Bringing home what I′m hiding at work: The impact of sexual orientation disclosure at work for same-sex couples

Abstract

The current study utilizes a dyadic design with two waves of data collection in 89 same-sex couples (N=178) to investigate the relationship between sexual orientation disclosure at work and work-family outcomes using the actor partner interdependence model (APIM). Drawing on spillover/crossover theory, conservation of resources theory, and the job demands-resources model (JD-R), we hypothesized that lower levels of sexual orientation disclosure to a supervisor and to coworkers would have a negative impact on both the employee's well-being and subsequently their partner's well-being. Results suggest that an employee's disclosure to a supervisor is positively associated with their partner's family satisfaction and negatively associated with their partner's family interfering with work (FIW). Additionally, an employee's disclosure to their coworkers is positively associated with their partner's family satisfaction. Finally, while no gender differences were observed for crossover effects, we observed two significant gender differences for spillover; first, the negative relationship between disclosure to a supervisor and FIW was stronger for sexual minority women than sexual minority men. Second, at lower levels of disclosure to coworkers, sexual minority men experience lower job satisfaction than sexual minority women, but at higher levels of disclosure to coworkers, sexual minority men and women experience similar levels of job satisfaction. Taken together, findings suggest significant crossover effects regarding sexual orientation disclosure in the workplace for sexual minority employees, paving the way for future research to uncover the spillover mechanisms beyond these findings.