Knox, Andrew J. (2016) The Balancing Act: An Investigation into Employees of the Sandwich Generation Working Unpaid Hours at Home. Honours thesis, University of Southern Queensland. (Unpublished)
Abstract
Limited research has been undertaken in an Australian context to understand the nature of employees who work unpaid hours at home. Typically, studies report the number of employees undertaking unpaid work but do not comprehensively explore why employees work at home and do not examine details of the effects on workers. Employees may undertake unpaid work at home for a number of reasons including loving their job, feeling coercion via organisational culture, or because they have too much work to do, amongst other reasons. Working at home may place strain on a worker's ability to balance work and life and may negatively affect work performance. This is particularly true for the sandwich generation - workers with caring responsibilities for children and an elderly relative or other adult requiring care. Accordingly, we applied theories relevant to work-life integration. We hypothesised that unpaid hours worked at home would be positively correlated with Work Life Interference (WLI). It was further hypothesised that the reason for the unpaid hours would moderate the relationship between unpaid hours worked at home and WLI for employees and the amount of hours of care would act as a moderator in the unpaid hours to WLI relationship. Finally, it was hypothesised that unpaid hours worked at home would be positively correlated with self-rated performance. In a sample of 724 workers, we found support for the first and second hypotheses, confirming expectations that unpaid hours at home significantly predict WLI with this association being greater in the sandwich generation. We also found support for the idea that employees work unpaid hours at home because they think it will help them get ahead in their career - this belief acts as a moderator between unpaid hours and WLI. In contrast, while loving your job and having too much work to do were strong predictors of WLI they did not serve as moderators. Finally, self-rated performance did not predict unpaid hours at home although a significant positive association between loving your job and self-rated performance was observed. The findings highlight the complexity of WLI for organisations seeking to support workers of unpaid hours to reduce the risk of burnout or disengagement. It would be advantageous in future studies to more fully explore the different predictors of WLI and incorporate burnout.
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| Item Type: | Thesis (Non-Research) (Honours) |
|---|---|
| Item Status: | Live Archive |
| Additional Information: | Current UniSQ staff and students can request access to this thesis. Please email research.repository@unisq.edu.au with a subject line of SEAR thesis request and provide: Name of the thesis requested and Your name and UniSQ email address |
| Faculty/School / Institute/Centre: | Historic - Faculty of Health, Engineering and Sciences - School of Psychology and Counselling (1 Jan 2015 - 31 Dec 2021) |
| Supervisors: | Erich Fein; James Brown |
| Qualification: | Bachelor of Science (Honours) |
| Date Deposited: | 26 Aug 2025 01:36 |
| Last Modified: | 26 Aug 2025 01:36 |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | work-life interference ; unpaid hours ; sandwich generation ; burnout |
| Fields of Research (2008): | 17 Psychology and Cognitive Sciences > 1799 Other Psychology and Cognitive Sciences > 179999 Psychology and Cognitive Sciences not elsewhere classified |
| Fields of Research (2020): | 52 PSYCHOLOGY > 5299 Other psychology > 529999 Other psychology not elsewhere classified |
| URI: | https://sear.unisq.edu.au/id/eprint/52475 |
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