Dual-career Families Research Articles

Self‐esteem and sense of competence as moderators of the job satisfaction of professionals in dual career families

esteem, be used in future investigations. Sekaran's (1982, 1983) research on dual career families, however, would seem to indicate that both concepts may be equally important moderators for professional married couples to experience satisfaction at the workplace. This study examined the moderating effects of both self-esteem and sense of competence on the relationship between four work variables - career salience, job involvement, income, and discretionary time or personal time spent on job-related activities - and the job satisfaction of professionals in dual career families. More specifically, it examined if each of these two variables would explain incremental variance in job satisfaction over and above the other. If they did, both variables must be considered to be relevant for future research on professional couples. If such is not the case, and self-esteem is not a variable which significantly contributes to the incremental explained variance, then Tharenou and Harker may be right in saying that it is not a useful variable for organizational research.

Growing up in a Dual-Career Family: The Children's Perceptions

Ninety-three adolescent and young adult children of dual-career families were surveyed as to their satisfaction with the lifestyle, perceptions of eight components of family strength and their views on various issues related to the dual-career experience. Family strength and lifestyle scores were compared by sex of respondent, age categories, ordinal position, whether or not their mothers had interrupted their careers, and as to the parent indicated as being the most influential in their lives. In general, the children viewed the lifestyle positively and scored their families respectively high in family strength, especially the categories of concern and supportiveness. Nonetheless, problem areas previously associated with dual-career family living, such as time constraints, were identified by the adolescents.

Individual Propensities for Emotional Supportiveness within a Dual Career Context: Work and Non‐work Reactions

One challenge increasingly arising in individuals' personal lives is balancing life style and career to maintain a satisfactory long‐term relationship with a spouse who also has a career. According to the Bureau of Census, there are more than 26 million married women in the workforce. By 1982 over half of all married women were employed outside the home, and fewer than 15 per cent of all US households acknowledged the father as sole wage earner and the mother as full‐time homemaker. The unprecedented increase in the number of dual career families (from 9.3 million in 1950 to over 13.4 million in 1960, and 26.8 million in 1984) suggests a need to know more about the demands facing such households. Relatively few studies have investigated the relationships of work and non‐work factors within the two provider or dual career family context. Moreover, much of the existing research on dual careers is lacking in methodological rigour.

The Effects of Dual-Career Families on Adolescents' Sex-Role Attitudes, Work and Family Plans, and Choices of Important Others

This study compares sex-role attitudes and choices of significant others and role models of adolescents from dual-career families and traditional single-earner families. Adolescents from dual-career families have less traditionsl sex-role attitudes and prefer a dual-worker family structure relative to adolescents from traditional single-earner families. The data show that the influences of family structure varies both by sex of respondent and by type of role under consideration. A positive feedback loop is created in which dual-career families produce children who will form dual-career families when they marry; the number of individuals with egalitarian sex-role attitudes and behaviors should also increase. Peers and same-sex parents have the greatest influence on sex role regardless of family structure. Potential interactions between dual-career families and variables such as ethnicity age of the children and the mothers attitudes toward her employment also should be explored in future work. (authors modified)

Rearranging Family and Career Priorities: Professional Women and Men of the Eighties

This study examines changes in the interrelationships of family career aspirations and occupational values over the 1970s decade for women and men graduating from college. Findings document the dramatic increase during the 1970s of university womens desires for high-status professional career and commitment to concomitant lifestyles and values. Aspiring professionals desiring career--accomodating lifestyles face the greatest potential for role conflict. The numbers of women who expect to place family 1st have declined. If family becomes a source of stress rather than support the dual-career family lifestyle may not be viable. Much of the hard-won ground upon which these undergraduates expectations rose is in danger of being lost unless changes are made in the social structure of the family and workplace to allow men intimate involvement in family life and women equitable opportunities for career advancement. Todays aspiring professionals will face difficult choices: lowering career aspirations or consciously rejecting parenthood.

A Study of the Scales for Investigation of the Dual-Career Family

The Scales for Investigation of the Dual-Career Family were revised and administered to a sample of 70 women. Internal consistency, scale intercorrelations, and correlations with sex role identity ...

Understanding the Dynamics of Self Concept of Members in Dual Career Families.

Gender differences in how self esteem and sense of competence moderate the work variables--Job Satisfaction relationships among professionals in dual career families was explored using 173 professionals. The results indicate that men and women may have different anchors for deriving, associating, and experiencing self esteem and a sense of competence.

Research on Wife/Mother Role Strain in Dual Career Families

Abstract. Concurrently with the rising trend in the number of dual career families, the problem of role strain in such families has arisen. In a recent series of scholarly studies (herewith subjected to critical analysis), time management, division of household labor, child care, and perceived guilt have been identified as likely determinants of wife/mother role strain for career women. Prior to 1980, most of the role strain studies have been of the exploratory, case study type. This does not permit generalizing, so a theory of role strain in such situations is still lacking. But those studies have provided useful hypotheses and insight into the limitations of available typology, thus setting the stage for quantitative studies and for the empirical research needed for a detailed understanding of the problems such strain creates and of the solution options available.

The effect of flextime on absenteeism and turnover for male and female employees

Interrole conflict resulting from the demands of work and family roles has become increasingly common over the past decade due to significant societal changes. Females are seen as more susceptible to this interrole conflict because maintaining the home is still perceived as primarily a woman's role. As such, females tend to have higher interrole conflict than males. Flextime may be instrumental in reducing work/family conflict because of the discretion it permits. In turn, the improved integration of conflicting roles is hypothesized to reduce absenteeism and turnover. Thus a longitudinal investigation of potential differences in absenteeism and turnover for females and males on-flextime and females and males not-on-flextime was conducted. Significant decreases in absenteeism but not turnover for females and males on-flextime were found. It was concluded that flextime, by reducing the need for absenteeism, has positive benefits for employees with interrole conflict problems (e.g., dual career families) and for the Organization.

Wives' Incomes as Predictors of Social and Work Adjustment of Husbands: An Occupational Level Explanation.

Most of the literature which has considered the emotional impact of the dual-career or dual-income family has emphasized the changed role of the wife in such households. That literature which has f...

Two Paychecks: Life in Dual-Earner Families.

Contributors provide new views and data on families in which both husband and wife work. The division of labour in such homes, the family relationships within them, and the demographics of dual career families are among the topics. Are dual career families only a response to economic necessity? Do they in fact simply make women work even harder? '...a number of the articles clearly and interestingly point out the difficulties of coping in families in which there are two wage earners and yet have a conservative outlook and have difficulties in coping with the daily problems of modern life.' -- 'Ba Mishpacha', Sept 1984

Coping Strategies for Role Conflict in Married Professional Women with Children

This study investigated how 97 women in dual-career families with preschool children manage typical conflicts between their professional and parental roles. Their characteristic coping strategies were measured using five scales developed for the study, labeled Structural Role Redefinition, Personal Role Redefinition, Increased Role Behavior, Cognitive Restructuring and Tension Reduction. Increased Role Behavior and Cognitive Restructuring were the most highly endorsed coping strategies. As expected, personal and situational resources (i.e., self-esteem, career engagement, spouse and social support) were associated with lower role conflict and greater coping effectiveness. The results are explained in terms of the realities of the work world for women and the continued societal emphasis on the greater importance of parenting for mothers than for fathers.

Women's Occupational and Family Achievement in the U. S. Class System: A Critique of the Dual-Career Family Analysis

The concept of the 'dual-career family' enjoys remarkable popularity in sociological discussions of the impact of continued growth in adult women's employment in the 1970s and 1980s. Robert and Rhona Rapoport coined the phrase in 1969, to signify their discovery among young, elite British couples of a new pattern of wife and husband aspiration to careers and domestic egalitarianism.l The Rapoports soon generalized their findings internationally: they projected the dual-career couples as the key social innovators of emerging 'post-industrial' societies.2 Their lead in dual-career family research has been pursued most enthusiastically by sociologists and social psychologists in the U.S A.3 Increasingly, the dual-career yardstick of achievement and innovation appears in discussions of sex roles, occupational advancement and the family not only in sociological literature, but also in popular media. This model of family success is emerging as an accepted cultural standard. It is used to evaluate the experience of all employed women (and often, housewives as well), male-female couples of all class positions, and all family-worklife arrangements. It is important to examine the adequacy of the theoretical framework established by Robert and Rhona Rapoport which has influenced subsequent research. Much of their conception of social change, family mobility, and class and gender relationships has shaped, and been elaborated by, the many U.S. dual-career case studies. Their conception can be summarized: first, the types of careers

The Family Responsibility Index: A Behavioral Measure of Marital Work Allocation

An instrument was developed to measure behaviorally the division of family-role responsibilities between spouses. Currently available marital role inventories, attitudinal scales and sex role surveys represent inadequate or inappropriate methods for measuring actual performance. The Family Responsibility Index (FRI) was designed to assess a spouse's degree of behavioral participation in 54 specific tasks divided among 10 areas of typical family responsibilities. A balance of traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine tasks was approximated. Sixty-one dual career family couples completed the instrument in two separate administrations. Results showed moderately high reliability of report between spouses and acceptable concurrent validity.

The father's contribution to child care: effects on children's perceptions of parental roles.

Adult role behavior and its effects on children were explored in a study of dual-career and traditional families. Fathers who were active in child care were found to be more nurturant and to partake in more housework. Fewer stereotypes about the maternal role were held by girls than by boys; and boys whose parents shared responsibility for child care held fewer stereotypes about the paternal role than did boys from traditional families.

How husbands and wives in dual-career families perceive their family and work worlds

The perceptions of men and women in dual-career families were mapped with a view to understanding their concerns, priorities, and attitudes toward their work and family lives. Sixteen variables which represented aspects of family and work life and members' own attitudes and behaviors were used to map the perceptions through the multivariate factor analytic technique. A sample of husbands and wives in 127 dual-career families in the St. Louis area was used to collect the data. The results of the study indicate that husbands and wives perceive and cognitively structure their family and work worlds in practically the same way. They both see four distinct facets of their work and family lives. These are (1) a psychologically rewarding job dimension, (2) a general effectiveness dimension, (3) an investment-return dynamic in their careers, and (4) an expectation from the organization and consequences dimension. If the results of this study are replicated in different samples of dual-career families, then we could be sure that the perceptions, values, priorities, and cognitive structuring of family and work factors are virtually the same for men and women and that there are no gender differences.

Dual-Career Families:

Since social scientists coined the term in the late 1960s a great deal has been written about this relatively new social phenomenon. While the authors of earlier books and articles were sometimes content to identify the problems unique to the dual-career couple, recent research frequently offers suggestions for change in social policy and advice to dual-career families on how to cope with this demanding lifestyle. Much of the literature focuses on the dilemma of the dual-career family faced with the possibility of relocation.

Emerging issues for college students in the 1980s.

Abstract This paper considers the emerging themes of the current era and reviews data on topics which will affect students during their lives. These include the choice to remain single, to marry, or to be childless. The impact of maternal employment on children, the determinants of sex roles, and emerging lifestyles including dual-career families and single parent families are also considered. The author emphasizes the complexity of the changes in current society and the need for maintaining a perspective which takes account of multiple variables when drawing conclusions, e.g., maternal work is not the same as maternal deprivation. For those who counsel students this paper is an important source of information about the concerns of students now and for the future.

Career involvement of women in dual-career families: The influence of sex role identity.

Career involvement of women in dual-career families: The influence of sex role identity.

Career involvement of women in dual-career families: The influence of sex role identity.

Career involvement of women in dual-career families: The influence of sex role identity.