Work–Life Balance

Work and family are considered the primary domains in a person’s life. The interface between the work and family domains of life is studied across psychology subfields (e.g., clinical, developmental, and social) and by other disciplines (e.g., anthropology, sociology, family studies, economics, and women’s studies). Industrial and organizational (I-O) psychologists are interested primarily in how interactions between work life and family life, or more broadly the nonwork aspects of one’s life, influence important individual and organizational outcomes. The terms work–family and work–life are often used interchangeably; but family sometimes refers more specifically to familial roles (e.g., spouse or parent), whereas life may refer more broadly to familial roles and other nonwork roles (e.g., church member or community volunteer). Thus, the more encompassing term, work–life, is ...