, but only
61% of academic staff reported overall job satisfaction (Wine-
field et al., 2003). UK academic staff surveys have also increas-
ingly reported increases in teaching loads and fears concerning
job security alongside reductions in job satisfaction for academ-
ics (Metcalf, Rolfe, Stevens, & Weale, 2005; Tytherleigh et al.,
2005). UK academics have high levels of perceived control at
work, but these have been progressively decreasing (Kinman &
Wray, 2016).
These findings suggest that academics generally have a much
lower perceived quality of working life compared to
nonacadem-
ics. Accordingly, we hypothesize,
H1: Academics perceive a poorer quality of working life in
terms of WCS, JCS, CAW, SAW, ECO and GWB, when
compared to nonacademics.
Working Extra Hours and Work-Life Balance in
Higher Education
Kinman (2014) suggested that the work of academics has, over
the last 20 years, become more demanding as student numbers
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of
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pu
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is
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16. tic
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174 FONTINHA, EASTON, AND VAN LAAR

18. have increased and academics are expected to excel at teaching
as
well as research. Furthermore, data from the Annual Survey of
Hours and Earnings provides evidence that teaching and
education
professionals in schools, colleges and universities do extra
unpaid
work each week, more than any other group of professionals
(Statistical Bulletin, 2013). Kinman and Wray (2013) have re-
ported that over a third of UK academics surveyed stated that
they
regularly work more than 10 hours in addition to their contract
per
week, which has been linked to adverse consequences in
relation
to physical and psychological well-being (Doyle & Hind, 1998;
Gillespie, Walsh, Winefield, & Stough, 2001; Kinman & Jones,
2004).
Fein and Skinner (2015) concluded from a survey of 1042
full-time workers in Australia that work-life conflict as a result
of
working long hours tended to adversely affect health outcomes.
A
study of more than 2,500 academic staff using work diaries re-
vealed an average working week of almost 55 hours during term
time (Court, 1996) and a subsequent report by Kinman (1998)
stated that almost three-quarters of academics indicated that
work-
ing during evenings and weekends was commonplace. Long
work-
ing hours have been linked to psychological and physical ill-
health, and that association appears to be greater where the

19. average
working week regularly exceeds 48 hours and the individual
perceives little job control (Sparks, Cooper, Fried, & Shirom,
1997). In the HE context, Kinman (1998) reported that
academics
who said they worked over 50 hours per week, or who took
work
home on a regular basis, tended to score more poorly on assess-
ments of psychological well-being. More recent data shows that
more than three-quarters of academics employed on a full-time
contract (typically 37.5 hours) worked over 40 hours a week,
and
more than one-third in excess of 50 hours a week (Kinman &
Wray, 2016). These results lead us to anticipate that while aca-
demics would normally report a poorer quality of working life
than
their nonacademic counterparts, this relationship may be
exacer-
bated by a high number of extra hours worked per week. Thus,
we
hypothesize,
H2: A higher number of extra working hours increases the
negative relationship between being an academic (vs. a non-
academic) and elements of quality of working life (WCS, JCS,
CAW, SAW, ECO and GWB).
Work-life balance can be defined as the individual perception
that work and nonwork activities are compatible and promote
growth in accordance with an individual’s current life priorities
(Kalliath & Brough, 2008). Various studies have reported that
balancing of work and home can be difficult for academics
(Nete-
meyer, Boles, & McMurrian, 1996; Winefield, Boyd, &
Winefield,
2014), particularly due to time-based conflict (time spent

20. working
at the expense of time devoted to family/leisure activities) and
strain-based conflict (job-related strain leads to irritability and
social withdrawal). Menzies and Newson (2007) highlight the
potentially adverse influence of the increase in working from
home, and others, including Boswell and Olson-Buchanan
(2007)
and Araújo (2008), have suggested that it is the blurring of
bound-
aries between work and home rather than working from home
per
se that can be the cause of difficulty, although there is evidence
that a sense of control over working patterns among academics
can
be helpful (Kinman & Jones, 2004).
Siegrist (1996) has proposed in the effort-reward imbalance
(ERI) model that the experience of imbalance will be more fre-
quent and more damaging in employees who are excessively
committed to work, where overcommitment is defined as
attitudes,
behaviors and emotions that reflect a strong desire for approval
and esteem which can lead to working excessively (Siegrist,
2001).
The ERI model was empirically tested by Kinman and Jones
(2008), who showed that effort-reward imbalance is particularly
damaging for the work-life balance of university workers, who
cope with work demands by overcommitting and working addi-
tional hours over and above their contract. High levels of over-
commitment in academics have been found in a culture where
working long hours and a relatively poor work-life balance can
be
more widely accepted (Hogan, Hogan, Hodgins, Kinman, &
Bun-
ting, 2014). While enjoyment of and commitment to work can
have health benefits and enhance career success (Kelloway, In-

21. ness, Barling, Francis, & Turner, 2010), overcommitment has
been
reported to increase risk of stress (Avanzi, van Dick, Fraccaroli,
&
Sarchielli, 2012; Kinman & Wray, 2016). Furthermore,
Greenhaus
and Beutell’s (1985) suggested that role pressures from work
and
family settings can be mutually incompatible to a greater or
lesser
degree, as workers perceive they have too little time for work
and
family commitments, and as they may experience stress, exhaus-
tion and fatigue which adversely affect their psychological and
physical well-being (Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985).
Hobfoll (1989) suggested that employees experience stress
when there is actual or threatened loss of valued resources.
Thus,
a balanced work-family interface (also referred to as work-life
balance or home-work interface) has been identified as such a
positive resource for individuals and therefore associated with
an
amelioration or absence of stress (Chiang, Birtch, & Kwan,
2010).
Most studies on the outcomes of a balanced work-life interface
aim
to understand its implications on stress. In this study we aim to
extend this body of research and consider the way the organiza-
tional context facilitates work-life balance as a relevant
resource
that academics can utilize to buffer the negative effects of
exces-
sive demands of their roles on their quality of working lives
(including, but not limited to stress). In particular, we
hypothesize,

22. H3: The negative relationship between being an academic (vs.
nonacademic) and elements of quality of working life (WCS,
JCS, CAW, SAW, ECO and GWB) is moderated by one’s
perception of an organizational context facilitating work-life
balance.
Figure 1 presents a model with all hypothetical relationships
tested, acknowledging the role of four control variables: age,
gender, tenure and contract type (permanent vs. temporary).
Method
Data Collection and Participants
We contacted a large number of higher education institutions
(HEI) in the UK, asking them to participate in our study. The
data
from nine British HEIs were employed in this study, three from
the
top third, three from the middle third and three from the bottom
third of UK university league tables (The Complete University
Guide, 2017; The Guardian, 2017). The average position in the
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25. is
in
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175OVERTIME AND QUALITY OF WORKING LIFE IN
ACADEMICS

27. ranking was calculated considering the two sources of league
tables at the time of data collection (2007–2009). All nine
human
resources departments e-mailed all their employees our request
to
participate in this study and the link to our Web-based question-
naire. This resulted in a total of 3,771 responses with an
average
response rate of 32.54%. We deleted all cases with missing data
on
the variables that we were analyzing, which resulted in a total
of
3427 usable cases. The total number of academics in our sample
was 1,474 (43%) and the total number of nonacademics was
1,953
(57%). According to data from the Higher Education Statistics
Agency (HESA, 2016), this proportion of academics and
nonaca-
demics is consistent with the national average proportion for the
year of data collection, 2007: 46.97% for academics and 53.03%
for nonacademics. Nonacademics predominantly performed
computer-based support tasks. A detailed description of our
sam-
ple based on gender, age, tenure (representing the number of
years
working for their current higher education institution), number
of
extra hours worked per week, contractual time (full-time, part-
time, part-time hourly paid, or no fixed hours) and contract type
(temporary vs. permanent) is presented on Table 1.
We conducted one-way ANOVAs with post hoc Bonferroni
tests in order to investigate whether there were significant
differ-
ences between the core characteristics of academics and nonaca-

28. demics in the nine different HEIs studied. We compared all
HEIs
based on the main variables in our study and the most relevant
result was that no significant differences were found between
the
nine HEIs regarding the number of extra hours that academics
work per week (F � 1.94; p � .05). However, nonacademics
working for higher-ranked universities worked for more hours
than
their counterparts that worked for lower-ranked universities (F
�
14.77; p � .001).
Measures
All outcome variables in our hypothesized model, as well as
work-life balance were measured with Easton and Van Laar’s
(2012) WRQoL1 (Work-related Quality of Life) Scale. The
WRQoL1 Scale has been used in a wide range of settings and
organizations across the world and has been translated into
various
languages (e.g., Blanch, Sahagún, Cantera, & Cervantes, 2010;
Easton & Van Laar, 2013; Vagharseyyedin, Vanaki, & Moham-
madi, 2011). Three items representing employees’ commitment
to
the organization were added to the scale and validated in a
recent
study (Fontinha et al., 2016). We used this updated 26-item
version
of the scale in this study. This scale comprises seven factors:
working conditions (WCS), job and career satisfaction (JCS),
control at work (CAW), employee commitment (ECO), (absence
of) stress at work (SAW), general well-being (GWB), and home-
work interface (HWI). For the purpose of consistency with
previ-

29. ous literature and a clearer understanding of the meaning of the
HWI factor, we have decided to address it as work-life balance
in
this study. All items are scored on a 5-point Likert scale from 1
(Strongly disagree) to 5 (Strongly agree) A detailed description
of
each factor is presented below.
Work-life balance. This construct was measured using the
three HWI items of the WRQoL1 Scale (Easton & Van Laar,
2012;
Fontinha et al., 2016) and refers to the perceived context
provided
by the organization to have a balance between work and
personal
life. This factor has a subscale reliability of � � .85 in these
data
and picks up on the importance of balancing home and work
demands (Dorsey, Jarjoura, & Rutecki, 2003). One example
item
is “My current working hours/patterns suit my personal circum-
stances.”
Working conditions (WCS). This construct assesses the ex-
tent to which someone is satisfied with their physical working
Figure 1. Relationships between role and quality of working life
factors
and interaction effects with additional working hours and work-
life bal-
ance. Notes for Figure 1: Observed variables represented in a
rectangle;
Latent variables represented in an ellipse; � represents
interaction effects
between two variables; for ease of presentation the regression
paths be-

30. tween all observed variables and all latent variables are
represented by the
large central arrow.
Table 1
Sample Characteristics
Nonacademics Academics
Gender:
Male 606 710
Female 1,347 764
Age (Years):
Under 25 107 20
25–44 1,016 741
45–59 731 614
60 or over 99 99
Tenure (Years):
Less than 1 252 141
1 to 2 735 536
3 to 5 392 295
6 to 10 391 342
11 to 20 178 149
More than 20 5 11
Number of extra-hours:
None 536 114
5 or less 794 365
6 to 10 431 509
11 to 20 161 349
More than 20 31 137
Time:
Full time 331 182

31. Part time 1,540 1,254
Part time hourly paid 80 34
No fixed hours 2 4
Contract type:
Temporary 266 470
Permanent 1,687 1,004
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33. d
pu
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is
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.
T
hi
s
ar
tic
le
is
in
te
nd
ed
so
le
ly
fo
r
th

34. e
pe
rs
on
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us
e
of
th
e
in
di
vi
du
al
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35. di
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in
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br
oa
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176 FONTINHA, EASTON, AND VAN LAAR
environment. Reliability for this subscale was � � .79 and an
example item is: “I work in a safe environment.”
Job and career satisfaction (JCS). This construct was mea-
sured with five items, with a subscale reliability of � � .84 and
includes questions relating to satisfaction with job and career
aspects, such as “I am satisfied with the career opportunities
available for me here.” The job and career satisfaction (JCS)
factor
seeks to measure the level to which a respondent feels their
workplace provides sense of achievement, high self-esteem and
fulfilment of potential.
Control at work (CAW). This construct refers to the sense of
control over decision-making at work, which can reflect the op-
portunities of voice and participation in decision making and

36. has
implications for health and well-being (Spector, 2002). This
factor
was measured using three items with a subscale reliability of �
�
.86, and an example item is “I am involved in decisions that
affect
me in my own area of work.”
Stress at work (SAW). This factor assesses the extent to
which an individual perceives they are subject to excessive
pres-
sure or experience of SAW. This construct was measured with
four
items, an example being “I often feel under pressure at work.”
The
items were reversed, meaning that for this construct is presented
in
this paper as the Absence of SAW. Subscale reliability of this
factor was � � .84.
General well-being (GWB). This factor assesses an individ-
ual’s sense of psychological well-being and general physical
health. This factor has a subscale reliability of .85 based on six
items. An example of an item is: “I feel well at the moment.”
Other variables. Our hypothesized research model also in-
cluded the variables: role and additional working hours. Role
was
operationalized as a dichotomous variable where 1 represented
academics and 0 represented nonacademic staff working in HEI.
Additional working hours per week were self-reported and mea-
sured with a categorical variable where 1 � none; 2 � five or
less;
3 � six to 10; 4 � 11 to 20; and 5 � more than 20. Age, gender,
tenure (years at organization) and contract type (1 � permanent;

37. 2 � temporary) were added in our model as control variables.
Data Analysis
Data were analyzed via structural equation modeling (SEM)
with v22 of the IBM® SPSS® Amos™ software (Arbuckle,
2012).
We performed our analyses using a two-step approach as recom-
mended by Anderson and Gerbing (1988). First, we tested five
competitive measurement models in order to verify the most
appropriate factorial structure for our variables with this data.
Our
hypothesized measurement model (HMM) contained the confir-
matory factor analysis of the 7 factors previously studied for
Quality of working life (HWI—work-life balance, WCS, JCS,
CAW, absence of SAW, ECO, and GWB), (Fontinha et al.,
2016),
role (academic vs. nonacademic), number of extra hours worked
per week, as well as age, gender, contract type (permanent vs.
temporary), and tenure as control variables.
The HMM was compared with four alternative models via
chi-squared difference tests. The first alternative measurement
model (AMM1) had a single factor where all items within the
quality of working life scale loaded, as well as all remaining
observable variables. The second alternative measurement
model
(AMM2) had two factors: all items within the WRQoL1 Scale
loaded on one and all remaining observable variables loaded on
the
other. The third alternative measurement model (AMM3) had all
non-WRQoL1 observable variables set out to be independent
(i.e.,
not loading in any factor) and all items within quality of
working

38. life loading on one factor. The fourth alternative measurement
model (AMM4) had all observable variables set out to be inde-
pendent and items from WRQoL1 loading on three factors: this
three factor structure was inspired by previous research
(Fontinha,
Van Laar, & Easton, 2016), which probed a model where items
form HWI, WCS, JCS and CAW were antecedents (first factor),
items …
53A Qualitative Study on Work-Life Balance of Software
Professionals© 2017 IUP. All Rights Reserved.
A Qualitative Study on Work-Life Balance
of Software Professionals
Rajni Gyanchandani*
* Assistant Professor, Sinhgad Institute of Management and
Computer Application, Narhe, Pune 411041,
Maharashtra, India. E-mail: [email protected]
Work-life balance is characterized by a condition of balance in
which the demands
of both a man's occupation and individual life are equivalent. It
involves contributing
equivalent measures of time and vitality between work and
individual life. The
transformation of information and communication technologies
and its usage has
affected individuals work and family lives positively or
negatively. The objective of

39. this study is to explore the work-life balance among select
employees (N=30). The
study employs thematic analysis through six themes: social
need, personal need,
time management, team work, compensation and benefits, and
work. The outcomes
suggests that many employees relinquish their own time keeping
in mind the end
goal to strike a balance between work and life. Employees,
particularly women, have
a great deal of role clash as moms and other family members.
Men nowadays need
to take up family duties. A considerable measure of adapting
procedures that the
workers used have been talked about in the present study.
Introduction
The conventional wisdom indicates that employees will never
feel truly satisfied with work
until they are satisfied with life. But in this new age it seems
that organizations have
failed to comprehend that work-life balance is an important
aspect for the individual as
well as for the organization. The survival of any enterprise

40. today is not only dependent
on its own ability to innovate and systemize its activities but
also on the happy workers
and it can be achieved by maintaining the balance between work
and personal life. So
the biggest challenge for human resource professionals is
recruiting, training and retaining
the people by keeping in mind the cost involved in all and this
it is very important that
organizations cultivate the culture that provides for balance
between the professional and
non-professional life of employees. Work-life balance is the
term used to describe those
practices at workplace that acknowledge and aim to support the
needs of employees
in achieving a balance between the demands of their family life
and work lives (Agarwal,
The IUP Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. XVI, No. 4,
201754
2009). According to Kofodimos (1993), work-life balance
alludes to “a fulfilling, sound,
and beneficial life that incorporates work, play and love”. Work
culture ought to provide

41. great environment to an individual and his/her family. Thus, the
work-life balance is about
overseeing internal pressure from one’s own particular cravings
and setting sensible
objectives which do not impinge on family commitments. Work-
life balance can be defined
as a state of equilibrium in which sufficient amount of time
should be given to personal/
family interests and organizational interests. Those who achieve
this balance tend to
achieve higher level of job satisfaction, organizational
commitment, as well as lower level
of stress and turnover. In sum, proof proposes a work technique
of “running yourself worn
out” which has costs both for meeting performance objectives
and be pleased about life;
the employee and the organization gain most when specialists
experience extraordinary
equivalence between what they do on and off the clock.
Literature Review
The paper explores the work-life balance among select
employees explaining thematic
analysis through six themes: social need, personal need, time

42. management, team work,
compensation and benefits, and work.
Work/Life Balance Defined and Explored
Work-life balance is a challenging issue for the organizations
and has attracted the
attention of many researchers. Work-life balance was initially
utilized in the 1970s to
describe the balance between an individual’s work and personal
life (Newman and
Mathews, 1999). Work-family conflict is characterized by the
incongruence between
obligations at home and workplace, which are observed to be
commonly inconsistent
(Greenhaus and Beutell, 1985). Work ought to give great
environment to an individual
and his family. Hence, work-life balance is about managing
internal pressure from one’s
own desires and setting reasonable objectives which do not
perpetrate on family
obligations. The absence of inadmissible level of contentions
among work and non-work
demands may bring about lower organizational performance.
Work-life balance is described as the sum of practices of

43. individuals who control and
oversee both life and career with accomplishment and
fulfillment. It is the term used to
describe those practices at workplace that recognize and intend
to support the efforts
of employees in accomplishing a balance between demands of
their family and work-
life. Work-life balance implies conforming the pattern of work
so that the employee can
benefit from a better fit between their work and zones of their
own life and in the long
run would accomplish feasible improvement and profitability.
Theories of Work-Life Balance
A great deal of speculation has been encircled on work-life
balance which have been bound
as a singular outline work not recognized all around (Pitt-
Catsouphes et al., 2006).
55A Qualitative Study on Work-Life Balance of Software
Professionals
A few frameworks on work-life balance incorporate spillover,
segmentation, compensation,
congruence, enrichment, inter role conflict, border and

44. boundary theory (Zedeck and
Mosier, 1990; Frone et al., 1992; Clark, 2000; Edwards and
Rothbard, 2000; Frone, 2003;
and Greenhaus and Powell, 2006). The theories which are
prominent in work-life balance
are as follows:
• Spillover Theory: Spill-over is a process whereby experiences
in one role affect
experiences in the other, rendering the roles more alike.
Research has
examined the spill-over of mood, values, skills and behaviors
from one role to
another (Edwards and Rothbard, 2000). A considerable research
work has been
done on spillover theory (Zedeck and Mosier, 1990).
Researchers have quite
a while ago perceived that work and family are most certainly
not ‘isolate
circles’, yet are related areas or parts with ‘permeable’ limits
(Kanter, 1977;
and Pleck, 1977). Spillover can be both positive or negative and
if an employee
is feeling stressed in one domain, he/she may feel dissatisfied
with other domain

45. also. On the other hand, positive spillover is when the employee
is satisfied
with one domain of his life either work or family, he will feel
satisfied and happy
with the other domain as well. This theory supports work-life
balance theory
taking into account that distressing occasions and issues in one
space has
an impact on how workers see their fulfillment in the other
space.
• Segmentation Theory: Work and family were considered two
separate areas
and independent of each other (Edwards and Rothbard, 2000).
Segmentation
theory has been used to define that work and life are two
different areas and
do not impact each other. This theory has been used for the
study as it states
that if employee wants to feel satisfied, he can maintain the
balance between
work and personal life by disconnecting himself with one of the
domains, i.e.,
either work or family.

46. • Compensation Theory: It considered work and family to have
a place with
two different spaces and the negative experience of one space
could be repaid
with the positive experience of other space. In other words,
work and family
display alter relationship (Clark, 2000).
• Congruence Theory: According to this theory, additional
factors such as
knowledge, identity, hereditary compel or level of education
could positively impact
both work and family domains evenly, however they are not
identified with work
and family influence (Zedeck, 1992; and Edwards and Rothbard,
2000).
• Inter-Role Conflict Theory: It implies that taking care of a
demand in one
area (work) makes it hard to meet the demands in other space
(family)
(Greenhaus and Beutell, 1985). For instance, role conflict arises
when an
employee has to do overtime due to work pressure and at the
same time faces
family pressure to come home.

47. The IUP Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. XVI, No. 4,
201756
• Enrichment Theory: Enrichment theory refers to how
encounters from
instrumental sources (aptitudes, capacities, and values) or
affective sources
(inclination, fulfillment) improve the nature of the other area
(Morris and Madsen,
2007).
• Work Family Border Theory: Work-family border theory is
devoted only to
work and family domains. The result of enthusiasm in this
theory is work-family
balance, which refers to satisfaction and good functioning at
work and at home,
with a minimum of role conflict (Clark, 2000).
• Boundary Theory: Boundary theory is a general cognitive
theory of social
classification (Zerubavel, 1991) which concentrates on results,
for example, the
implications individuals allot to home and work and the
straightforwardness and

48. recurrence of transitioning between roles (Ashforth et al.,
2000). Boundary and
border theory connected to a scope of work family themes like
adaptable
calendars working with family and so on. This theory lead to
further analysis of
nature of borders, their permeability, the ease with which they
can manage and
move on. In the analysis of work-life balance, the analysis of
borders can help
to decide how far an individual can control issues determining
work-life balance.
According to Tomazevic et al. (2014) the meaning of work-life
balance is to adequately
combine professional life with personal commitments and make
a concordance between
these two viewpoints. It can be characterized as the
nonappearance of contention among
organizational and individual life.
Kumar and Khyser Mohd (2014) emphasize that work-life
balance is about individuals
having a measure of control over when, where and how they
work. The authors identified

49. two main variables, time and stress. The manager should be able
to distinguish issue,
and discover an answer with cooperation of others. Organization
must incorporate
work-life balance as a HR approach. The investigation primarily
concentrates on the
results of imbalanced work-life confronted in the everyday life
and the role of the
organization in accomplishing work-life balance.
Felicity Asiedu-Appiah (2013) study presumed that work-life
balance is critical in
improving employee performance at work and home. The
authors identified that gender
difference exists in work-life balance needs since work and non-
work duties are different
for men and women. Same study demonstrated that women
exhibited greater necessity
for work-life balance when compared with men. An individual
derives satisfaction in life
from work and family domains.
According to Lingard et al. (2012) work-life strategies present
the importance of the
issues of creating positive feelings among employees, directing
work-life balance and

50. adaptation of participants. Communication channels should
function very well and the
cultural conditions of the country where the organization is
located, should be taken into
57A Qualitative Study on Work-Life Balance of Software
Professionals
account to realize work-life strategies and applications used in
organizations (Lingard
et al. 2012). Kalliath and Brough (2008) found that “work-life
balance is the individual
discernment that works and non-work exercises are perfect and
advance development
as per an individual’s present life priorities”.
Jang (2009) examined the relationship between work-life
balance and the well-being
of working parents. The objective of this study was to identify
how working parents cope
with the demands of work and life. The study considered 27
parents with either ill or
disabled children in New Jersey. The author used both
qualitative and quantitative
techniques. The outcome discussed the impact of formal and

51. casual work environments
in improving the wellbeing of employees with kids in general
and those with a sick or
handicapped child in particular.
Reddy et al. (2010) researched work-life balance among married
women employees.
The study took various factors into consideration that lead to
work-family conflict and
family-work conflict among married women employees. Work-
family conflict and family-
work conflict surveys were conducted on 90 married working
ladies aged between 20 to
50 years. The discoveries of the review underscored the need
for mediation by the
management of work-family conflicts at organizational level as
these affect occupational
satisfaction and employee performance.
Margo et al. (2008) carried out in-depth interviews of 18
teleworking mothers working
in a Canadian financial corporation. The questions asked were
related to their work,
leisure, and their perception of work-life balance. The outcome
of their study suggested

52. that the mothers’ viewed teleworking positively because of the
flexible schedule that can
go with the rhythm of their children’s school and holiday.
Matjasko and Feldmen (2006) investigated how intrinsic work
motivation, work hours,
and taking time for oneself influenced the interplay between the
emotional climates of
work and home. The authors examined day-to-day emotional
transmission between work
and home (spillover) for 143 families using the experience
sampling method and interview
data from the Sloan Center’s 500 family study. They focused on
getting work home in
expanded natural setting and help the workers in devoting time
for themselves in the midst
of everyday demands between work and home. Confirmations
from the review demonstrate
how bringing back work home can influence mothers’
satisfaction, tension and fathers’
nervousness. Among fathers there is an increased intrinsic work
motivation and a more
prominent general tension at home. The ramifications of the
review suggested women’s
efficiency and wellbeing in two working-parents families.

53. Objective
• To understand the theory of work-life balance;
• To gain knowledge about how workers manage balance
between work and
individual commitments and roles;
The IUP Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. XVI, No. 4,
201758
• To comprehend the work-related issues and difficulties
confronted by the
employees; and
• To comprehend the family-related issues and difficulties
confronted by the
employees.
Data and Methodology
The study was conducted on software professionals working in
Pune. A conceptual
framework based on a model of Pareek and Purohit (2010)
connecting work and personal
life reflects the questions and provides a broad architecture for
the literature review and

54. a thematic framework for an aspect of the data analysis. The
elements of the study include
features such as a measure of work/life balance like social need,
personal need, time
management, team work, compensation and benefits, and work
to underpin the analysis
of work/life balance of software professionals.
A semi-structured interview schedule was developed by the
author to study the work-
life adjustment of the members and how function, family and
self-related issues are
interconnected in empowering them to adjust between
individual and professional
responsibilities and duties. It was administrated to 30
employees working in IT companies
in HR and specialized employments. The study used qualitative
techniques, which helped
the author in gaining deeper insight into participants’
experiences. The study investigates
the gender differences and contrasts the variables studied in the
study. A number of past
studies have also utilized phenomenological gender and work-
life balance to study the
phenomenon of work-life balance by exploring the lived

55. experiences of women (Lewis,
2003; Millward, 2006; and Woodward, 2007).
The author developed semi-structure interview schedule and
used it to understand the
inside and outside of the work-life adjustment difficulties,
issues and adapting procedures
utilized by the employees. These questions helped the author in
comprehending the work-
life-balance which is generally inaccessible in quantitative
information and furthermore to
comprehend their coping strategies. The questionnaire (see
Appendix) consists of 19
open-ended questions which are divided into six categories:
• Social Need
• Personal Need
• Time Management
• Team Work
• Compensation and Benefits
• Work
Based on the scale developed by Pareek and Purohit (2010), the
author arrived at

56. the above six categories for measuring work-life balance.
59A Qualitative Study on Work-Life Balance of Software
Professionals
• The selection technique used was purposive sampling. The
sample for the
quantitative analysis consisted of 30 employees from IT
companies. The sample
selected was a conscious choice comprising of dynamic women
employees
with family duties. For this review, face-to-face semi-organized
interviews were
conducted. Every member was given the option to withdraw
from the study at
any time. Only employees working in the IT sector were
selected for the study.
IT sector has been chosen because it is the technology which
made it possible
to be in constant touch with employees both during the day and
at night. To
a large extent in the IT sector, an employee is expected to be
engaged on the
job almost at all times and it creates work-life imbalance. In the
IT sector five

57. companies had been selected for the study.
• Employees with working spouses (full-time) were selected for
the study. This
is because Women’s Liberation Development was an impetus to
enable women
continuing a profession while having a family. These changes
have posed new
difficulties for families such as the division of tasks at home
and child care.
Now mother and father both are equally responsible and this
created author's
interest in selecting employees with working spouses for the
study.
• Employees with at least one child were selected for the study.
The reason
behind this selection is that the individual’s participation inside
the work
constraints has expanded as both parents are working. So the
author decided
to identify employees who have children and are working to
ascertain their
experiences of work-life balance.
Results and Discussion

58. Thematic Analysis was utilized in the current study: The
information obtained in the
present study was dissected by arranging the items/questions in
the semi-structured
interview into themes and the reactions of the members was
dissected under those topics.
This area of the study talks about the subjective results obtained
from the semi-structured
interview which was conducted on 30 employees working in the
IT sector. The analysis
was done by using thematic analysis as qualitative approaches
are extraordinarily
different, complex and nuanced (Holloway and Todres, 2003)
and thematic analysis ought
to be viewed as a foundational strategy for qualitative analysis,
and also identified that
‘thematizing meanings’ as one of a few shared nonspecific
abilities crosswise over
qualitative analysis. For this reason, Boyatzis (1998) describes
it not as a particular
strategy but rather as a device to use crosswise over various
strategies. Similarly, Ryan
and Bernard (2000) find thematic coding as a procedure
performed inside ‘major’

59. systematic conventions, (for example, grounded hypothesis), as
opposed to a particular
approach in its own privilege. We contend thematic analysis
should be viewed as a
strategy in its own particular right. From the answers obtained
from the participants
following results have been revealed:
The IUP Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. XVI, No. 4,
201760
• Social Need: Social needs include love, belonging, acceptance
and safety.
Satisfaction of these needs is important in order to feel
supported and accepted.
Having one’s social needs met also helps prevent problems such
as loneliness,
depression and anxiety. When a person develops an emotional
connection with
other people, he/she can more easily cope with depressing
situations and can
find strength through interacting with other people. When
participants were
asked about fluffing their social needs they report that they are

60. not able to
maintain connections with others such as friends, family and
team members.
But fulfillment of this need is very important in order to avoid
problems such
as anxiety, depression or loneliness as we all need to feel
accepted and
supported by others.
A few of the reactions by the employees related to the social
needs are:
• I find it difficult to take leave at the time of social
emergencies.
• I do not find enough time to spend with my friends.
• I find it difficult to attend and enjoy the parties.
• Personal Need: The personal need of the employee is related
to the need of
spending time with family, time for personal interest and so on.
When
respondents were asked about the challenges they face to fulfill
the personal
need, few men reported that their working wives were not happy
with the time
they spent on household task. The other challenges which were

61. reported by
employees were getting children ready for school before office,
not able to spend
time with children, and inability to listen to children’s stories
about their school,
friends and teachers, and travel to school. A few of them also
said that meeting
teacher or going for parent-teacher meeting is also a challenging
task for them
and also they do not find time for themselves which they want
to utilize for
their hobbies, recreation, health, me-time and so on.
A few of the reactions by the employees related to the personal
needs are:
• I am not able to give time for my personal interest as it is
difficult to maintain
the balance between role of an employee and a parent.
• I do not find me-time.
• Time Management: On being approached about what they
accomplish during
their ‘personal time’, the employees complain that they do not
have time for
themselves by any means. They say that they need to do a great

62. deal for their
wellness and leisure activities for which they do not find time
by any stretch
of the imagination.
A few of the reactions by the employees related to time
management are:
• I do not get time for my sick partner/child/parent.
61A Qualitative Study on Work-Life Balance of Software
Professionals
• Organization emphasizes on time more than on task and it
creates problem
in managing time.
• I cannot adjust my working schedule to attend my family
priorities.
• I do not get time to invite my friends for a party at home.
• Work: When participants were asked about the work-related
questions, many
employees complained about unstructured work schedule. The
employees also
complained that because of heavy work load, lunch also gets
delayed and also

63. they do not get leisure time. The respondents also stated that
emphasis should
be given on task completion than on the time to stay in the
organization.
A few of the reactions by the employees related to the work are:
• When my spouse and kids have vacation I cannot make plan of
outing with
them as I do not know when, what important work has been
scheduled.
• There is ambiguity in role and the task I am supposed to
perform in the
organization.
• A few women have responded that they are not able to give
sufficient time
to their kids and in-laws.
• Team Work: When respondents were asked about the questions
related to
the team work, many employees said that they cannot rely on
their team as
they are also heavily loaded with work that teammates are not
able to help
each other and thus feel dissatisfied.
A few of the reactions by the employees related to team work

64. are:
• I experience work pressure while doing a group task.
• A few respondents said that they can share their task with
their colleagues
whenever needed and enjoy working in teams as their teammates
are
cooperative.
• Compensation and Benefits: Monetary satisfaction is one of
the important
factors which helps in maintaining work-life balance of
individuals. It also
includes the benefits provided by the organization.
Compensation for extra work
gives satisfaction. When respondents were asked about the extra
benefits and
compensation, they made it clear that they do not get additional
payment for
the overtime as the organization considers it as part of their
duties
A few of the reactions by the employees related to the
compensation and benefits
are:
• I am able to meet the basic requirement of my family.

65. • I enjoy the privileges offered by the organization and also able
to enjoy
holiday with my family.
The IUP Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. XVI, No. 4,
201762
• A few participants responded that they do not get compensated
for putting
in extra effort in the organization.
Conclusion
The issues talked about in the study can help in determining and
outlining mediation/
preparing programs and other employee-friendly arrangements
by organizations. The
study talks about the issues confronted by a greater proportion
of the employees on the
whole - work, life, self, and other issues that may influence a
representative’s harmony
among among organizational and individual responsibilities and
individual responsibilities
and their influences on execution at work. Organizations can
use the present study to

66. realize strategies that support and encourage the representatives
to adapt to these issues.
Accomplishing a decent balance between work and family
duties is a growing worry
for contemporary employees and organizations. There is
currently mounting proof
connecting work-life awkwardness to diminished wellbeing and
prosperity among
individuals and families. It is definitely not surprising then that
there is growing enthusiasm
among organizational stakeholders for preparing work-life
policies in their organizations.
Work-life balance policies are most likely to be effectively
mainstreamed in organizations
which have an unmistakable comprehension of their business
reason and which regard
the significance of work-life balance for all employees.
Whatever the course, it is hoped
that the study can be used as a framework and offers a premise
for reflection and open
deliberation on work-life balance issues in the IT industry in
Pune city.
Limitations of the Study:
• The first limitation of qualitative study is that the quality of

67. the study depends
greatly on the individual researcher. Because the researcher
designs the type
of questions he/she will ask and can inadvertently influence the
results due to
his/her own personal beliefs.
• The other limitation which the author faced was long and
tedious process of
applying qualitative models of analysis to quantitative or
numerical data. The
author carefully pondered over the data in detail while crafting
the analysis.
• It is difficult to analyze the qualitative data as compared to
quantitative data
as the latter does not fit neatly in a standard category.
• The presence of the author in the process of data gathering is
unavoidable and
References
1. Agarwal T (2009), Strategic Human Resource Management,
pp. 1-20, Oxford
University Press, New Delhi, India.

68. 63A Qualitative Study on Work-Life Balance of Software
Professionals
2. Ashforth B E, Kreiner G E and Fugate M (2000), “All in a
Day’s Work: Boundaries
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https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167218797294
Personality and Social

70. Psychology Bulletin
2019, Vol. 45(5) 808 –823
© 2018 by the Society for Personality
and Social Psychology, Inc
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DOI: 10.1177/0146167218797294
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Article
Partner with the right person because you cannot have a full
career and a full life at home with the children if you are also
doing all the housework and childcare.
—Sheryl Sandberg (2013)
In understanding gender disparities in career advancement,
social psychologists have focused on how stereotypes about
women constrain women’s career decisions (Brown &
Diekman, 2010; Ceci & Williams, 2011; Park, Smith, &
Correll, 2010; Stout, Dasgupta, Hunsinger, & McManus,
2011). But as Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg suggests,
the dynamics in heterosexual couples can also impact wom-
en’s ability to freely pursue their career. Although there is
an active literature on the gendered distribution of domestic
labor in sociology and economics (England, 2010; Haddock,
Zimmerman, Lyness, & Ziemba, 2006; Kroska, 2004; Offer
& Schneider, 2011), social psychologists have not exam-
ined how expectations about men’s roles constrain wom-
en’s own aspirations to adopt counterstereotypic roles. In
line with field theory (Lewin, 1939), which highlights how
social forces constrain and afford individuals’ behavior, it
stands to reason that women’s expectations of adopting tra-
ditional roles (i.e., becoming a caregiver rather than a
breadwinner) are causally predicted by their perception that

71. men are becoming more involved in childcare. We tested
this complementarity hypothesis across five experiments
and an internal meta-analysis.
The Division of Domestic Labor and
Asymmetrically Changing Gender
Roles
Over the past several decades, gender roles have both
changed and stayed the same. In 1970, almost half of all two
parent households had a mother who stayed at home, whereas
today nearly 70% of families in the United States are com-
prised of dual-earner parents (Pew Research Center, 2015).
Although men generally outearn their partners, women are
increasingly likely to be the primary economic provider in
their families (Pew Research Center, 2013). Despite this evi-
dence of women’s expanding roles, family responsibilities
continue to fall disproportionately to them (Hochschild &
Machung, 2012). In fact, after having children, women are
797294PSPXXX10.1177/0146167218797294Personality and
Social Psychology BulletinCroft et al.
research-article2018
1The University of Arizona, Tucson, USA
2The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Corresponding Author:
Alyssa Croft, The University of Arizona, 1503 E University
Blvd., Tucson,
AZ 85721-0001, USA.
Email: [email protected]
Life in the Balance: Are Women’s
Possible Selves Constrained by Men’s
Domestic Involvement?

72. Alyssa Croft1, Toni Schmader2, and Katharina Block2
Abstract
Do young women’s expectations about potential romantic
partners’ likelihood of adopting caregiving roles in the future
contribute to whether they imagine themselves in nontraditional
future roles? Meta-analyzed effect sizes of five experiments
(total N = 645) supported this complementarity hypothesis.
Women who were primed with family-focused (vs. career-
focused)
male exemplars (Preliminary Study) or information that men are
rapidly (vs. slowly) assuming greater caregiving responsibilities
(Studies 1-4) were more likely to envision becoming the
primary economic provider and less likely to envision becoming
the
primary caregiver of their future families. A meta-analysis
across studies revealed that gender role complementarity has a
small-to-medium effect on both women’s abstract expectations
of becoming the primary economic provider (d = .27) and
the primary caregiver (d = –.26). These patterns suggest that
women’s stereotypes about men’s stagnant or changing gender
roles might subtly constrain women’s own expected work and
family roles.
Keywords
gender roles, possible selves, stereotypes, romantic
relationships, work–life balance
Received July 26, 2016; revision accepted August 7, 2018
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73. Croft et al. 809
more likely than men to reduce their work commitment, earn
lower salaries, and advance slowly in their career (Stone,
2007). Many women embrace this choice (Park et al., 2010).
However, twice as many working mothers as fathers report
that parenting responsibilities stand in the way of their career,
particularly among families of highly career-focused men
(Pew Research Center, 2015). Such data suggest that many
women feel their career choices are constrained by men’s
lower caregiving contributions (Croft, Schmader, & Block,
2015).
It is not surprising that women, once parents, might make
a rational decision to prioritize family over career. Our ques-
tion is whether women anticipate this trade-off in advance of
negotiating work and family responsibilities with a partner.
Young heterosexual women expect a traditional, gender-
based division of labor in their future relationship (Askari,
Liss, Erchull, Staebell, & Axelson, 2010; Hodges & Park,
2013; Park, Smith, & Correll, 2008). But what if they
believed that men’s interest in childcare was increasing? For
example, although the percentage of stay-at-home fathers is
still low, it has been increasing over the last two decades
(Pew Research Center, 2014), and working couples are
increasingly sharing family responsibilities equally (Pew
Research Center, 2015). Are these, albeit modest, changes in
men’s caregiving roles incorporated into how young women
view their own future?
Schemas of the Self, Others, and
Relationships
When women envision their future, they imagine the person

74. they might become (Oyserman & James, 2011). Self-schemas
are people’s cognitive representations of the self, informed
by their past experiences, current context, and future expec-
tations. The self-schemas people have for the person they
could become are called possible selves (Markus & Nurius,
1986; Smith & Oyserman, 2015). Unlike current self-sche-
mas, possible selves are uniquely based on anticipated social
roles and environments people might inhabit. Some past
research has shown that possible selves about being a parent
or provider can be influenced by pragmatic concerns (e.g,
Bloom, Delmore-Ko, Masataka, & Carli, 1999; Lee &
Oyserman, 2007, 2009; Smith, James, Varnum, & Oyserman,
2014). Of greater relevance to the current research is the way
in which possible selves are shaped by gender stereotypes.
Consistent with social role theory (Eagly & Steffen, 1984;
Eagly & Wood, 2013), because young girls see women as
caregivers and men as breadwinners, gender-stereotypic role
expectations are internalized into possible selves. Such ste-
reotypes are especially likely to influence people’s possible
selves when imagining themselves in a distant future that is
necessarily more abstract. For example, a recent study
showed that grade school–aged girls aspire to more gender-
neutral (than female-stereotypic) occupations to the extent
that their fathers exhibit less male-stereotypic behavior by
engaging in domestic tasks (Croft, Schmader, Block, &
Baron, 2014). In addition, there is a notable gender differ-
ence in the family-related possible selves of college students
who imagine their lives in 10 to 15 years, but no such differ-
ence when imagining themselves only 1 year in the future
(Brown & Diekman, 2010). This pattern suggests distant
possible selves are shaped, at least to some degree, by stereo-
typic expectations.
Women’s (and men’s) possible selves are not only a

75. function of the schemas they have about themselves, but
also the schemas about future romantic partners. Aron and
Aron (1986) theorized that the perception of oneself
includes the resources, perspectives, and characteristics of
one’s relationship partner. Importantly, relationship sche-
mas are defined not merely by expectations of the self and
the partner as individuals, but also by expectations about
relationship dynamics (e.g., forecasted division-of-labor).
Heterosexual women’s stereotypical expectations about
their future partner should therefore inform their own pos-
sible selves, but the abstract nature of these future forecasts
makes them susceptible to stereotypes and norms. Thus,
women’s own future selves might be shaped by their beliefs
that men (and therefore future partners) will continue to be
less communal than women (Diekman & Eagly, 2000).
There is some initial support for gender role complemen-
tarity in future selves. In a clever study, men and women who
were randomly assigned to imagine becoming the primary
breadwinner or primary caregiver of their future families
reported preferring a partner with a role complementary to
their own (Eagly, Eastwick, & Johannesen-Schmidt, 2009).
Our research examines the reverse relationship: When
women expect that men’s roles are unchanging (i.e., men
remain more career- than family-focused), are women less
likely to imagine themselves becoming the economic pro-
vider of their family? And if instead women encounter evi-
dence that men are becoming more family-focused, are they
more likely to imagine themselves as a future economic
provider?
In addition to women’s anticipated adoption of provider
roles, we also considered their anticipation of becoming the
primary caregiver to their children. On one hand, expecta-
tions that men are becoming more involved in caregiving
might lead women to feel less pressure to take on caregiving

76. responsibilities themselves. However, we also recognize that
social pressures and individual expectations surrounding
motherhood are quite strong. For example, even when fathers
are involved in childcare, women often find it difficult to
give up the primary caregiver role and still manage how
these tasks are done (Allen & Hawkins, 1999). The role of
primary caregiver might be difficult for women’s to relin-
quish given that it can be a source of power (Williams &
Chen, 2013). Thus, we examined how change in male roles
affects women’s anticipation of becoming the primary eco-
nomic provider and the primary caregiver of their future
families as distinct outcomes.
810 Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 45(5)
Overview of the Current Research
Five studies (total N = 645) provide a test of the complemen-
tarity hypothesis—stating that the likelihood that heterosex-
ual women anticipate adopting nontraditional gender roles in
their future families (i.e., becoming the primary breadwinner,
and not the primary caregiver) is at least partly contingent
upon their expectations about men’s willingness to adopt non-
traditional roles (i.e., becoming the primary caregiver).
Although parallel complementarity effects could be tested for
men’s future role expectations, we limited our focus to out-
comes for women but will consider the generalizability of
these effects in the general discussion. In the Preliminary
Study, we used counterstereotypical male exemplars to prime
women with thoughts of family-oriented men (vs. career-ori-
ented men) prior to measuring their career- and family-related
possible selves and estimates of the time they will spend on
work and childcare. In Studies 1 to 4, we sought to broaden
the ecological validity of the design by providing participants

77. with normative messages (like those they might read in the
news) indicating that men are increasingly assuming caregiv-
ing roles (as opposed to staying more career-focused). We
recruited larger sample sizes with each subsequent study and
preregistered hypotheses and analyses for Study 4.
Preliminary Study: Evidence for
Complementarity
In this preliminary study, participants viewed a set of profiles
of men who were either career-oriented, family-oriented, or
career-family balanced. We originally designed this study to
examine how exposure to these profiles might influence
men’s expected gender roles, but the key discovery was that
women primed with more family-oriented (as compared with
career-oriented) male exemplars were more likely to envi-
sion themselves, complementarily, as the primary economic
provider in their future families. Because these initial effects
were used to formulate the complementarity hypothesis, we
focus our presentation on these preliminary findings among
women in the sample. The data for men are summarized in
Supplementary Online Materials (SOM) and footnoted in
results when relevant.
Method
Participants and Design
A sample of 74 heterosexual undergraduate women partici-
pated in this study for course credit (62% East Asian/23%
White). Age data were not collected in this study. Participants
were randomly assigned to one of three male exemplar prime
conditions in a between-subjects design. This study was run
in 2011, and the sample size was planned based on conven-
tions at that time (Simmons, Nelson, & Simonsohn, 2011).
More sample characteristics for each of the studies are pro-

78. vided in Table 1 and SOM; sensitivity analyses for this and
all studies are detailed alongside key effects for the critical
comparisons in Table 3.
Procedure
In a two-part study on life narratives, participants were first
asked to rate five similar profiles of men to ostensibly help us
select stimuli for future research. Based on random assign-
ment to condition, these profiles were all either (a) career-
oriented, (b) family-oriented, or (c) career–family balanced.
After viewing each profile, participants completed questions
that included the manipulation checks. During the second
part of the study, participants imagined and made ratings of
their lives 15 years in the future. Measures central to the
complementary hypothesis are reported here, but all addi-
tional measures included in this exploratory study (and each
subsequent study) are listed in SOM.
Materials and Measures
Exemplar primes. The profiles were adapted from Stout et al.
(2011; Study 2). In the family-oriented condition, the men
took time off from their successful careers (as women often
do) to raise small children, whereas in the career condition
the men worked full-time (as men often do). In the balanced
condition, the exemplars were portrayed as having thriving
careers paired with flexible schedules that allowed for some
childcare (see SOM). Across condition, facts about men’s
(former) occupation, children, and wives’ careers were held
Table 1. Sample Characteristics for All Studies.
Study N
% who expect

79. graduate degree
(for self)
% who expect
graduate degree
(for partner)
Expected
personal
income
Expected
combined
household income
Anticipated
work hours
M (SD)
Career
ambition
M (SD)
Preliminary 74 63 64 $60-70,000 $110-120,000
1 33 67 55 $70-80,000 $150,000 or more
2 121 63 56 $80-90,000 $140-150,000
3 114 61 42 $70-80,000 $140-150,000 35.32 (10.5) 6.90 (1.20)
4 303 71 57 $90-100,000 $150-160,000 39.67 (11.95) 7.25
(1.15)
Note. The first four studies were conducted at a large Canadian
university and used CAD for income estimates. Study 4 was

80. conducted at a large
American university and used USD for income estimates. Career
ambition was measured on a 1 to 9 scale.
Croft et al. 811
constant. Pilot data on a separate sample of 25 undergradu-
ates (both men and women participated, but no gender data
were collected) revealed that the career-focused exemplars
were rated as significantly more career-oriented (M = 5.96)
than the family-oriented exemplars (M = 2.19), and both
were significantly different from the balanced exemplars
(M = 4.14), all ps < .001 (1 = family-oriented; 4 = bal-
anced; 7 = career-oriented).
Ratings of exemplars. Participants’ ratings of each of the five
exemplars’ degree of career–family balance on a 7-point scale
(1 = family; 4 = balanced; 7 = career) were averaged to pro-
vide a manipulation check (α = .84). Participants also rated
the exemplars’ agency (α = .89) and communion (α = .89) on
the 16 item Personal Attribute Questionnaire (PAQ; Spence,
Helmreich, & Stapp, 1975) using a 1 (not at all descriptive) to
5 (very descriptive) scale.
Participants’ future lives. Participants first provided demo-
graphic information for their future life expectations by indi-
cating whether or not (yes/no) and how likely (1 = not at all
likely to 7 = extremely likely) they will be to be married and
have children. They also rated the highest level of education
anticipated for themselves and their spouse, and their pro-
jected annual household and personal income.
Participants rated their abstract future roles as the likeli-
hood of becoming the primary economic provider (“bread-

81. winner”) and primary caregiver of their future families on
two 7-point scales (0 = not at all likely, 6 = extremely likely).
To assess more concrete task estimates, participants first
allotted a percentage of their total waking hours they would
spend on each of several daily tasks (e.g., work, childcare).
They also completed an adapted Day Reconstruction Method
(DRM; Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, & Stone,
2004) to forecast a typical Wednesday in their lives 15 years
in the future (see SOM). These anticipated daily schedules
were then manually tallied for the number of hours spent at
work and on childcare. Because these two ways of quantify-
ing time spent working, r(67) = .69, p < .001, and on child-
care, r(67) = .36, p = .003, were correlated, the percentage
and DRM measures were standardized and averaged to cre-
ate two variables of estimated time for work and childcare.
Correlations among study variables in this and all studies are
summarized in SOM.
Results and Discussion
Ratings of Exemplars
A one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) on exemplar rat-
ings revealed the expected effect of condition with all means
differing from one another, all ps < .001, F(2, 68) = 69.42,
p < .001, ηp
2 = .67 (see Table 2).1 There were also condition
differences in perceived exemplar agency, F(2, 68) = 18.63,
p < .001, ηp
2 = .35, and communion, F(2, 68) = 9.83, p <
.001, ηp

82. 2 = .22. The career-oriented exemplars were rated as
significantly more agentic (M = 4.03, SD = .33) and less
communal (M = 3.15, SD = .52) than both the family-ori-
ented and balanced exemplars, both ps < .001. The family-
oriented and balanced exemplars were rated as similarly
agentic (Mfamily = 3.22, SD = .57; Mbalance = 3.43, SD = .48)
and communal (Mfamily = 3.82, SD = .65; Mbalance = 3.82,
SD = .61) to one another, both ps > .12.
Future Roles
The complementarity hypothesis (based on the results of this
study) posits that women’s imagined roles are shaped by
Table 2. Manipulation Check Results for All Studies, Broken
Down by Attention Checks (Recall of Manipulation About
Men’s Roles)
and Personal Beliefs About Men’s Roles.
Study Conditions n
Attention
Check 1 M (SD) Cohen’s d
Attention
Check 2 M (SD) Cohen’s d
Personal
Belief 1 M (SD) Cohen’s d
Personal
Belief 2 M (SD) Cohen’s d
Prelim Family 24 Item A 3.23 (0.55) −3.40***
Career 25 5.17 (0.59) — — — — — — — — —
Balance 24 4.08 (0.55)

83. 1 Rapid 17 Item B 5.82 (1.33) 2.25*** — — — Item D 5.24
(1.20) .85* — — —
Slow 16 2.69 (1.45) 4.00 (1.67)
2 Rapid 36 Item C 2.19 (1.39) −.97*** Item E 3.25 (1.23) −.46*
Slow 40 3.68 (1.66) — — — 3.88 (1.49) — — —
Control 45 — 3.87 (1.67)
3 Rapid 59 Item B 4.95 (1.39) 2.52*** Item C 1.72 (1.25)
−.90*** Item E 3.12 (1.27) −.41* — — —
Slow 55 1.85 (1.09) 2.79 (1.12) 3.67 (1.43)
4 Rapid 138 Item B 5.59 (1.39) 1.84*** Item C 1.48 (0.93)
−1.27*** Item E 3.43 (1.47) −.17 Item F 4.12 (1.18) .78***
Slow 165 2.72 (1.71) 2.92 (1.30) 3.67 (1.29) 3.41 (1.34)
Note. Text in bold denotes comparison groups for Cohen’s d
calculations. All Cohen’s d were calculated using
http://www.uccs.edu/~lbecker/. Attention check items: (A) Rate
the individual’s level of balance between family and career: 1 =
family-oriented, 4 = balanced, 7 = career-oriented; (B)
According to the graphs you saw in today’s study, what is
the rate at which men’s roles in society are changing?: 1 = very
slowly, 7 = very rapidly; (C) According to the graphs you saw
in today’s study, men are: 1 = increasing their focus
on family, 4 = staying the same, 7 = increasing their focus on
career. Personal beliefs items: (D) Please indicate whether or
not you agree with the following statement: Men’s roles
in society are changing and will continue to do so in future
years: 1 = completely disagree, 7 = completely agree); (E) I
personally believe that men are: 1 = increasing their focus on
family, 4 = staying the same, 7 = increasing their focus on
career; (F) I personally believe that men’s roles are changing: 1
= very slowly, 7 = very rapidly.
*p < .05. ***p < .001.

84. http://www.uccs.edu/~lbecker/
812 Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 45(5)
their perceptions of men’s childcare engagement. A one-way
ANOVA on expectations of becoming the primary economic
provider yielded a significant effect of condition, F(2, 70) =
3.61, p = .03, ηp
2 = .09 (see Figure 1). As expected, women
who viewed family-oriented men anticipated becoming the
primary provider more than those who viewed either career-
oriented, d = .64, p = .03, or balanced men, d = .73, p = .02
(see Table 3). The manipulation had no significant effect on
becoming the primary caregiver, F(2, 70) = 1.41, p = .25,
ηp
2 = .04, and ratings of these two roles were uncorrelated,
r = –.08, p = .52.2 Additional analyses in this and all studies
directly comparing the provider to the caregiver ratings can
be found in SOM.
Concrete Tasks
One-way ANOVAs of the concrete task measures revealed
no effects on estimated time on work, F(2, 71) = .92, p =
.40, ηp
2 = .03, or childcare, F(2, 71) = .22, p = .80, ηp
2 =
.01 (see Table 4). Interestingly, these concrete time estimates
Table 3. Descriptive Statistics, Estimates of Effect Size, and
Sensitivity Analyses for Future Role Measures in All Studies.

85. Study Conditions n
Sensitivity
analysis
M (SD)
Provider
Cohen’s d
Provider
95% CI
Provider
M (SD)
Caregiver
Cohen’s d
Caregiver
95% CI
Caregiver
Prelim Family 24 d = .82 3.25 (1.29) .64* [0.06, 1.21] 3.58
(1.71) −.33 [–0.89, 0.24]
Career 25 2.36 (1.50) 4.12 (1.48)
Balanced 24 2.25 (1.45) 3.33 (1.83)
1 Rapid change 17 d = .89 3.71 (0.85) .90* [0.18, 1.61] 4.29
(0.59) −.24 [–0.92, 0.45]
Slow change 16 2.75 (1.24) 4.50 (1.10)
2 Rapid change 36 d = .58 3.28 (0.88) .58* [0.12, 1.04] 4.08
(0.87) −.44 [–0.89, 0.02]
Slow change 40 2.65 (1.27) 4.55 (1.22)
Control 45 2.91 (1.17) 3.96 (1.22)

86. 3 Rapid change 59 d = .47 2.93 (1.29) .13 [–0.24, .50] 4.07
(1.19) −.13 [–0.50, 0.24]
Slow change 55 2.76 (1.26) 4.22 (1.05)
Same primary provider measure used in
Studies 1-4
Same primary caregiver measure used in
Studies 1-4
4 Rapid change 138 d = .29 3.29 (1.19) .13 [–0.15, 0.41] 3.79
(1.28) −.25* [–0.23, 0.03]
Slow change 165 3.13 (1.25) 4.11 (1.33)
New relative provider measure New relative caregiver measure
Rapid change 138 3.90 (0.91) .28* [0.05, 0.51] 4.30 (0.74)
−.32* [–0.55, –0.09]
Slow change 165 3.64 (0.95) 4.57 (0.93)
Note. Text in bold denotes comparison groups for Cohen’s d
calculations and sensitivity analyses (α = .05, 1 – β = .80, two-
tailed for preliminary study,
one-tailed for Studies 1-4). All Cohen’s d calculated using
http://www.uccs.edu/~lbecker/. Studies 1 to 4 excluded
participants who are not heterosexual
or do not anticipate having a partner and/or children. CI =
confidence interval.
*p < .05.
Figure 1. Preliminary study: Women’s expected likelihood of
becoming the primary economic provider and primary caregiver
for their
families, 15 years in the future.
Note. Error bars represent standard errors.

87. http://www.uccs.edu/~lbecker/
Croft et al. 813
were generally unrelated to women’s abstract roles expecta-
tions (see Table 4).
The patterns from this exploratory study suggested that
women’s abstract possible selves (but not their concrete task
estimates) might be contingent upon the extent to which they
perceive men as interested in childcare. Interestingly, these
effects were specific to the economic provider and not the
caregiver role, which led us to formulate the complementar-
ity hypothesis, whereby a prime of men’s caregiving behav-
ior would have a complementary effect on women’s imagined
provider role in their future family.
Study 1
Because the Preliminary Study had not been specifically
designed to test the complementary hypothesis, we devel-
oped a more focused test for Study 1. Out of a concern that
extreme exemplars would be subtyped and treated as
“exceptions to the rule,” rather than seen as indicative of
broader norms (Weber & Crocker, 1983), we developed a
new manipulation. Specifically, in all further studies women
viewed graphs suggesting that men are either rapidly or
slowly taking on more caregiving roles before completing
the same dependent measures from the Preliminary Study.
We hypothesized that when women were led to believe that
men’s roles are changing rapidly (vs. slowly), they would be
more likely to imagine becoming the primary economic pro-
vider in their future family. We again tested for parallel
effects on becoming the primary caregiver and other con-
crete task estimates.

88. Method
Participants. A sample of 37 heterosexual undergraduate
women below age 25 (Mage = 19.44, SD = 1.27) participated
for course credit (44% East Asian/25% White). Because the
complementarity hypothesis should only apply to women
who expect to have a male partner and children, four partici-
pants were excluded for not meeting these criteria.3 Data
were collected in 2013, and we had aimed to collect 20 par-
ticipants randomly assigned to each condition (Simmons
et al., 2011), but stopped data collection when the term
ended. We recognize that this is a small sample by today’s
conventions, a limitation we address with the later meta-
analysis and discussion of the sensitivity analyses.
Procedure. The procedure was similar to the Preliminary
Study, except that normative trend primes replaced the exem-
plar primes in Part 1 of the session. As part of a study of how
changing trends affect people’s own life narratives, partici-
pants spent 5 min studying graphs on food consumption,
weather changes, smoking rates, and stay-at-home fathers,
before completing the same primary measures used in the
Preliminary Study.4 This fourth graph varied by condition to
manipulate changing norms.
Materials and measures
Graph primes. The focal graph depicted data on stay-at-
home fathers in Canada between 1986 and 2010 (Statistics
Canada, 2010). However, the graph and figure caption were
manipulated to show rapid or slow change (see SOM). In
the slow change condition, the y-axis ranged from 0% to
100% and the figure caption described that the percentage of
stay-at-home fathers is projected to remain relatively low in

89. the coming years. In the rapid change condition, the y-axis
was condensed to create a steep positive slope, and the fig-
ure caption emphasized projected increases in stay-at-home
fathers in the coming years.
Manipulation checks. Following this manipulation, par-
ticipants rated the speed at which the graph depicted men’s
gender roles as changing (1 = very slowly, 7 = very rapidly)
and their personal beliefs that men’s roles are changing rap-
idly (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree).
Table 4. Descriptive Statistics and Estimates of Effect Size for
Concrete Task Measures in All Studies.
Study Conditions n
M (SD)
Time working
Cohen’s d
Time working
M (SD)
Time caregiving
Cohen’s d
Time caregiving
Prelim Family 24 −.21 (0.98) −.39 −.01 (0.94) −.12
Career 25 .16 (0.90) .10 (0.89)
Balanced 24 −.07 (1.04) −.05 (0.65)
1 Rapid change 17 .02 (0.81) .12 −.20 (0.79) −.64
Slow change 16 −.08 (0.85) .33 (0.86)
2 Rapid change 36 .20 (0.71) .64** −.04 (0.80) −.20

90. Slow change 40 −.35 (0.98) .12 (0.76)
Control 45 .15 (0.75) −.09 (0.73)
3 Rapid change 59 .002 (1.06) .01 −.12 (0.91) −.27
Slow change 55 −.003 (0.94) .14 (1.08)
Note. All mean values are standardized; higher numbers
indicate above average anticipated time spent working or
caregiving. Text in bold denotes
comparison groups for Cohen’s d calculations. All …