Work and Leisure

Stress and working parents 153incomes were no more likely to have higher stress than those with lowerincomes. Rather, what we find is that, within each income bracket, there areindividuals who experience stress differently.With respect to hours of work, the median is 41.5 hours, and there are nosignificant differences in median hours worked among high and low stressindividuals. 5 Longer hours do not necessarily produce greater work stress. Aswith income, there are significant differences between the high and low stressgroups by each category of hours worked. This pattern is repeated with yearsat current job. The mean length of time at one’s job is nine years. For highstress individuals, the longer one has been at one’s job, the more work stressone experiences. For low stress individuals, length at job is inversely related tostress, although these differences are not significant. However, within eachcategory of length at job, we again find a significant difference between thehigh and low stress groups.Moving beyond demographics, we next examined whether high and lowstress mothers and fathers had different experiences doing work at home anddifferent thoughts about work. As shown in Figure 8.2, results follow theexpected pattern. High stress mothers and fathers are twice as likely as lowstress mothers and fathers to spend three or more hours a week working athome on the weekends. On weekday evenings, high stress mothers andfathers are likely to spend almost 15 per cent more time doing three or morehours of work at home. These differences in time allocations suggest thatstress and working at home are related, a conclusion often drawn in themedia.As shown in Figure 8.3, high stress mothers and fathers are much morelikely to feel drained, exhausted and angry than low stress mothers andfathers. High stress mothers and fathers are nearly two and half times morelikely than low stress mothers and fathers to say that they feel drained. Theyare twice as likely to report that they are exhausted. This is particularly thecase for high stress fathers who reported feeling exhausted most of the time.Finally the high stress mothers and fathers are one and half times as likelyas low stress mothers and fathers to say they feel angry. Medical researchhas linked high stress to high blood pressure and other physiological effects(Taylor 1991). These results suggest that stress may have deleterious socialand psychological consequences as well.As expected, these long hours and negative emotions take a toll, and wefind that work and family relations suffer. Figure 8.4 shows that high stressindividuals are nearly twice as likely as low stress individuals to think aboutwork when with their families. At the same time, when thinking about work,these high stress parents are more likely to feel guilty about not spendingmore time with their families. High stress parents are also the most likely toreport having higher work and family conflict. This may be the result of theworking conditions that high stress individuals experience. High stressmothers and fathers are more likely than low stress mothers and fathers to