Couples experiencing private life constraints to their career: understanding home-to-career interference from a couple's perspective

Abstract

PurposeThis paper examines home-to-career interference (HCI), i.e., the extent to which employees perceive that their private life has constrained their career decisions to date, from a couple perspective. Building on scarcity theory, the authors expect higher levels of HCI among couples that need more and have less resources and, within couples, among the partner who is most likely to take care of home demands. Therefore, the authors explore the role of children and social support as between-couple differences and gender, relative resources and work centrality as within-couple differences. Moreover, the authors examine how one partner's HCI is related to both partners' life satisfaction.Design/methodology/approachHypotheses are tested using hierarchical linear modeling and APIM-analysis with a sample of 197 heterosexual dual-earner couples (N = 394).FindingsAs hypothesized, employees in couples with more children and less social support reported more HCI. No support was found for within-couple differences in gender, educational level or work centrality. Next, HCI was negatively related to employees' own life satisfaction but not to their partner's life satisfaction.Originality/valueThe authors enrich the understanding of HCI by examining this phenomenon from a couple perspective and shed light on couple influences on career experiences.