Humane orientation, work-family conflict, and positive spillover across cultures.

Although cross-national work-family research has made great strides in recent decades, knowledge accumulation on the impact of culture on the work-family interface has been hampered by a limited geographical and cultural scope that has excluded countries where cultural expectations regarding work, family, and support may differ. We advance this literature by investigating work-family relationships in a broad range of cultures, including understudied regions of the world (i.e., Sub-Saharan Africa, Southern Asia). We focus on humane orientation (HO), an overlooked cultural dimension that is however central to the study of social support and higher in those regions. We explore its moderating effect on relationships between work and family social support, work-family conflict, and work-family positive spillover. Building on the congruence and compensation perspectives of fit theory, we test alternative hypotheses on a sample of 10,307 participants from 30 countries/territories. We find HO has mostly a compensatory role in the relationships between workplace support and work-to-family conflict. Specifically, supervisor and coworker supports were most strongly and negatively related to conflict in cultures in which support is most needed (i.e., lower HO cultures). Regarding positive spillover, HO has mostly an amplifying role. Coworker (but not supervisor) support was most strongly and positively related to work-to-family positive spillover in higher HO cultures, where providing social support at work is consistent with the societal practice of providing support to one another. Likewise, instrumental (but not emotional) family support was most strongly and positively related to family-to-work positive spillover in higher HO cultures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Gendered share of housework and the COVID-19 pandemic: Examining self-ratings and speculation of others in Germany, India, Nigeria, and South Africa.

This cross-sectional study examined gender differences between male- and female-typed housework during the early COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020. Participants in Germany, India, Nigeria, and South Africa (N = 823) rated their housework share before and during the lockdown, then speculated about the division of housework performed by men and women in general, before and post-lockdown. Women spent more time on female-typed tasks and men (in Nigeria and South Africa) on male-typed tasks before and during the lockdown. Irrespective of participants' gender, they speculated that men's and women's housework was more pronounced post-lockdown than before, but we only found gender differences in South Africa and India. Gender role ideology (GRI) moderated the gender‒housework relationship in Germany, but gender did not moderate the paid work hours and housework relationship in any country. Our findings suggest that gendered housework persisted in these countries and raises concerns that this pattern is likely to continue post-lockdown.

Experiences of workplace breastfeeding in a provincial government setting: a qualitative exploratory study among managers and mothers in South Africa.

BACKGROUND: Return to employment is a major barrier to breastfeeding continuation, globally and in the Southern African context. The Lancet Breastfeeding Series revealed an explicit need for research exploring breastfeeding as a workplace issue in low- and middle-income countries. A dearth of research on workplace breastfeeding in South Africa calls for attention to this topic. This study sought to explore breastfeeding at work experiences from the perspective of employed mothers and senior managers in a provincial government setting in South Africa. METHODS: The study adopted an exploratory qualitative design with multi-perspective semi-structured interviews. Snowball sampling was employed to recruit twelve participants, senior managers (n = 4) and employed mothers (n = 8), from two provincial government departments in Cape Town, South Africa. Interviews were conducted between April and August 2018 to capture participants' experiences with breastfeeding in the workplace. Thematic analysis was used to analyse data. RESULTS: Four key themes that described experiences of workplace breastfeeding emerged which further traversed three critical maternity periods: pregnancy, maternity leave, and return to work. The prevalent themes were: 1) Knowledge about the legislation and breastfeeding support benefits. Most participants only knew about the legislated four months maternity leave and time off for prenatal visits but lacked knowledge about comprehensive maternity benefits; 2) Perceptions and experiences of breastfeeding in the workplace. Breastfeeding was perceived to be a mother's responsibility and a private issue. As a result, most participants stopped breastfeeding prior to or immediately upon return to work after maternity leave; 3) Barriers to breastfeeding continuation, such as the absence of a conversation about infant feeding plans between managers and mothers; and 4) Recommendations to improve breastfeeding support at work from an individual, organisational and national level. CONCLUSIONS: Our study contributions emphasise that breastfeeding support from managers should begin prior to the mother taking maternity leave, and that in addition to providing supportive facilities (such as private space and breastmilk storage), immediate supervisor support may be critical in fostering breastfeeding-friendly workplaces for mothers. Management implications for advancing workplace breastfeeding support in the public sector are presented.