Date of Award

5-2022

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Psychology

Committee Chair/Advisor

Robert Sinclair

Committee Member

Thomas Britt

Committee Member

Patrick Rosopa

Abstract

People spend a majority of their lives working and commuting is an essential part of most workers’ daily schedule. According to the 2017 American Community Survey distributed by the U.S. Census Bureau, the average commute for Americans is approximately 27 minutes. Time spent commuting has increased in recent decades (Denstadli et al., 2017; Gimenez-Nadal & Molina, 2019; Hoehner et al., 2012; Künn‐Nelen, 2016). Commuting to work is often a source of stress for workers, and its detrimental impacts are a rising public health issue as well as an area of concern for occupational health psychologists. Commuting is not considered a part of the workday and subsequently has not received as much attention as other workplace stressors despite its potential impact on the quality of workers’ lives. Within work-family literature, the constructs of family supportive supervisor behavior (FSSB) and family supportive organizational perceptions (FSOP) are continuing to gain interest as the importance of providing a family supportive work environment is recognized. Organizations are implementing family supportive practices and policies to provide support for employees with work and family responsibilities. But, the impact of commuting on work-family balance has received limited research attention (Denstadli et al., 2017) The purpose of this study was to examine family supportive supervisor behaviors and family supportive organizational perceptions as moderators of the relationship between commuting time and work, health, and family outcomes. This study sought to examine the moderating effects of both FSSB and FSOP on the outcomes of interest to better understand the beneficial impact of each construct. The relationships between commuting times and work-family conflict (WFC), burnout, and turnover intentions were examined in a sample of cross-occupational U.S. workers. No moderating effects were found for FSOP or FSSB. However, results showed significant main effects of FSSB on all outcomes of interest and of FSOP on WFC, overall burnout, physical fatigue, and turnover intentions.

Author ORCID Identifier

https://orcid.org/ 0000-0003-3058-9680

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