Premium
Fighting for time: Spillover and crossover effects of long work hours among dual‐earner couples
Author(s) -
Xu Xiaohong,
Peng Yisheng,
Zhao Peng,
Hayes Richard,
Jimenez William P.
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
stress and health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.009
H-Index - 61
eISSN - 1532-2998
pISSN - 1532-3005
DOI - 10.1002/smi.2882
Subject(s) - spillover effect , spouse , psychology , work (physics) , crossover , partner effects , social psychology , dual (grammatical number) , developmental psychology , economics , sociology , mechanical engineering , artificial intelligence , anthropology , computer science , engineering , microeconomics , art , literature
Drawing upon the spillover–crossover model, this study examined the extent to which one's work time demands spilled over to the family domain and crossed over to his or her spouse, utilizing data of 365 dual‐earner couples from the 500 Family Study. The results of the distinguishable actor–partner interdependence model indicated that there was gender symmetry in the spillover processes such that the effects of work hours were identical between men and women. Further, although there was more bidirectional crossover between partners within couples, we observed some unidirectional crossover from husbands to wives. Specifically, husbands only increased their contribution to domestic work in response to wives' work fatigue, whereas wives increased their contribution to domestic work in response to husbands' work fatigue and high workloads. Finally, husbands' housework hours negatively related to wives' marital satisfaction and positively related to wives' depression, whereas wives' housework hours negatively related to husbands' marital satisfaction and depression. These findings have practical implications for improving the work–family balance, health, and well‐being of dual‐earner couples.