Shared Identity, Work-life Roles and Career Priority: A Study of Dual Career Couples

Abstract

Globalization and liberalization are the two main catalysts for the increasing number of dual-career couples in the global workforce. Maintaining work-life balance is a serious challenge for this type of families, which makes it interesting to understand how they cope with it. It is useful to study chemistry between couples to know the pattern of their decision making, their perception for work-life roles, and the effects it has on their respective organizations as both husbands and wives are crucial members of the workforce.

A review of the literature shows that various comparative studies were conducted for dual-career couples, dual-earner couples, and single-earner couples. Various concepts, such as role, career, work-life conflict, work-life balance, social support, crossover effect, spillover effects have been studied across the literature. Based on the literature review, a concept matrix was developed for this study. Research gap identified based on this concept matrix was, no study was conducted (in Indian or global context) for the presence of the Shared Identity construct among couples. Based on this gap, three objectives were developed for this study. They are: ● To measure Shared Identity among dual-career couples ● To study the influence of Shared Identity on different work and life roles (occupational, marital, homecare, and parental) of dual-career couples ● To study the influence of Shared Identity of dual-career couples on their career priorities

The Non-probability sampling method was used to collect data from the target population i.e., dual-career couples, residing in four major cities – Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara, and Rajkot – of Gujarat. Responses were collected using the Self-administered structured questionnaire method. The data was analyzed to determine the categorical differences and thereby relationship was examined using the multivariate technique.

The questionnaire for Shared Identity was developed and was validated using expert opinions. Construct validation was conducted through ‘Exploratory Factor Analysis’ (EFA). The result of Exploratory Factor Analysis showed that Shared Identity was composed of five prime factors: ‘Cognitive’, ‘Affective’, ‘Behavioral’, ‘Perceived similarity’, and ‘Inclusion’. There was significant difference related to various factors, such as gender, age, profession, types of families, presence and absence of children, and origin of couples, whereas there was no significant difference in the Shared Identity in different types of marriages and education levels. These differences were found using ‘Independent t-test’ and ‘Analysis of Variance’ (ANOVA) tests. Shared Identity influenced work (occupational role) and life role (marital and homemaker role), but it did not influence the parental role of couples. Shared Identity along with gender influences the career priority decisions among couples.

This study attempts to contribute to the literature on work-life balance by introducing a new construct – Shared Identity. The study provides a framework for the family counselors and managers to create work-life balance programmes and career development programmes and is concluded with the limitations of the study and scope for future research.