Relation between Working Caregivers’ Work-family Conflicts and Their Intentions to Continue Working

Abstract

Purpose: As more people quit work to take care of family members, it has become urgent to construct a support system so that they can continue their outside work. To meet that necessity for a system, this study clarifies the relation of working caregivers’ conflicts between work and family roles and clarifies their intentions to continue working.

Methods: This study examined 3,000 working caregivers. Anonymous, self-administered questionnaires were sent by mail. Analyzable questionnaires were returned by 696 respondents (response rate 23.2%). The questionnaire asked respondents about their basic attributes, jobs, work interference with family (WIF) and family interference with work (FIW) using a Japanese version of the work-family conflict (WFC) scale, and their intentions to resign, change jobs, change employment status.

Results: The average respondent age was 57.2 (SD8.8) years; 79.3% were women. Those who intended to resign, change jobs, or change employment status were, respectively, 36.2%, 24.4%, and 41.4%. Logistic regression analysis results indicated that the group of respondents with higher WIF was more likely to have intentions to resign (OR=1.57，95%CI=1.09-2.27) , change jobs (OR=2.25，95%CI=1.47-3.45), or change employment status (OR=2.84，95%CI=1.97-4.10) compared to the group with lower WIF. The group of respondents with higher FIW was more likely to have those intentions than the group with lower FIW (OR=1.52，95%CI=1.06-2.17: OR=2.37，95%CI=1.57-3.58: OR=2.14，95%CI=1.51-3.04).

Discussion: Results suggest that working caregivers with high WFC intended to resign from their jobs, suggesting difficulties with continued working.