Occupational Wellbeing Among Female Academics ; the Influence of Family-Work Interface

There has been a plethora of research on work-life and work-family balance in Nigeria and across the globe, however there is still much to learn of the intersection between people’s work and non-work life. This study examines the influence of work-family interface on occupational and general wellbeing of women in academia. A descriptive survey research design was adopted, with a researcherdesigned set of questionnaires of reliability co-efficient of 0.72 obtained through Cronbach alpha methods. A stratified random sampling technique was adopted in selecting 220 participants from two tertiary institutions in Ibadan, Nigeria out of which 181 were used for data analysis. Frequency Count, Standard Deviation, Pearson Product Moment Correlation and Rank Order were used for data analysis. Findings revealed that work-family interface significantly correlates with, and influences both occupational and general wellbeing of female lecturers. It was suggested that efforts should be geared towards ensuring that work-family balance policy options (such as job sharing, compressed working hours, selfrostering, telecommuting, flexi time, child-care assistance, and so forth) are made for women academics. Such policies should prioritise work flexibility for female academics.


Introduction
In traditional African society, work activities were carried out simultaneously with domestic activities at home.It was purely an agricultural system where the family was a unit of production and productions were made purposely for family consumption (Fajana, 2006: 10;Googins, 1991).In those days, and to an extent presently in some rural areas, labour services were rendered on family agricultural farms and no wages were paid.Extra farm labour was seldom hired and in such cases, payments were made in kind, rather than cash, i.e., in terms of food, clothing and shelter (Fajana, 2006).There was division of labour as the father hunted for animals, the mother gathered fruits and vegetables, while the children handled house chores like sweeping, cooking and sometimes fetched water with the mother.The employer was the father and family head and was, at his discretion, all-in-all as he determined the reward system, recruitment, selection, promotion, and not necessarily based on merit or seniority.He provided food, housing and security for all the employees (mostly family members) and even determined when they would get married and to whom (Iwuji, cited in George, Owoyemi & Onokala, 2012).
However, with the advent of the industrial revolution and the ensued technological advancement, people left agricultural and family business for paid employment in factories that were located outside the home.Clark (2000: 748), posits that the more industrialized the market economy became, the more workplaces were created outside the home and the more organisations, other than families, were in charge of productions.This physical and temporary separation between work and family lives poses several challenges to modern day employees.Since work and family are now in different domains or spheres which influence each other, certain changes in the nature of work and society have now emerged and increased the burden and responsibilities which are placed upon individuals both at work and at home.The work-family dichotomy also leads to a number of anomalies which, according to Brief and Nord, cited in Clark (2000) include; increase in divorce rates, leading to a high number of single parents; growing female participation in the labour force; more parttime work; increased labour mobility, which distances them from social supports of nuclear and extended families; changing employee expectations indicating greater interest in quality of life outside work; and growing social value placed on the fathers' involvement in the home [p.249].
Resultantly, one of the issues at the front burner in today's business world and among researchers in business and organisational behaviour is finding a balance between work and family life (Anafarta, 2011: 168;Fapohunda, 2014: 72) such that work-life conflicts can be managed if not eliminated totally.This is why there has been a plethora of research on work-life and work-family balance in Nigeria (see Adisa, Mordi & Mordi, 2014;Akanji, 2013;Amazue, & Ugwu, 2014;Fapohunda, 2014) and a substantial amount of studies of same concern have been done across the globe, (see Ahmed, Muddasar & Perviaz, 2012;Anafarta, 2011;Arif, & Farooqi, 2014;Shujat, Cheema & Bhutto, 2011; among others).However, there is still much to understand about the intersection between people's work and non-work life.Specifically, a scanty number of studies have been targeted at investigating female employees whose domestic responsibilities seem weightier than of male counterparts.This study thus, builds on work-family border theory (Clark, 2000: 751) to examine how female lecturers address the changing nature of their work and family commitments throughout their life course and how such interface influences their wellbeing, both at work and in general.

Statement of the Problem
Apart from the enormous day-to-day tasks of teaching, formulating questions, marking scripts, attending to students as guardians, engaging in research, supervising undergraduate and postgraduate students, performing community service duties (such as heading units and being members of committees etc) within and outside the university or college communities by academics, the tripartite demand that academic jobs place on lecturers is enormous.An academic staff member must be a teacher, researcher and community service provider (Akinjobi, 2013: 21;Kuther, 2015).For the female academics, research reveals that most academics' time is taken mostly by research and writing that are usually done in evenings and weekends.This is time that women need to keep up their homes and raise their families (Kuther, 2015).Since it is a must that female academics do research to keep their jobs and earn tenure while completing essential domestic obligations, they juggle career needs, family responsibilities towards husbands and children, socio-cultural responsibilities to and relationship with relatives; society and personal recreation needs (Akinjobi, 2013: 21).To balance these multiple conflicting roles of being a professional, a mother, a house worker, among others, is a stressful but indispensable routine.When domestic work is coupled with a busy professional life, the workload can become burdensome, and it increases significantly as she procreates.Consequently, they suffer from strange rashes, neck and back problems, rheumatoid arthritis, breast infections, asthma, lupus among others (Kuther, 2015).
Unfortunately, stressors are interactive and cumulative: the more stressors one experiences, the greater the likelihood of stress-related health problems (Kuther, 2015).It may degenerate into hidden injuries resulting from exhaustion, overload, insomnia, anxiety, shame, aggression, hurt, guilt and feelings of being out-of-place, fraudulence and fear of exposure within the contemporary academy (Gill, 2009:1).It is against this backdrop that a study of this kind becomes imperative, such that the following research questions can be addressed:

Literature Review
Occupation refers to a group of everyday life goal-directed activities which are associated with any life domain but not necessarily work, such as leisure, education, or self-care (Anabym, Jarus, Backman, & Zumb, 2010: 81).However, work activities take more (both physically and mentally) from individuals than other daily engagements which raises the question of workplace wellness more often than wellness in general aspects of life.Hence, the concept of occupational wellbeing has gained popularity over the past few years (CIPD, 2007:1) because it has been recognised as a key factor in determining an organisation's long-term effectiveness (ILO, 2009).Many scholars have attempted a conceptualisation of occupational wellbeing but the definitions, even though related, overlap significantly.According to ILO (2009) and Marie-Amélie, et al., (2013:1) occupational wellbeing relates to all aspects of working life, from the quality and safety of the physical environment, to how workers feel about their work, their working environment, the climate at work and work organization.Whereas wellbeing is more than an avoidance of becoming physically sick, it involves creating an environment to promote a state of contentment which allows (an) employees to flourish and achieve their full potential for the benefit of themselves and their organisation (CIPD, 2007: 4).Although this common and everyday view of occupations as work, employment, or one's chosen career rather than recognizing that occupations refer to everything that people do during the course of everyday lives has been criticised by recent scholars (Davis & Polatajko, 2010;Singh, 2014:24).To conceptualise occupational wellbeing in such perspective will amount to reducing it to 'workplace' wellbeing.
Occupational wellbeing refers to the wellbeing derived from participation and engagement in meaningful and valued occupations which may include but is not exclusively limited to paid work (CAOT, 2007;Singh, 2014: 24).This is why occupational wellbeing is subdivided into two categories (workplace and general wellbeing) in this paper.

Dimensions of Wellbeing
It appears that wellness has varieties of domains (CIPD, 2007), categories, levels or types (Grebner, Semmer, & Elfering, 2005).Grebner, et al., did a longitudinal research on working conditions which shows three types of wellbeing: general wellbeing, job-related wellbeing and spill-over from work to non-work domains.This categorisation is in congruence with that of the Black Dog Institute except that the latter's has more detailed and specific types of wellbeing.Researchers at the Institute came up with results indicating where an individual sits on the following four areas of occupational wellbeing: a) work satisfaction, b) organisational respect for the employee, c) employer care, d) intrusion of work into private life.Another set of scholars also categorised aspects of human wellbeing using different indices in different contexts.Ryff and her colleagues studied a general context, and came up with 'sixdimensional context-free model' of well-being (Ryff, 1989;Ryff & Keyes, 1995).These dimensions include: a) self-acceptance: a positive evaluation of oneself and one's past life; b) environmental mastery: the capacity to effectively manage one's life and the surrounding world; c) autonomy: a sense of self-determination and the ability to resist social pressures to think and act in certain ways; d) positive relations with others, expressed by, for instance, a genuine concern about the welfare of others; e) personal growth: the sense of continued growth and development as a person as well as openness to new experiences; and f) purpose in life: the belief that one's life is purposeful and meaningful and that one has something to live for.This is context-free while a study on job-specific wellbeing by Warr (1994) reveals four dimensions of job-specific wellbeing to include: affective wellbeing, aspiration, autonomy and competence.These four dimensions are considered by Warr as primary while a secondary fifth dimension; 'integrated functioning' was added.The fifth dimension encompasses the four primary dimensions of wellbeing and reflects the person as a whole (Warr, 1994).The CIPD, (2007: 8) also developed five domains of occupational wellbeing to include: a) Physical wellbeing (whether an individual is healthy or sick); b) emotional wellbeing (whether an individual is contented or distressed); c) wellbeing on personal development (whether an individual is flourishing or demotivated); d) wellbeing on values (whether an individual is committed or disengaged); and e) wellbeing on organisation or work (whether an individual is prospering or failing).With its general and work-specific nature, wellbeing is understood to be best mixed with other aspects of personal life among which family is most significant.Hence, the study of familywork interface and occupational wellbeing is desirable.

Studies on Work-life Interface and General Wellbeing
A growing body of empirical studies now focus on wellbeing and its connection with other variables within and outside organisations.In the past two to three decades, many studies on workplace have concentrated on its connection or benefits to individuals, organisations and societies in general.The studies of Betsey & Justin, 2013;Böckerman, et al., 2012;Cotton & Hart 2003;Dame, 2006;Davis & Polatajko, 2010;Graham, 2003;Marie-Amélie, et al., 2013;Singh, 2014;Tehrani, et al., 2012;Willmott & Haslam, 2007;Wood, 2010; among others, have all made efforts towards adding to our understanding of wellbeing.While the study of Dame (2006) examined the best way to manage workplace wellness to boost employee as well as business performance, studies of Böckerman, et al., (2013) investigated variables like high management involvement and their influence on employee wellbeing.Various other scholars show connections between wellbeing and performance (Cotton & Hart 2003), productivities (Graham, 2003), job design (Wood, 2010), work-related stress, (Siti Aisyah, et al, 2012), income (Betsey, & Justin, 2013), burnout, (Singh, 2014) among others.A wide array of revelations has been made from the outcomes of these studies.Yet, there are only a few studies on wellbeing in connection to the concept of work-family interface especially among academia.Does it mean that the interface of work and family is so insignificant to people's wellbeing, or has it been a widely known phenomenon, that it does not need further empirical probing?For the sake of empirical confirmation, it can be stated hypothetically that work-family interface may influence workers' wellbeing (research question 1): Is there a relationship between work-family interface and general wellbeing among academics?

Studies on Female Academics and Workplace Wellbeing
In spite of the recent public enlightenment and campaign for gender mainstreaming in paid work, work roles are still seen to be men's primary domain while women are still primarily responsible for the home and children (Doucet, 2000;Noor, 2003: 298;Windebank, 2001).The situation is worse in the African continent where patriarchy is more intense.The perceptive distribution of work roles is not likely to be given prominence at the place of work where men and women who earn the same amount are expected to undertake the same weight of tasks.This makes work-family roles of women more complex than men's.Studies of Noor (2003), accounted for a number of family-related and work-related roles (variables) that seriously undermine women's general wellbeing.However, the study was not carried out in the African context and it was not particularly focused on female, academics.Other studies that have given attention to female academics occupational wellbeing are either conducted in contexts foreign to Africa (see Kinnunen, Feld, Geurts & Pulkkinen, 2006;Schmidt & Umans, 2014) or are not with special attention on work-family interface (see Cusack & Numer, 2012;Daukantaitė, 2006;Hellsten, Martin, McIntyre & Kinzel, 2011;Mugweni, Mufanechiya & Dhlomo, 2011;among others).
While the study of Kinnunen, et al., (2006), examined the negative and positive spill over between work and family as influenced by work-family interface among Finnish women, the study of Schmidt and Umans, (2014) investigated the experiences of well-being among female doctoral students in Sweden.Noor (2003) examined workrelated and family related variables as they influence the wellbeing of British women in Malaysia; a context where patriarchy is not strongly practised as it is in Nigeria.These studies would have provided us with adequate information of work-family interface and occupational wellbeing of female academics if conducted in cultural areas where women roles are perceived to be dominant at home.Unfortunately also, while the doctoral study of Daukantaitė (2006), on middle-aged Swedish women's general Subjective Wellbeing focused on the importance of childhood factors, social circumstances, and personality, other studies on women wellbeing in university work tried to relate wellbeing to job-related stress, personality, and burnout among College of Education lecturers (Salami, 2009) social support (Salami, 2009;Cusack & Numer, 2012), hopes and hiccups concerning promotion (Mugweni, et al., 2011), academic track tenure, (Hellsten, et al., 2011), among others.None of these empirical studies show connections between workfamily interface and workplace wellbeing.The study of Asiedu-Appiah, Aduse-Poku, and Acheampong (2014), which examined work-life balance of female lecturers in the African setting (Ghana) related it with career progression and not workplace wellbeing.Mugweni, et al., (2011) also investigated work-family conflict associating it with barriers to female lecturers' promotion and not on workplace wellbeing.However, in Nigeria, Ogbogu (2013) recently attempted a study of work-life balance among female academics in Nigeria but it was focused on job performance as the dependent variable.While the outcomes of these researches constantly demonstrated that work-family interface connects and affects certain aspects of female life, there is still much to understand about the intersection between female academics' job task/responsibilities and their wellbeing at work (workplace wellbeing) especially in the Nigerian context.This provokes the second research question: Does the interface of work and family significantly affect workplace wellbeing of female academics?

General/Context-free Wellbeing and Workplace Wellbeing
In the literature, especially on the dimension of wellbeing, it appears undeniable that general wellbeing (as in the first research question) is not the same as workplace wellbeing (as in the second research).
While the formal encompasses all aspects of wellbeing (such as, financial wellbeing, occupational wellbeing, workplace wellbeing, physical wellbeing, emotional wellbeing, family wellbeing, community wellbeing, among others), the latter simply refers to the wellbeing derived from participation and engagement in meaningful and valued occupations which may include but is not exclusively limited to paid work (CAOT, 2007;Singh, 2014: 24).Rather than reckoning with a particular model, the present study dwells on these multidimensional aspects of wellbeing to develop a framework (see Table 1 for the categories of wellbeing) considered suitable for the objects, subjects and context of this study.

Method
Research design and procedure: This study adopts a descriptive survey research design; a set of questionnaires was used as instruments to collect data from the female academic staff about the influence of work-family interface on occupational wellbeing among them.To obtain data for this study, the researchers designed a set of questionnaires with a 7 point rating scale of work-family interface and occupational wellbeing.The reliability test of the instrument yielded reliability co-efficient of 0.72 obtained through Cronbach alpha methods.With the aid of two research assistants who were postgraduate students, a sample size of 220 female academics selected by stratified random sampling technique from two tertiary institutions.They are 117 from the University of Ibadan and 1wq from the Polytechnics Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria.In all, 201 questionnaires were retrieved giving a return rate of 91.4% but 181 were found useful for data analysis.The responses were scored and used to prepare a spread sheet on Microsoft Excel for computer analysis.

Data Analysis:
The statistical techniques that were used for analysis of the data include the use of Frequency Count, Standard Deviation, Pearson Product Moment Correlation and Rank Order.The dependent variable was occupational wellbeing of female academics while the independent variable was the interface of work to family life of these women.

Participants:
The mean age score of the participants was 36.70 years with a standard deviation of 4.50 ranging from 25 to 55 years.While 59% are married, 31.5% never married and 9.5% once married.The average number of years in service of participants was 10.6 years (S.D. = 5.60) ranging from 1 to 20 years.

Results
Findings are presented in tabulated form according to research questions.

Discussion of Findings
The study investigated the influence of work-family interface on occupational and general wellbeing of female lecturers in selected tertiary institutions in Ibadan south-western Nigeria.The analysis revealed that work-family interface significantly correlates with both occupational and general wellbeing of female lecturers.On general wellbeing, (first research question), the mean score of work-family  Noor (2003) which accounted for a number of family-related and work-related roles (variables) that seriously undermine women's general wellbeing.On workplace wellbeing (second research question), the mean score for the interface of work and family is 16.78 while workplace wellbeing based on this interface is 16.64.The correlation is 0.707 which is significant at 0.01 level (see Table three).It shows that the interface of work and family significantly affect workplace wellbeing of female academics.The more the task and responsibility of work intersects with family life, the more its effects intensify on their wellbeing at work.These findings build up to the existing body of knowledge advanced by previous other previous studies (such as Kinnunen, et al., 2006;Schmidt & Umans, 2014) which investigated female academics' occupational wellbeing in contexts that are foreign to Africa.Earlier studies on occupational wellbeing among women have also examined its association with other variables such as jobrelated stress, personality, and burnout (Salami, 2009) social support (Salami, 2009;Cusack & Numer, 2012), hopes and hiccups concerning promotion (Mugweni, et al., 2011), and academic track tenure, (Hellsten, et al., 2011).The current finding suggests a new determinant factor (work-family interface) in occupational wellbeing.
In Table four, the third research question was addressed.The area of general wellbeing where work-family interface has highest influence is family life which has a mean score of 4.21 amounting to 60%.The interpretation is that the distance and/or closeness to one's family and the extent to which one is responsible at home is the most affected by the interface of job to family life.This finding confirms the postulations of Brief and Nord, cited in Clark (2000) that workfamily dichotomy affects family life such that it leads to increased divorce rates, leading to a high number of single parents; increased labour mobility, which distances them from social supports of nuclear and extended families; and growing social value placed on fathers' involvement in the home [p.249].After family life, an area of general wellbeing where work-family interface has the second highest influence is on their personal growth with a mean score of 4.11 which amount to 58.7%.Personal growth being the sense of continued growth and development as a person as well as openness to new experiences in life, has some consistence with recent findings of Asiedu-Appiah, et al. (2014: 426) which suggest that family-work conflicts have a negative effect on the career progression of female lecturers.Following this finding, it appears that whatever affects career progression or personal growth affects overall purpose in life.This is probably why the third area of general wellbeing where workfamily interface has the highest influence is their purpose in life.
Purpose in life is defined as the belief that life is purposeful and meaningful and that female lecturers have something to live for.In other areas of general wellbeing, work-family interface has an average level of influence.
The last research question was addressed in Table five; the area of workplace wellbeing where work-family interface has highest influence is on aspirational wellbeing with a mean score of 4.17 (59%).Aspirational wellbeing means wellbeing in personal and occupational development: whether an individual is flourishing or demotivated on the job.This finding is very crucial and critical and consistent with our findings on personalgrowth (under general wellbeing) with a mean score of 4.11 which amount to 58.7%, an area where work-family interface has the second highest influence (see Table 4).This finding is meaningful because previous studies (see Mugweni, et al., 2011;Akinjobi, 2013;Asiedu-Appiah, et al., 2014) have demonstrated that work-life conflict has negative effects on the career progression of female lecturers.A majority of the respondents in the study of Asiedu-Appiah and his colleagues agreed that combining family and work-life affect female lecturers' ability to pursue further studies and publication.Their aspiration and ability to flourish at work is badly affected because academic qualification and research productivity are a major factor in career progression.In the same perspective with current findings on aspirational wellbeing, the study of Akinjobi, (2013: 21) revealed the challenges facing female academics such as juggling career needs with family responsibilities towards husbands and children, sociocultural responsibilities to and relationship with relatives; society and personal recreation needs, which seriously undermine their research productivities and ability to progress.The present findings also corroborate the findings of Mugweni, et al., (2011) which suggested that balancing work responsibility with the domestic role of female lecturers is one of the barriers and hiccups for rising to top leadership positions in universities.Asiedu-Appiah, et al., (2014: 426)

Conclusion and Recommendations
Female academics' aspiration and ability to flourish at work is badly affected as work-family interface undermines their ability to pursue further studies and publications.They are grievously disadvantaged because the interface of work and family is found to affect their relationships with friends and members of their immediate families, while distancing them from their domestic responsibility and social supports from friends, relatives and possibly extended family members.
Based on these findings, it is recommended that government, university administrators and management alike, men whose wives are academics should bear in mind that the interception of work to family life has grievous effect on female lecturers' wellbeing both at work and in their general life.As such efforts should be geared towards ensuring that a work-family balance policy is crafted for women academics, especially those married who are in the process of procreating.Such policies should place top priority on 'work flexibility' and ensure adequate quality of working life for female academics.A number of work-life balance options may be incorporated into such policies.Such options include job sharing, compressed working hours, self-rostering, telecommuting, flexi time, child-care assistance, among others (see Fapohunda, 2014: 75).
The area of general wellbeing where work-family interface has highest influence is family life, as revealed in this study.There is, therefore, an urgent need for public campaign and enlightenment about gender mainstreaming in the perception and distribution of family responsibility.It is also important that, in the family institutions, women's homework, which includes but is not limited to child rearing and caring, cooking, housekeeping and other domestic responsibilities of women should be evenly divided between men and women, especially if they are both in paid employment.The perception that paid work is mostly men's primary domain, while women are perceived to be primarily responsible for the home and children should be corrected with immediate effect.
Whatever affects career progression or personal growth affects overall purpose in life, and the intersection between work and family life of female lecturers seriously undermines their career progression.These adverse effects can be mediated through various empowerment programmes or units targeted towards women in academia.These empowerment programmes or units, established in each campus, should consider first priority to expand job and career prospects for women academics for professional growth in teaching and research as well as personal development (aggrandisements.) It is also pertinent to say that this study focused only on two tertiary institutions in Ibadan south western, Nigeria.Future studies may expand its scope to cover more state and federal institutions across south western region.It will also be useful to investigate and quantify the perception of female lecturers in universities as compared to those in polytechnics and colleges of educations in Nigeria.Future studies may also explore, compare and contrast the work-family balance policies that are most effective in reducing work-life conflict among women academics.Such studies may distinguish policies that are most effective in universities from those that are effective in polytechnics or colleges of education.

Table 1 :
Categories of wellbeing

Table 2 .
Correlation between work-family interface and general wellbeing

Table 3 .
Correlation between work-family interface and workplace wellbeing of female academics

Table 4 .
Ranking of areas of general wellbeing according to intensity of influence by work-family interface

Table 5 .
Ranking of areas of workplace wellbeing according to intensity of influence by work-family interface Average interface was 16.58 with standard deviation of 4.218 while general wellbeing based on the interception had a mean score of 16.52 and standard deviation of 6.048.Correlation is 0.777 which is significant at 0.01.This means that work-family interface has a significant positive correlation with wellbeing in general.This finding corroborates earlier finding of also found 72.1% evidence that childbearing and child care negatively conflict with the job progression of female lecturers.