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Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology ( 1 9 9 6 ), 6 9 , 3 5 1 - 3 6 6 Printed in Great B ritain 3 5 1 1996 The British Rsychological Society

Workplace family-supportive programmes:Predictors of employed pa ren ts 'importance ratingsMichael R. Frone'*

Research Institute on Addictions, 1021 Main Street, Buffalo, NY 14203, USA

John K. YardleyDepartment of Recreation an d Leisure Studies, Brock University

Little research has examined the predictors of employed parents' perceived importanceof family-supportive programmes. Therefore, this study examined the relationship ofgender, parenting demands (number of children living at home and age of youngestchild), family-related tangible support (spouse tangible support and other-family tan-gible support), and workfamily conflict (work>family and family>work conflict) tothe perceived importance of six family-supportive programmes (flextime, compressedwork week, job sharing, child-care assistance, work at home and reduced work hours).Survey data were obtained from a sample of 252 employed parents. Hierarchical re-gression analyses revealed that age of youngest child and family>work conflict werethe m ost consistent predictors. Im plications of the findings for the outcome evaluationof family-supportive programmes are discussed.

Several demographic trends are reshaping the composition of the workforce in mostindustrialized nations. Specifically, there are increasing numbers of married women withchildren joining the workforce, and an increasing prevalence of employed adults who arepart of dual-earner or single-parent families (e.g. Bjorklund, 1992; Etzion, Smokoviti &Bailyn, 19 93; Lewis, 199 2; Paris, 1990; Piotrkowski, Rap oport & Rapopo rt, 1987).Therefore, work and family researchers have begun to advocate the development andimplementation of family-supportive prograrnmes (FSPs) by work organizations (e.g.Friedman, 1990; Friedman & Galinsky, 1992; Kraut, 1990; Lewis, 1992; Thompson,Thomas & Maier, 1992). A variety of FSPs have been promulgated. The major pro-gram m es discussed in the workfamily liter ature are flextime, compressed wo rk week , jobsharing, child-care assistance, work at home, and reduced work hours (e.g. Friedman,I99O; Friedman & Galinsky, 1992; Goodstein, 1994; Lewis, 1992; Morgan & Milliken,1992; Paris, 1990; Thompson et al., 1992).Work and family researchers are advocating the development of FSPs in the workplace,and are beginning to examine the factors that predict employer responsiveness to


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352 Michael R. Frone an dJohn K. Yardleywork-fam ily issues (e.g. Goo dstein, 1994 ; Morgan & M illiken, 1992). Non etheleslittle attention has been paid to the factors that predict the importance of FSPs employed parents. Knowing the factors that increase the perceived importance of FSPs useful for several reasons. Such knowledge (1) helps to substantiate anecdotal argumentbased on changing demographics, that there is indeed a desire for FSPs among employepare nts; (2) helps to identify those employed p aren ts mo st likely to benefit from FSPs; an(3) may inform studies that evaluate the effectiveness of FSPs. Therefore, this studexamines the relationship of several potentially important predictors to the perceiveimportance of six FSPs (flextime, compressed work week, job sharing, child-care assitance, work at home and reduced work hours). The potential predictors are gendeparenting demands, family-related tangible support, and work-family conflict.

Prior research and hypothesesGenderResearch on sex-role socialization and on time use suggests that gender may be a signifcant predictor of the importance of FSPs to employed parents. Reviews of the literaturon work and family roles report that men are socialized to give priority to the breadwinner role, whereas women are socialized to give priority to homemaker and motherhooroles (Lewis, 199 2; Major, 19 93 ; Th om pson & W alker, 1 989 ). Moreover, Major (1 993stated that 'deeply ingrained norms about the priority of women's motherhood and ho memaker roles and men's breadwinner roles may produce internal feelings of discomforwhen women and men deviate too far from their internalized norms. They may also produce external sanctions in the form of disapproval by important others when individualdeviate from social norm s' (Major, 19 93 , p. 150). Th e im pact of gend er differences in sexrole socialization is apparent in studies examining the allocation of time to work anfamily roles among men and women. This research suggests that men devote more timthan women to paid employment and that women devote more time than men to chilcare and household tasks (e.g. Dean, 1992; Pleck, 1985; Rodgers, 1992). Moreover, thgender difference in time devoted to child care and household tasks exceeds the gendedifference in time devoted to paid em ploym ent (Pleck, 1 985 ; Ro dgets, 1992).

If FSPs are perceived by parents to grant them the flexibility to balance the demandof work and c hild care, the im porta nce of having access to FSPs should be stronger am onwomen than among men. A recent study by Wietsma (1990), using a sample of 31employed parents drawn from day-care centres in the northeastern United States, founthat women rate the importance of FSPs significantly higher than do men. This gendedifference was significant for a composite importance measure and the importance ratingfor each of the individual programmes comprising the composite measure (i.e. four-dawork week, ability to shift between full- and part-time work, flextime, five days offor sick children, child-care education money, child-rearing leave of absence, companday-care centre, and company day-care lunch room). Although supporting the abovargument for gender differences in the perceived importance of FSPs, the gen eralizabilitof Wiersma's findings needs to be examined.


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Family-supportive programmes 3 5 3Parenting demandsThe importance of FSPs among parents may be a function of the amount of parentingdemands to which an individual is exposed. Two objective characteristics that are likelyto increase the level of parenting demands are the number of children living in the house-hold and the age of the youngest child. As the number of children that live in the homeincreases, so too will the number of hours devoted to such tasks as transportation, super-vision, school-related activities, cooking and shopping. Moreover, young children createincreased logistical demands in tetms of providing needed child care, and an increasedresponsibility to stay home with or locate additional care when they become ill. Priorresearch has found that num ber of children is positively relate d, and age of youn gest childis negatively related, to the amount of time devoted to child care, domestic work anderrands (e.g. Bre tt & Yogev, 1989 ; Izraeli, 1993 ). Furth er, these parental dem and s mayinterfere w ith daily job activities (e.g. Bre tt & Yogev, 198 9; Crouter, 198 4; Izraeli, 19 93 ;Marshall, 1992; Vandenheuvel, 1993) and occupational achievement (Glover, 1994),thereby eliciting a need and desire among employed parents fot work-based FSPs thatmitigate any negative influence of parenting on their work roles.Hypothesis 2a . Number of children living at home will be positively related to the per-ceived importance of FSPs.Hypothesis 2b. Age of the youngest child living at home will be negatively related to theperceived importance of FSPs.

Family-related social supportSocial support from one's spouse and other family members may influence the importanceof FSPs to employed parents. Perceived social support can be broadly defined as'the resources provided by other persons' (Cohen & Syme, 1985, p. 4). Although severaltypes of support have been postulated and assessed by various researchers (see Cohen &Wills , 1985, fot a review), tangible or instrumental support is the most likely formto influence the perceived importance of work-based FSPs. Tangible support representsthe direct provision of needed resources and services by individuals in one's social net-work (Cohen & Wills, 1985). Although a large body of research has examined therelationship between tangible social support and both psychological and physical well-being (e.g. see Cohen & Wills, 1985, for a review), no research has examined the rela-tionship of tangible support to the perceived importance of FSPs among employedparents. Based on the conceptual definition provided above, the availability of tangiblesupport from one's spouse and othet family members is expected to reduce the perceivedimportance of FSPs.Hypothesis 3a . Tangible support from one's spouse will be negatively related to the per-ceived importance of FSPs.Hypothesis 3b. Tangible support from other family members will be negatively related to


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354 Michael R. Frone andJohnK. YardleyWorkfamily conflictPrior research on work-family conflict suggests that a relatively large proportion oemployed adults with family responsibilities report that their work and family roles intefere with one anothe r (e.g. Frone, Russell & Cooper, 1992;?; Pleck, Staines & Lang, 1980Moreover, research indicates that frequent workfamily conflict may lead to adverse joband family-related outcomes, such as role-related dissatisfaction, low levels of role perfomance, and role-related withdraw al (e.g. Bedeian, Burke & Moffett, 198 8; Burke, 198 9Frone, Batnes & Fatrell, 1994; Frone, Russell & Cooper, 1992^; Goff, Mount & Jamiso1990; MacEwen & Barling, 19 94; O'DriscoU, Ilgen & H ildre th, 199 2; Patasuram anGreenhaus & Granrose, 19 92; Rice, Frone & Mc Fatlin, 1992 ; Yardley, 1994). Thereforbased on the assumption that employed parents are motivated to reduce work-familconflict and its negative impact on work and family outcomes, Wiersma (1990) hypothesized and found a positive relationship between wotkfamily conflict and a compositmeasure of the perceived importance of FSPs.

Although supporting the hypothesized relationship between work-family conflict anthe perceived importance of FSPs, Wiersma's (1990) study was limited by the use ofglobal measure that confounded the directional nature of workfamily conflict. In othewords, the measure assessed both the extent to which work interfered with family lif(work->family conflict) and the extent to which family life interfered with wot(family>work conflict). A growing body of empirical research indicates that the twtypes of wo rk-fam ily conflict ate differentially related to domain-specific an teced ents anoutcomes (e.g. Frone et al., 1994 , 1992^; Frone & Yardley, 19 96; MacEwen & Barling1994; O'DriscoU etal., 1992). W ith regard to antecedent conditions, fam ily-> wo rk conflict is associated with the amount of time devoted to family activities and the experiencof family-related demands and stressors, whereas work->family conflict is associatewith the am oun t of time devoted to work and th e experience of work-related de ma nds anstressots. W ith regard to outcom es, family>work conflict is associated with negativwork outcomes (e.g. job dissatisfaction, poot work performance, and wotk-related withdrawal), whereas work>family conflict is associated with negative family outcome(e.g. family dissatisfaction, poor family performance, and family-related withdrawal)Taken together, prior research suggests that family demands affect job outcomeindirectly via family>work conflict, whereas work demands affect family outcomeindirectly via work->family conflict (see ^Tontet al.'s, \992b, model of the work-familinterface).Th u s , by using a glo bal m easure of workfamily conflict, it is unclea r from W iersm a(1990) study whether the positive relationship between workfamily conflict and the perceived im portan ce of FSPs was mo tivated by a desire to reduce family >wotk conflic(resulting from family demands) and its negative impact on job-related outcomes, a desirto reduce work->family conflict (resulting from work demands) and its negative impacon family-related outcomes, or a desire to reduce both types of wotk-family conflict. Ian effort to explore this issue in more detail, the following hypothesis and research question were examined:


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Family-supportive programmes 355Corollary research question. Are both fam ily-> wo rk conflict and w otk ->f am ily conflictpositively related to the perceived importance of FSPs?

MethodsSample and procedureThe sample was drawn from a mid-sized financia l services company located in Onta rio, Canada. A question-naire covering a variety of issues regarding work and family life was distributed to all 600 em ployees and wasfilled out on company time. Respondents were informed that the primary purpose of the questionnaire wasfor an outside research project examining job stress and work-family processes. A secondary goal was to pro-vide feedback to the company regarding the work-family problems and needs of its employees. Completedquestionnaires were returned to the investigators via locked collection boxes that were located at employeeentrances and cafeterias, or by mail using stamped envelopes that were provided with the questionnaire. Intotal, 480 questionnaires were returned, yielding an 80 per cent response rate. The subsample for the p resentstudy was comprised of the 252 respondents who had children living at home.On average, respondents were 36.17 (SD = 6.19) years old, worked 41.04 (SD = 7.82) hours per week(including paid and unpaid ov ertime), and worked for the company for 8.98 (SD = 6.60) years. In term s offormal educa tion, 1.2 per cent had less than a high school education, 53.2 per cent had a high school educa-tion, and 45.7 per cent had at least a college diploma. The m odal number of children living at home was 2.0(range = 1-5). The age of the youngest child living at home was less than six years of age for 45.6 per cent,between six and 17 years of age for 46.0 per cent, and 18 years of age or older for 8.3 per cent of the respon-dents. Seventy-four per cent were women and 90.5 per cent were married or living as married. The medianfamily income category was $50 OOO-$59 999 (Canadian).

MeasuresDescriptive statistics (i.e. means and standard deviations) and zero order correlations are presented inTable 1.Gender. Gender was coded as 0 = male and 1 = female.Parenting demands. To assess parenting dem ands, respondents were asked to report the num ber of children thatwere living at home. In addition, respondents reported the age of the youngest child living at home accord-ing to the following three categories: 1 = under six years of age, 2 = between six and 17 years of age, and3 = 18 years of age or older.Tangible support. The perceived availability of tangible support was assessed separately for spouse and for otherfamily members using four parallel items adapted from the tangible support subscale from Cutrona &Russell's (1987) Social Provisions measure. The tangible support items and the six-point agree/disagreeresponse scale are provided in Appendix A. Coefficient alpha was .76 for spouse tangible support and was .81for other-family tangible support.Work-family conflict. Twelve items were used to assess work-fam ily conflict; six item s each assessed the degreeto which a respondent's job interferes with his or her home life (work->family conflict) and the degree towhich a respondent's home life interferes with his or her job (family->work conflict). For each of the twodimensions of work-family conflict, the present measure was developed by combining the two-item scaledeveloped by Frone et al. (1992a,*) and the four-item scale used by Gutek, Searle & Klepa (1991). Thework-family conflict items and thefive-pointfrequency-based response scale are provided in A ppendix B. Toassess the dimensionality of the work-family conflict items, an exploratory factor analysis wasconducted. Thefactor analysis revealed three factors with eigenvalues > 1.0. However, the scree plot suggested retain ing two


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Family-supportive programmes 357second factor (oblique rotated loadings = .46 to .74). In addition, the 12 cross-factor loadings were small(oblique rotated loadings = -. 06 to .19). Coefficient alpha was .87 for work->family conflict and was .79for family>work conflict.Importance of am ily-supportive programmes. Respondents were provided with a list of six potential FSPs and wereasked to 'Indicate how im portant the following work issues are to you as an (Company N ame) employee'. Wephrased the question stem generally in terms of work issues rather than more specifically in terms of family-supportive programmes in an effort to minimize any explicit confounding between these outcome measuresand the family-related predictor variables. The six FSPs were flextime , compressed work week, job sharingopportunities, child-care assistance, work at home policies and reduced hours of work. The importance of eachFSP was assessed with a seven-point response format that ranged from 1 = not at all important to 7 =extremely important.

Statistical analysisHierarchical regression analysis (e.g. Cohen &. Cohen, 1983) was used to test Hypotheses 1^ . For each impor-tance rating that served as a dependent variable, the following predictor variables were entered on Step 1:gender, number of children, age of youngest child, spouse tangible support, and other-family tangible sup-port. The two work-family conflict measures were then entered on Step 2. The two-step hierarchical entry ofvariables was used because prior work-family conflict research, which was cited above, suggests thatwork-family conflict might mediate the relations between the other predictor variables and the importanceratings.

Missing dataSeveral respondents were missing data on one or both of the two support scales, but had valid data on all othermeasures used in the analyses. Specifically, 22 single parents were not able to provide data on the spouse tan-gible support scale, 27 married parents were unable to respond to the other-family tangible support scalebecause they did not have other family members available, and two single parents were unable to provide dataon both measures of tangible support. In order to m aximize the number of respondents available for the anal-yses, each of these 51 respondents were assigned the m ean value on the tangible support scale they were miss-ing. Although only two of these 51 respondents were missing data on both tangible support scales, weinitially conducted two sets of regression analyses to determine if including individuals with missing datainfluenced the relationships between the tang ible support measures and FSP importance ratings. The firstsetincluded the 51 respondents who were missing data on at least one of the support scales (N = 252), whereasthe second set excluded these 51 respondents (N = 201). The pattern of significant and non-significantregression coefficients across the six outcome measures were identical in the two sets of analyses. Therefore,because the 51 respondents who were missing data on at least one of the support measures had valid dataon each of the other five predictors, and including them did not influence the results for the two tangiblesupport measures, we estimated the hierarchical regression equations using the full sample of 252 respon-dents.

ResultsThe results of the hierarchical regression analyses are summarized in Table 2. The firstblock of variables led to a significant increment in R^ for five of the six FSP importanceratings (i.e. flextime, compressed work week, job sharing, child care and work at home).The regression coefficients reveal that gender is significantly related to the importanceratings for job sharing and child care. Consistent with Hypothesis 1, the regression coef-


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Family-supportive programm es 359The number of children living at home is only related to the importance of child care,and th e direction of this relatio nship (i.e. negative) is oppo site to predictio n (i.e. positive).Th u s , there is no support for Hypothesis 2a. In contrast, age of youngest child is signifi-cantly and negatively related to the importance of flextime, compressed work week, childcare and work at home. There also is a marginally significant (p < .10) negative relation-ship between age of youngest child and the importance of reduced work hours. Thus, theresults provide strong support for Hypothesis 2b.With regard to the two tangible support measures, there is only one significant rela-tionship. Specifically, other-family tangible support is negatively related to the impor-tance ratings for compressed work week. Thus, the results fail to support Hypothesis 3aand Hypothesis 3b.Finally, the second block of variables, containing the two workfamily conflict vari-

ables, led to a significant increment in R^ for all six FSP importance ratings. Moreover,the individual regression coefficients reveal that family->work conflict is significantlyand positively related to the importance ratings for all six FSPs, whereas work->familyconflict is unrelated to all six outco me s. Th us, there is strong sup por t for Hy poth esis 4 inrelation to family->work conflict only.

D i s c u s s i o nThe goal of this study was to examine the relationship of gender, parenting demands,family-related tangible support, and work-family conflict to the perceived importanceof work-based FSPs. The results concerning each ofthese predictors is discussed in turn,followed by a discussion of the lim itatio ns of the prese nt research.GenderOverall, the present results provide limited support for the hypothesis that men andwomen differ with regard to the perceived importance of FSPs. A gender difference wasfound only for two of the six FSPs included in this study. In contrast, of the eight FSPsexamined by Wiersma (1990), a significant gender difference was found for all of them.In terms of similar results across the two studies, women in this study had higher impor-tance ratings for job sharing and child-care programmes than did men. The finding forchild care replicates findings reported by Wiersma (1990). Of the eight FSPs examinedby Wiersma, five represent some form of child-care assistance and all five programmeswere more important to women than to men. Although Wiersma did not ask about jobsharin g, our finding of a gend er difference is consisten t with wom en's desire for more flex-ibility to meet their family and paren ting dem ands. No netheless, there are several incon-sistencies between our results and those of Wiersma. Both studies asked about theimportance of flextime, compressed work week and reduced work hours. However,whereas Wiersma found that these programmes were significantly more important towomen than to men, our study failed to find gender differences. In addition, we askedabout work at home and found no significant gender difference.Three explanations may account for the failure to replicate Wiersma's (1990) finding of


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360 Michael R. Frone andJohn K. Yardleyhad no restrictions on the ages ofthe children living at home. To examine the possibilitythat more consistent gender differences might be found among parents with young chil-dren, additional analyses were conducted that tested for an interaction between genderand age of young est child. H owever, none ofth e six interaction tests (one of each outcom e)were statistically significant. Thus, sample differences based on children's age do notexplain the different patte rn of results across the two stu dies.

Second, it is possible that both men and women in our sample desire FSPs, but for dif-ferent reasons. To the extent that recent studies still show that women devote more timethan men to child care and household tasks (e.g. Rod gers, 1 992 ), wom en may desire theseFSPs because they allow them to both meet their family responsibilities and reduce anynegative spillover from home to work. In contrast, men may have found several of theseprogrammes (i.e. flextime, compressed work week, reduced hours, work at home) equallyim po rtan t because they allow for more tim e to be devoted to personal and leisure purs uits.With regard to activities off the job, time use studies not only show that women devotemore time to child care and housework than men, but that men devote more time to per-sonal and leisure pursuits than women (e.g. Shaw, 1991). Thus, the failure to replicateWiersma's findings may be the result of men in the present sample rating these pro-grammes as important as women, but for different reasons. The men in Wiersma's studymay not have focused on the po ten tial freedom th ese pro gram m es could afford th em interms of personal and leisure activities. Future research assessing both importance andmotives for desiring such programmes would be useful.

Third, Wiersma used a sample of employed parents from the USA, whereas the presentstudy used a sample of employed parents from Canada. Perhaps Canadian parents aremore egalitarian than US parents when it comes to meeting family responsibilities.Alternatively, the corporate cultu re in Canadian firms may place less stigm a on em ployedfathers who want to avail themselves of FSPs than their US counterparts. Work-familyresearchers suggest that although US employers generally expect both men and womento behave as though work and family life are independent, they may be less acceptingof men's than women's needs and desires concerning flexibility to meet family responsi-bilities (see Starrels, 1992; Thompson et al., 1992, for reviews). Because this possibleexplanation cannot be tested in the present study, future cross-national work-familyresearch is needed.

Parenting demandsThe present results support the relationship between parenting demands and employedparents' desire for FSPs. Ofthe two parenting demand variables examined in this study,num ber of children living at hom e and age of youn gest child, th e latter was related to theperceived importance of five out of the six FSPs (i.e. flextime, compressed work week,child-care assistance, work at home and reduced work hours). In each case, parents withyoung er children rated th e availability of FSPs as being m ore imp orta nt than pa rents w itholder children. This finding is consistent with prior research indicating that the presenceof young children in the hom e increases the am oun t of time devoted to child care, dom es-tic work, and errands (e.g. Brett & Yogev, 198 9; Izraeli, 1993). It is presum ably the exten tto which these elevated parenting demands interfere with daily job activities that elicits


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Family-supportive programmes 361tive influence of pa ren ting on the ir work roles. As discussed in mo re detail below, our datasupport this explanation.

Family-related social supportContrary to expectations, both spouse and other-family tangible support were unrelatedto the perceived importance of FSPs. Although it seems reasonable to posit that anemployed parent's perceptions of tangible support from either their spouse or other fam.-ily members might attenuate the need for FSPs, two explanations can be offered for thenull results. The first explanation rests on a growing distinction in the social support lit-erature between the perceived availability of support (i.e. available support) and supportactually received (i.e. received support, see Dunkel-Schetter & Bennett, 1990, for areview). In the present context, available tangible support refers to the perception thatone's social network comprises individuals from whom one can obtain needed resourcesand services. In contrast, received tangible support refers to tangible assistance that hasbeen actually obtained. The measures of spouse and other-family support used in thisstudy assess the perceived availability of tangible support from one's spouse and otherfamily members, not the amount of tangible support that is actually received from thesetwo sources.

Employed parents, and especially mothers, may not ask for help from their spouse andother family members because they do not want to impose on them or because theybelieve that asking for help reflects negatively on th eir ab ility as pare nts. If high scores onmeasures of available support do not coincide with a high amount of received support, onewould not expect perceptions of support availability to be negatively related to the im-portance of FSPs. In their review of eight studies, Dunkel-Schetter & Bennett (1990)found that measures of available and received support are not highly correlated (averager= .18).

A second explanation for the null relationship between tangible support and theimportance of FSPs is that we used a general measure of tangible support. Perhaps a morefocused measure that assesses the availability of assistance regarding child care and otherhousehold responsibilities would be related to the perceived importance of FSPs. Giventhese two possible explanations, future research should assess both the perceived avail-ability of tangible support and the amount of tangible support received specifically withregard to child care and household chores.

Work family conflictOur results support Wiersma's (1990) finding that workfamily conflict is positivelyrelated to the perceived importance of FSPs. However, we extend Wiersma's study byexamining both work->family and family->work confl ict . The results reveal thatfamily->work conflict was positively related to the rated importance of all six FSPs,whereas work>family conflict was unrelated to all six FSPs. Thus, the distinctionbetwe en the tw o types of workfamily conflict is im po rta nt. T his pa ttern of findings sug -gests that the major motivation underlying parents' desire for FSPs is to reduce fam-


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362 Michael R. Frone andJohn K. Yardleythem. That is, employed parents and employers assume that FSPs can help employeesmanage family-related demands, thereby reducing the prevalence of family->work con-flict and its adverse impact on organizational outcomes (e.g. Crouter, 1984; Friedman1990; Friedman & Galinsky, 1992; Gonyea & Googins, 1992; Kraut, 1990; Morgan &Mill iken, 1992, Thom pson et al., 1992).

The pattern of findings regarding work-family conflict is also consistent with the ear-lier described relationship between age of youngest child and the importance of FSPs. Asnoted, parents of young children may rate the availability of FSPs as more important thanparents of older children because young children increase parenting demands, which inturn have a negative impact on job-related outcomes. If this is true, one would expecfam ily -> w or k conflict to med iate the relationship between age of youngest child and theperceived importance of FSPs. To test this possibility, we compared the magnitude of theregression coefficients for age of you nge st c hild from Ste p 1 of the reg ression analyses (seeTable 2) to the magnitude of the same coefficients from Step 2 after family->work con-flict was forced into the regression equations (not shown in Table 2). This comparisonrevealed that, with the exception of the importance ratings for child-care assistance, ageof youngest child was no longer significantly related to flextime, compressed work week,work at home and reduced work hours after controlling for fam ily -> w or k conflict. Theseresults support the notion th at fam ily -> w or k conflict is a more proximal predictor of theimportance ratings, thereby mediating the influence of age of youngest child.

The finding that fam ily -> w ork conflict was positively related and wo rk -> fa m ily con-flict was unrelated to the perceived importance of FSPs provides a potentially importantimplication for studies that evaluate the effectiveness of FSPs. Such studies have focusedon two types of outcomes: (1) reductions in work-family conflict and (2) reductions innegative work outcomes (e.g. work-related withdrawal and job dissatisfaction). Reviewsof the literature conclude that evaluation research generally fails to provide strong andconsistent support for the effectiveness of FSPs (e.g. Gonyea & Googins, 1992; Kingston,1990). Documenting the effectiveness of FSPs is critically important because in theabsence of such data, the general lack of enthusiasm shown by businesses for FSPs willcontinue unabated (Kingston, 1990). One explanation suggested by our results for thefailure to document the effectiveness of FSPs is tha t prior evaluation studies have failed totake into account the type of work-family conflict being assessed and baseline measuresof family->work conflict. This oversight can affect the results of evaluation studies intwo ways. First, when examining the relationship between utilization of FSPs and post-utilization reductions in work-family conflict, our findings suggest that it is importantto assess separately work->family and family->work conflict. To illustrate, a study byGoff al. (1990) failed to find a relationship between the utilization of an on-site day-care centre and levels of workfamily conflict. However, Goiiet al. used a global measureof work-family conflict that combined items assessing the two types of conflict. Had sep-arate measures been used, our results suggest that a negative relationship may have beenfound between day-care utilization and family->work conflict, but not between day-careutilization and work->family conflict.

Second, when examining the relationship of FSP utilization to post-utilizationmeasures of family>work conflict or work outcomes (e.g. job satisfaction, absenteeism,


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Family-supportive programmes 363family->work conflict may have a stronger need and be more likely to benefit from FSPsthan employees who experience little family>work conflict. Thus, baseline measures offamily>work conflict may moderate the relationship between FSP utilization and post-utilization o utcome measures. The rationale is that if a FSP is made available to employ-ees, some individuals may use the programme even if they were not experiencing highlevel of family->work conflict before the programme was offered. For example, in thecase of day care, an employee may take advantage of a work-based programme becauseit is less expensive or more convenient than their current child-care arrangement.Alternatively, in the case of job sharing, it may simply fit the employee's personal desireto work less hours. Thus , one mig ht expect a strong relationship between FSP utilizationand post-utilization outcom e measutes only amon g employees who experience high base-line levels of family> work conflict. Fu ture FSP evaluation research should test the use -fulness of these suggestions.

Study limitationsAlthough the results of this study provide insight into the factors that influence employedparents' perceived importance of FSPs and have implications for evaluating the effective-ness of such programmes, several study limitations need to be noted. First, this study wasbased on a sample of employed parents from a single company. Moreover, this study andthe study reported by Wiersma (199 0) were based on samples from N ort h A merica. U nti ladditional research is conducted using samples from a variety of companies, industries,and cultural contexts, the generalizability of the present findings is unknown. Givenwide variation am ong coun tries in family-supportive p ublic policies and subsidized fam-ily/child-care leave (e.g. Cohen, 19 91 ; Hofferth & Deich, 1994 ; Joshi & Davies, 1992 ), itis likely that the importance of employer-initiated FSPs may vary systematically acrosscountries. Therefore, future research that examines broader multinational samples willlikely lead to greater insight into the needs of and FSPs desired by different groups ofemployed adults. Such information would be useful to multinational corporations to theextent that personnel programmes need to be designed with a specific workforce andnational context in mind.

Second, we examined the importance of family-supportive program me s from the contextof the nuclear family. In other w ords, with the exception of gender, we examined predictorsrelated to parenting dem ands and conflict. H owever, caregiving is a broader construct thatincludes taking care of me mbe rs from one's extended family (e.g. parents and grandp arents).There is a growing body of literature showing that with the increasing life expectancy inindustrialized nations, employed adults need to cope with elder-care demands as well aschild-care demands (e.g. Barling, MacEwen, Kelloway & Higginbottom, 1994; Scharlach,Lowe & Schneider, 1991). Future research should incorporate both types of caregiving whenexaming the needs and desires of employed adults reg arding FSPs.

Third, this study relied on cross-sectional research, thereby limiting inferences regard-ing causal direction. However, several of the independent variables represent objectivedemographic characteristics (e.g. gender, number of children, age of youngest child) thatcannot be influenced by paren ts' importanc e rating s. In addition, it seems unlikely tha t a


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364 Michael R. Frone an dJohn K. Yardleyavailability of spouse and other-family social support and the frequency of experiencinboth types of wotkfamily conflict.

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Hi l l sda le , NJ: Erlbaum.Coh en, S. & Sym e, S. L. (19 85 ). Issues in the stu dy and a pplicatio n of social supp ort . In S. Cohen & S. L. Sym

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Etzion, D ., Smok ovit i , L. N . & Bailyn, L. (199 3). A cross-cultural com parison of American, Israel i , and Greewomen pursuing technical and scientific careers. International Review of Sociology, 1 - 2 , 7 6 - 9 4 .

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(Ed.), Work,Families and Organizations. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.Frone, M. R. , Barnes, G. M. & Farrel l, M. P. (199 4). Relat ion ship of wo rk-fam ily conflict to substance us

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366 Michael R. Frone and John K. YardleyAppendix A

Tangible support itemsSpouse1. I can depend on my spou se/partner to help me if I really need it.2. If something went wrong, my spouse/partner would not come to my assistance (reverse score).3. I can depend on my spouse/partner for aid if I really need it.4 . I can count on my spouse/partner in an emergency.Other family1. I can depend on some other member(s) of my family to help me if I really need it.2. If something went wrong, some other member(s) of my family would not come to my assistance (reverscore).3. I can depend on some other member(s) of my family for aid if I really need it.4 . I can count on som e other m embeK s) of my family in an em ergency.Response scale1 = strongly disagree, 2 = mod erately disagree, 3 = sl ightly disagree, 4 = sl ightly agree, 5 = mod erateagree, 6 = strongly agree.

Appendix BWork-family conflict itemsWork>family conflict1. After work , I come hom e too t i red to do some of the thin gs I 'd l ike to do. (G)2. On the job I have so much work to do that it takes away from my personal interests. (G)3. My family/friends disl ike how often I am preoccupied with my work while I am at home. (G)4 . My work takes up t ime that I 'd l ike to spend with family/friends. (G)5. My job or career interferes w ith m y respon sibi l it ies at hom e, such as yard work, co okin g, cleaning, repairshopping, paying the bi l ls , or chi ld care. (F)6. My job or career keeps me from spen ding the amo unt of t ime I would l ike to spend w ith m y family. (F)Family^work conflict1. I'm too tired at work because of the things I have to do at home. (G)2 . My personal demands are so great that i t takes away from my work. (G)3. My superiors and peers dislike how often I am preoccupied with my personal life while at work. (G)4 . My personal life takes up time that I'd like to spend at work. (G)5. My h ome l ife interferes with my respon sibi l it ies at work , such as ge t t ing to work on t im e, acco mp lishin

daily tasks, or working overt ime. (F)6. My ho me l ife keeps me from spend ing the amo unt of t ime I would l ike to spend on job- or career-relateactivities. (F)Note. (G) = item from Gate\ietat. (1991 ); (F) = item from Frone c; a/. (1992).Response scale1 = never, 2 = seldom, 3 = sometimes, 4 = often, 5 = very often.


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