After the Baby: Work-Family Conflict and Working Mothers' Psychological Health (original) (raw)
The Psychosocial Work Environment and Maternal Postpartum Depression
International Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 2009
Background Postpartum depression is a debilitating mental disorder affecting women after childbirth. This study examined the correlates of postpartum depression at 11 weeks after childbirth, focusing on work-related stressors and applying the job demand–control–support model. Method Investigators recruited a prospective cohort of 817 employed Minnesota women when hospitalized for childbirth in 2001. Trained interviewers collected data in person and by telephone at enrollment and 5 and 11 weeks postpartum from three Minneapolis and St. Paul hospitals. Results Results of hierarchical regression analysis showed that worse depression scores (Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale) were associated with higher psychological demands, lower schedule autonomy, and lower perceived control over work and family. Perceptions of control mediated the relationships of coworker support and schedule autonomy with postpartum depression scores. Study findings showed no significant buffering effects for decision latitude; however, coworker support and decision latitude appear to act as functional substitutes in reducing postpartum depressive symptoms. Conclusion These findings raise questions about the applicability of the job demand–control–support model to postpartum women or to postpartum depression. Future research could assess the impact of the interaction between the work and home environment on maternal postpartum depression.
Working-Class Jobs and New Parents' Mental Health
Journal of Marriage and Family, 2011
Little research has explored linkages between work conditions and mental health in workingclass employed parents. The current study aims to address this gap, employing hierarchical linear modeling techniques to examine how levels of and changes in job autonomy, job urgency, supervisor support, and coworker support predicted parents' depressive symptoms in a sample of 113 dual-earner couples interviewed five times across the transition to parenthood. Increases in job autonomy and decreases in job urgency predicted fewer depressive symptoms in fathers at 1 year postpartum. For mothers, coworker support predicted fewer depressive symptoms, and supervisor support mitigated the negative effects of job urgency on depressive
Depressive Symptoms in Mothers: The Role of Employment and Role Quality
Journal of Workplace Behavioral Health, 2011
The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether paid employment of mothers in Austria with children up to 10 years of age is related to depressive symptoms (N ¼ 248). Three contrasting theoriesscarcity theory, role enhancement theory, and role quality theory-have been discussed to explain the relation of multiple-role occupation and depressive symptoms. Results indicate that (a) in accordance with the assumptions of scarcity theory working mothers have higher levels of depressive symptoms than notworking mothers; (b) in accordance with role quality theory only mothers with low work-role quality have higher rates of depressive symptoms; and (c) besides work status the perceived quality of the mother role was significantly related to depressive symptoms.
Balancing Work and Family After Childbirth: A Longitudinal Analysis
Women's Health Issues, 2011
Background: In the United States, women with young children have dramatically increased their participation in the workforce, resulting in greater potential conflict between work and family roles. However, few studies have examined postpartum work-family conflict. This study examined associations between work-family conflict and women's health after childbirth. Methods: Employed women, 18 years of age and older, were recruited while hospitalized for childbirth and followed for 18 months (n ¼ 541; 66% response rate). Health outcomes were measured using the Short Form 12, version 2. Longitudinal fixed-effects models estimated the associations between work-family conflict (modeled as job and home spillover) and health. Results: Women who reported high levels of job spillover to home had mental health scores slightly, but significantly, worse than women who reported low levels of spillover (b ¼ À1.26; SE ¼ 0.47). Women with medium and high levels of home spillover to job also reported worse mental health (b ¼ À0.81, SE ¼ 0.30; and b ¼ À1.52, SE ¼ 0.78) relative to those with low spillover. Women who reported medium (versus low) levels of home spillover reported slightly improved physical health (b ¼ 0.64, SE ¼ 0.30). There was no significant association between job spillover and physical health. Conclusion: This study focused exclusively on employed postpartum women. Results illustrate that job and home spillover are associated with maternal mental and physical health. Findings also revealed that flexible work arrangements were associated with poorer postpartum mental health scores, which may reflect unintended consequences, such as increasing the amount of work brought home.
Maternal Depressive Symptoms, Employment, and Social Support
The Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, 2014
The purpose of this study was to characterize the relationship between maternal depressive symptoms and employment and whether it is mediated by social support. Methods: We used data from a nationally representative sample of 700 US women who gave birth in 2005 and completed 2 surveys in the Listening to Mothers series, the first in early 2006, an average of 7.3 months postpartum, and the second an average of 13.4 months postpartum. A dichotomous measure of depressive symptoms was calculated from the 2-item Patient Health Questionnaire, and women reported their employment status and levels of social support from partners and others. We modeled the association between maternal employment and depressive symptoms using multivariate logistic regression, including social support and other control variables. Results: Maternal employment and high support from a nonpartner source were both independently associated with significantly lower odds of depressive symptoms (adjusted odds ratio [AOR], 0.35 and P ؍ .011, and AOR, 0.40, P ؍ .011, respectively). These relationships remained significant after controlling for mothers' baseline mental and physical health, babies' health, and demographic characteristics (AOR, 0.326 and P ؍ .015, and AOR, 0.267 and P ؍ .025, respectively). Conclusions: Maternal employment and strong social support, particularly nonpartner support, were independently associated with fewer depressive symptoms. Clinicians should encourage mothers of young children who are at risk for depression to consider ways to optimize their employment circumstances and "other" social support.
International Journal for Equity in Health, 2010
Background: A large body of international research reveals that single mothers experience poorer mental health than their partnered counterparts, with socioeconomic disadvantage identified as an important contributory factor in understanding this health disparity. Much less research, however, has focused specifically on the psychological well-being of single mothers who are employed, despite their growing presence in the labor force. Of the research which has considered employment, the focus has been on employment status per se rather than on other important work-related factors which may impact psychological health, such as psychosocial work quality and work-family conflict. The aim of this study was to: (1) compare employed single mothers and employed partnered mothers on measures of psychological distress, psychosocial work quality and work-family conflict; and (2) explore the potential role of work-family conflict and psychosocial work quality as explanations for any observed differences in psychological distress based on partner status. Method: Analysis of data obtained from a cross-sectional telephone survey of employed parents in a mid-sized Western Canadian city. Analyses were based on 674 employed mothers (438 partnered and 236 single), who were 25-50 years old, with at least one child in the household. Results: Compared to employed single mothers, employed partnered mothers were older, had more education and reported fewer hours of paid work. Single mothers reported higher levels of psychological distress, financial hardship, work-family conflict and poor psychosocial work quality. Statistical adjustment for income adequacy, psychosocial work quality and work-family conflict each independently resulted in single motherhood no longer being associated with psychological distress. Conclusions: While single employed mothers did experience higher levels of psychological distress than their partnered counterparts, differences between these groups of women in income adequacy, psychosocial work quality, and work-family conflict were found to explain this relationship. Future research employing a longitudinal design and subject to lower selection biases is required to tease out the interrelationship of these three life strains and to point to the most appropriate economic and social policies to support single mothers in the workforce.
Motherhood, Employment and the Development of Depression
British Journal of Psychiatry, 1990
A prospective inquiry of a largely working-class sample of women with children considers the effect of employment on risk of developing clinical depression. The hypothesis was that there would be a direct protective effect arising from employment once quality of other support was taken into account. In fact full-time working mothers were at high risk. This appeared to be explained by either prior work strain or a severe event involving ‘deviant’ behaviour on the part of husband/boyfriend or child. Neither factor was relevant for part-time workers. The severe events appeared to be particularly depressogenic for full-time workers because they represented either failure in the motherhood role or a sense of entrapment in an unrewarding work/domestic situation. However, those in part-time work had a low rate of onset compared with non-workers, and the difference appears to be related to non-working women feeling less secure about their marriages.
Journal of Applied Psychology, 2011
This study examined organizational levers that impact work-family experiences, participant health, and subsequent turnover. Using a sample of 179 women returning to full-time work 4 months after childbirth, we examined the associations of 3 job resources (job security, skill discretion, and schedule control) with work-to-family enrichment and the associations of 2 job demands (psychological requirements and nonstandard work schedules) with work-to-family conflict. Further, we considered subsequent impact of work-to-family conflict and enrichment on women's health (physical and mental health) 8 months after women returned to work and the impact of health on voluntary turnover 12 months after women returned to work. Having a nonstandard work schedule was directly and positively related to conflict, whereas schedule control buffered the effect of psychological requirements on conflict. Skill discretion and job security, both job resources, directly and positively related to enrichment. Work-to-family conflict was negatively related to both physical and mental health, but work-to-family enrichment positively predicted only physical health. Physical health and mental health both negatively influenced turnover. We discuss implications and opportunities for future research.
Archives of Women's Mental Health, 2011
Maternal postpartum mental health is influenced by a broad range of risk and protective factors including social circumstances. Forty percent of Australian women resume employment in the first year postpartum, yet poor quality employment (without security, control, flexibility or leave) has not been investigated as a potential social determinant of maternal psychological distress. This paper examines whether poor quality jobs are associated with an increased risk of maternal postpartum psychological distress. Data were collected from employed mothers of infants ≤12 months (n=1,300) participating in the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children. Logistic regression analyses estimated the association between job quality and maternal psychological distress, adjusting for prior depression, social support, quality of partner relationship, adverse life events and sociodemographic characteristics. Only 21% of women reported access to all four optimal job conditions. After adjustment for known risk factors for poor maternal mood, mothers were significantly more likely to report psychological distress (adjusted OR=1.39, 95% CI 1.09, 1.77) with each reduction in the number of optimal employment conditions. Interventions for maternal post-partum affective disorders are unlikely to be successful if major risk factors are not addressed. These results provide strong evidence that employment conditions are associated with maternal postpartum mood, and warrant consideration in psychosocial risk assessments and interventions.