Gender and the Relationship Between Marital-Role Quality and Psychological Distress: A Study of Women and Men in Dual-Earner Couples

In this paper, we estimate the association between marital-role quality and psychological distress in a sample of 300 full-time employed women and men in dual-earner couples. We control for such individual-level variables as age, education, occupational prestige, and job-role quality, and for such couple-level variables as length of marriage, parental status, and household income. We then compare the magnitude of this effect for men and for women and for parents and nonparents. Results indicate that in dual-earner couples marital-role quality is significantly negatively associated with psychological distress for women as well as men and that the magnitude of the effect depends little, if at all, on gender or on parental status. These findings challenge the view that marital experiences more significantly influence women's mental health states than men's. The results are discussed in the context of identity theory.

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Gender and the Relationship between Parent Role Quality and Psychological Distress

Journal of Family Issues ◽

10.1177/0192513x94015002005 ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 15 (2) ◽

pp. 229-252 ◽

Cited By ~ 44

Author(s):

ROSALIND C. BARNETT ◽

ROBERT T. BRENNAN ◽

NANCY L. MARSHALL

Keyword(s):

Psychological Distress ◽

Marital Quality ◽

Occupational Prestige ◽

Full Time ◽

Health States ◽

Individual Level ◽

Role Quality ◽

Dual Earner ◽

Parent Role ◽

The Relationship

The association between parent role quality and psychological distress is examined in a sample of 180 full-time employed dual-earner couples, controlling for such individual-level variables as age, education, occupational prestige, and marital quality and for such couple-level variables as length of marriage, household income, and number, ages, and sex of children. The magnitude of this effect is compared for men and for women. Results indicate that parent role quality is significantly negatively associated with psychological distress for men as well as for women and that the magnitude of the effect depends little, if at all, on gender, casting doubt on the widely held view that parenting experiences more significantly influence women's mental health states than men's. The results are discussed in the context of the converging roles played by men and women in dual-earner couples.

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Exposure to Violence, Ethos of Conflict, and Support for Compromise

Journal of Conflict Resolution ◽

10.1177/0022002715569771 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 61 (1) ◽

pp. 84-113 ◽

Cited By ~ 47

Author(s):

Daphna Canetti ◽

Julia Elad-Strenger ◽

Iris Lavi ◽

Dana Guy ◽

Daniel Bar-Tal

Keyword(s):

Psychological Distress ◽

Political Violence ◽

Exposure To Violence ◽

Political Conflict ◽

Individual Level ◽

Peaceful Settlement ◽

Political Outcomes ◽

The Impact ◽

The Relationship ◽

East Jerusalem

Does ongoing exposure to political violence prompt subject groups to support or oppose compromise in situations of intractable conflict? If so, what is the mechanism underlying these processes? Political scholarship neither offers conclusive arguments nor sufficiently addresses individual-level forms of exposure to violence in the context of political conflict, particularly the factors mediating political outcomes. We address this by looking at the impact of exposure to political violence, psychological distress, perceived threat, and ethos of conflict on support for political compromise. A mediated model is hypothesized whereby exposure to political violence provokes support for the ethos of conflict and hinders support for compromise through perceived psychological distress and perceived national threat. We examined representative samples of two parties to the same conflict: Israelis ( N = 781) and Palestinians from Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the West Bank ( N = 1,196). The study’s main conclusion is that ethos of conflict serves as a mediating variable in the relationship between exposure to violence and attitudes toward peaceful settlement of the conflict.

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Gender, Job and Family Conditions, and Psychological Symptoms

Psychology of Women Quarterly ◽

10.1111/j.1471-6402.1994.tb00454.x ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 18 (2) ◽

pp. 251-270 ◽

Cited By ~ 58

Author(s):

Diane L. Hughes ◽

Ellen Galinsky

Keyword(s):

Psychological Distress ◽

Psychological Symptoms ◽

Work And Family ◽

Hierarchical Regression ◽

Regression Equations ◽

Full Time ◽

Dual Earner ◽

Psychological Symptomatology ◽

Work Family ◽

Role Occupancy

This study examined the hypothesis that gender differences in psychological distress are mediated by job and family role conditions. Previous research has failed to directly test such mediational hypotheses but rather has inferred effects of role conditions from simple role-occupancy variables. The sample consisted of full-time employed married respondents including 161 women with full-time employed spouses, 142 men with nonemployed spouses, and 126 men with full-time employed spouses. Although the sample reported low psychological symptomatology overall, the women in dual-earner families reported more psychological symptomatology than did either group of men. Hierarchical regression equations indicated that work and family conditions fully attenuated this gender differential. Women in dual-earner families also reported less job enrichment, less time at work, and more household labor inequity than did either group of men. They also reported more childcare difficulty than did men with nonemployed spouses. Work-family interference predicted psychological symptomatology and partially accounted for its relationship with some job and family conditions. We discuss processes through which gender affects psychological distress.

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Women's Jobs and Family Adjustment

Journal of Family Issues ◽

10.1177/0192513x8100200202 ◽

1981 ◽

Vol 2 (2) ◽

pp. 126-147 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Chaya S. Piotrkowski ◽

Paul Crits-Christoph

Keyword(s):

Family Relations ◽

Job Security ◽

Occupational Prestige ◽

Paid Work ◽

Family Adjustment ◽

Work Lives ◽

Work Related ◽

Dual Earner ◽

Multiple Characteristics ◽

The Relationship

THIS study investigated the relationship between multiple characteristics of women's jobs and their family adjustment in a sample of 99 women in dual-earner families. Six work-related variables were considered simultaneously as predictors of family adjustment: intrinsic job gratification, satisfaction with job security, job-related mood, time spent at work, occupational prestige, and salary. The results were consistent with the hypothesis that women's paid work lives influence their family adjustment. Women's experiences of their work were significantly related to two of three measures of family adjustment. Salary was negatively associated with satisfaction with family relations for women in low-status occupations only. Time spent at work and occupational prestige showed no significant associations with reported adjustment. Of the three indicators of family adjustment, marital satisfaction appeared to be relatively immune from work influences. We hypothesized that the marital relationship may be less sensitive to women's paid work than are other aspects of their family relations.

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Gender and the relationship between job experiences and psychological distress: A study of dual-earner couples.

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology ◽

10.1037/0022-3514.64.5.794 ◽

1993 ◽

Vol 64 (5) ◽

pp. 794-806 ◽

Cited By ~ 122

Author(s):

Rosalind C. Barnett ◽

Nancy L. Marshall ◽

Stephen W. Raudenbush ◽

Robert T. Brennan

Keyword(s):

Psychological Distress ◽

Dual Earner ◽

Job Experiences ◽

The Relationship

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Does Community Resource Fit Matter to Fathers?

Journal of Family Issues ◽

10.1177/0192513x08327886 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 30 (7) ◽

pp. 1001-1016 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Rosalind Chait Barnett ◽

Karen C. Gareis

Keyword(s):

Psychological Distress ◽

Quantitative Measure ◽

Well Being ◽

Work And Family ◽

Community Resources ◽

Community Resource ◽

Activity Schedules ◽

Role Quality ◽

Job Role ◽

School Activity

Several scholars have noted that community resources might facilitate or hinder employees' ability to meet their many work and family demands, thereby affecting their psychological well-being. However, this is the first study to estimate these relationships using a newly developed quantitative measure of community resource fit that assesses the satisfaction of employed parents of school-aged children with key community resources. In this analysis, the authors focus on the relationships linking one aspect of community resource fit—specifically, child's school and school activity schedules, or school resource fit—as a contextual variable influencing well-being (i.e., job-role quality, psychological distress) in a sample of 53 employed married fathers. Among these fathers, having school and school activity schedules that meet their needs is associated with low psychological distress and high job-role quality. Importantly, fathers with fewer resources in terms of income or job flexibility benefit most in terms of their job-role quality.

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The Relationship between Job-Role Quality and Parenting Behaviors among Employed Mothers in Korea

Journal of Comparative Family Studies ◽

10.3138/jcfs.47.4.527 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 47 (4) ◽

pp. 527-548 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Young Eun Chang ◽

Hee-Jin Kim

Keyword(s):

Parenting Behaviors ◽

Role Quality ◽

Employed Mothers ◽

Job Role ◽

The Relationship

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Interpersonal Stress and Poor Health

European Psychologist ◽

10.1027/1016-9040/a000003 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 15 (1) ◽

pp. 3-11 ◽

Cited By ~ 32

Author(s):

Mette M. Aanes ◽

Maurice B. Mittelmark ◽

Jørn Hetland

Keyword(s):

Psychological Distress ◽

Depressive Symptoms ◽

Social Relationships ◽

Indirect Effects ◽

Social Connectedness ◽

Somatic Symptoms ◽

Total Effect ◽

Subjective Feeling ◽

Interpersonal Stress ◽

The Relationship

This paper investigated whether the lack of social connectedness, as measured by the subjective feeling of loneliness, mediates the well-known relationship between interpersonal stress and psychological distress. Furthermore, a relationship between interpersonal stress and somatic symptoms was hypothesized. The study sample included 3,268 women and 3,220 men in Western Norway. The main findings were that interpersonal stress was significantly related to psychological distress as well as to somatic symptoms, both directly and indirectly via paths mediated by loneliness. The size of the indirect effects varied, suggesting that the importance of loneliness as a possible mediator differs for depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and somatic symptoms. In the case of depressive symptoms, more than 75% of the total effect was mediated through loneliness, while in the case of somatic symptoms just over 40% of the total effect was mediated through loneliness. This study supports the hypotheses that social connectedness mediates a relationship between interpersonal stress and psychological distress. The study also provides the first link between interpersonal stress, as measured by the Bergen Social Relationships Scale, and somatic symptoms, extending earlier research on the relationship between interpersonal stress and psychological distress.

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