Formal and Informal Supports for Managing Work and Family

Abstract

Many working adults manage joint work and family responsibilities and turn to supports offered at work and in the home to help manage these roles successfully. We review the current evidence on supports for improving work–life outcomes, including informal support from people at work and at home as well as formal organizational and national policies. Informal support is consistently moderately associated with better work–family experiences. Despite popular emphasis on formal policies, evidence for their effectiveness is relatively weak. We propose an agentic perspective to drive future understanding of how and when supports may be used to improve work–family management.