Peculiarities of intrafamilial relations of married couple with different levels of occupational employment

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Peculiarities of intrafamilial relations of married couple with different levels of occupational employment

Varina H.

Master of Psychology, Senior Lecturer of the Department of Psychology, Bogdan Khmelnytsky Melitopol State Pedagogical University

Shevchenko S.

Candidate of Psychological Sciences, Associate Professor of Psychology, Bogdan Khmelnytsky Melitopol State Pedagogical University

Abstract

The article theoretically investigates and experimentally identifies the impact of professional activities of spouses associated with increased employment on the peculiarities of relationships and conflicts in the family. Theoretical approaches to the study of changes in family roles in connection with the professional activities of spouses are analyzed. It has been experimentally established that high employment of spouses in professional activities has a negative impact on their marital relations: the level of conflict, the sphere of interaction, marital satisfaction and its stability. The resulting scatter and variability of indicators is explained by the use of subjective assessments of the spouses of their marriage. The highest level of conflict in families where men and women have high professional employment in professional activities was found in the areas of: role-playing, mutual awareness, leisure. In families where wives have a higher employment rate than husbands, the level of conflict is higher in all areas of marital interaction. The data obtained indicate that the process of adaptation of spouses to the new conditions of professional activity associated with high professional employment, the requirements of corporate traditions, and others. The reasons are difficult and pose a number of serious problems for spouses (the number of stable families decreases, the number of unstable and even troubled families increases).

Key words: professional employment, spouses, conflict, marital relations, family well-being.

Варіна Г.Б.

магістр психології, старший викладач кафедри психології Мелітопольського державного педагогічного університету імені Богдана Хмельницького

Шевченко С.В.

кандидат психологічних наук, доцент кафедри психології Мелітопольського державного педагогічного університету імені Богдана Хмельницького

ОСОБЛИВОСТІ ВНУТРІШНЬОСІМЕЙНИХ ВІДНОСИН ПОДРУЖЖЯ З РІЗНИМ РІВНЕМ ПРОФЕСІЙНОЇ ЗАЙНЯТОСТІ

У статті теоретично досліджено та експериментально виявлено вплив професійної діяльності подружжя, пов'язаної з підвищеною зайнятістю, на особливості взаємин і конфліктність в сім'ї. Експериментально встановлено, що висока зайнятість подружжя у професійній діяльності негативно впливає на їх подружні взаємини: рівень конфліктності, сферу взаємодії, задоволеність шлюбом і його стабільність. Отримані дані свідчать про те, що процес адаптації подружжя до нових умов професійної діяльності, пов'язаної з високою професійною зайнятістю, вимогами корпоративних традицій і ін. причинами проходить складно і ставить перед подружжям ряд серйозних проблем (кількість стабільних сімей зменшується, зростає число нестабільних і навіть проблемних сімей).

Ключові слова: професійна зайнятість, подружжя, конфліктність, подружні взаємовідносини, сімейне благополуччя.

Варина А.Б.

магистр психологии, старший преподаватель кафедры психологи Мелитопольского государственного педагогического университета имени Богдана Хмельницкого spouses conflict professional

Шевченко С.В.

кандидат психологических наук, доцент кафедры психологи Мелитопольского государственного педагогического университета имени Богдана Хмельницкого

ОСОБЕННОСТИ ВНУТРИСЕМЕЙНЫХ ОТНОШЕНИЙ СУПРУГОВ С РАЗНЫМ УРОВНЕМ ПРОФЕССИОНАЛЬНОЙ ЗАНЯТОСТИ

В статье теоретически исследовано и экспериментально изучено влияние профессиональной деятельности супругов, связанное с повышенной занятостью, на особенности взаимоотношений и конфликтность в семье. Экспериментально установлено, что высокая занятость супругов в профессиональной деятельности негативно влияет на их супружеские отношения: уровень конфликтности, сферу взаимодействия, удовлетворенность браком и его стабильность. Полученные данные свидетельствуют о том, что процесс адаптации супругов к новым условиям профессиональной деятельности, связанной с профессиональной занятостью, требованиями корпоративных традиций и др. причинами, проходит сложно и ставит перед супругами ряд серьезных проблем (количество стабильных семей уменьшается, растет число нестабильных и даже проблемных семей).

Ключевые слова: профессиональная занятость, супруги, конфликтность, супружеские взаимоотношения, семейное благополучие.

Problem statement. The family is a complex and at the same time integral organism, which functions according to certain laws, has its stages of development and its "pitfalls". In the last few decades, perceptions of what a family is, what the roles of a man and a woman are, and how a family should be arranged have changed greatly. In its modern form, marriage acts as a psychological communication between spouses, cause it is very important to have intimate communication based on respect, love and understanding. Modern families are experiencing many difficulties. The stratification of families by income level is of great importance, another important problem is the destruction of family traditions, norms of behavior. Although the problem of intrafamilial relations in modern science is considered quite widely, including the development of various factors influencing the success of the marriage, but such problem as the relationship of occupational employment of spouses and the degree of their satisfaction with marriage is not sufficiently researched.

The transition to a market economy and the change of forms of ownership have led to the rapid development of activities in various areas of business, which attract not only male but also female. These activities are usually associated with an increase in the time spent for work (business trips, irregular working hours, business meetings in the evening), which can cause dissatisfaction of one of the spouses; cause not only family conflicts but also divorces. Today, the institution of the family and marriage is in a state of crisis, it is manifested in negative indicators of population reproduction, a decrease in the number of registered marriages, a constant increase in the number of divorces and single-parent families. A large number of married couples refuse to solve the problems that arise, considering divorce as a panacea, and avoiding responsibility for the family for the sake of their own well-being. Family scenarios have changed significantly, the understanding of the normative roles of men and women in the family and society, the distribution of responsibilities between the sexes have also been transformed. The causes of the crisis are the following: from different types of temperaments of partners, to the desire to realize in marriage everyone's own needs. At the same time, there is almost no information that the occupational employment of both spouses can be a significant factor that changes the life of the family. It is known that marital and family relationships can either promote or hinder the professional self-realization of each spouse. In case of positive scenario people prefer the relationships that contribute to the personal and professional development of each spouse. In this case, each spouse acts as a facilitator of self-realization of the other one in both family and professional spheres. The family environment of psychological comfort, mutual respect, support of adequate and positive self-esteem, provided by the spouses, has a positive effect on the success in professional activities. M. Argyle has noted that work and other spheres of life have many common features (related to friendship, status and personality traits), therefore, professional self-realization and job satisfaction and other areas of life correlate with life satisfaction in general. This is a process according to which the satisfaction with the work has a decisive influence on overall satisfaction, including satisfaction with marriage [3]. The negative scenario of marital and family relations hinders the professional self-realization of the spouses. In some families, the very fact that the wife works may be a cause of dissatisfaction with the marital and family relationship of the spouses. If the husband sticks to traditional gender stereotypes and believes that the wife should dedicate herself to home and family rather than professional self-realization, family conflicts are inevitable whenever the wife has a conflict between work responsibilities and family needs. The ambiguity and uncertainty of the relationship between occupational employment and intrafamilial relations requires not only the development of psychological strategies and tactics to support the relationship, but also careful theoretical and empirical study.

The aim of the article is to analyze the impact of professional activities of spouses associated with their increased occupational employment on the peculiarities of relationships and conflicts in the family.

Research results. Most scholars emphasize that the most important aspect of family relationships is the personal-rational relationship, which involves orientation towards other person's motives and personal meanings. This layer of relations is manifested in the attitude to joint activities for the sake of this person, in the name of the well-being of the family. A characteristic feature of a favorable personal-rational relationship in the family is mutual understanding between the couple, which is expressed in mutual readiness and ability to empathize and sympathize, understand each other's mood, know what he or she likes and dislikes, what he or she wants and what the husband or wife does not want. Both visible and inconspicuous conflicts of interpersonal, social, psychophysical and physiological nature lay the foundation for family unhappiness [4].

Alyoshina Yu.E., a specialist in the field of family counseling, identified the following groups of reasons for psychological counseling, which are connected with the relationship between the partners in the marriage:

1. Various conflicts, mutual dissatisfaction, which is associated with the distribution of marital roles and responsibilities.

2. Conflicts, problems caused by differences in views on family life and interpersonal relationships.

3. Sexual problems, mutual inability of partners to establish normal sexual relations.

4. Illness of one of the partners, problems and difficulties determined by the need to adapt the family to the disease.

5. Problems of power and dominance in intrafamilial relations.

6. Lack of warmth in the relationship of partners, lack of intimacy and trust, communication problems [1].

Another interesting point of view on the problem of sources of misunderstandings between spouses is expressed by V. A. Sys- oenko. According to the researcher, the causes of all intrafamilial conflicts can be grouped into three major groups:

1. Conflicts based on unfair division of family responsibilities. The main thing in the distribution of family responsibilities is their coherence, as a result of which both the traditional and egalitarian model of the family can be quite acceptable for the family well-being, if they satisfy both partners. If family members understand their roles in their own way and disagree with each other's expectations and requirements, the family is in conflict.

2. Conflicts based on dissatisfaction with certain needs. Each partner wants to meet their own marriage needs. At the same time, partners often do not know each other's real needs, so they do not meet them.

3. Disputes over shortcomings in education. Many conflicts in young families arise because of differences in the rules of family behavior that partners have inherited from their parental families [6].

In the field of family employment there is a horizontal occupational segregation, i.e. asymmetric arrangement of men and women in the occupational structure. In some countries in recent decades, women have successfully made their way into traditionally male professions. Thus, in the period from 1985 to 1995 in the United States the number of women judges increased from 7 % to 18 %, operators and information systems professionals - from 11 % to 28 %, economists - from 13 % to 34 %, architects - from 4 % to 11 % [7]. It should be noted that the distribution of male and female in different professions is largely determined by the established traditions of the country and the economic situation.

A survey of adult women showed that 40 % of them work only for money. The second most common motive is the desire to be in the team, and only the third - interest in the content of professional activity. The transition to a market economy and the emergence of employers-owners have led to the rapid development of new social groups of workers, which are required to have increased business activity (irregular working hours, meetings and communication with business partners in the evening, corporate parties, etc.). Moreover, in modern conditions, women are increasingly included in the working sphere. Women have occupied a strong place in various spheres of public life; there are even some women in public authorities (although in isolated cases). Currently, women seek to establish themselves in professional activities and realize themselves through participation in socio-political life. A characteristic feature of recent years is the focus of more and more women on the profession, which, in their opinion, allows them to be independent and self-sufficient, but causes excessive occupational employment [5].

In families where the level of financial security due to the work of the husband is quite high, the professional activities of wives often cause a negative attitude on the part of husbands. Their motives can sound like ("you have to leave this job"), economic (kindergarten fees can be higher than the mother's salary) or most often related to the interests of the child / children ("our youngest son does not study very well - he needs to be taken care of"). There are also motives that men rarely talk about, but their wives do: "He doesn't want me to work for reasons of prestige. Once he earns well, his wife doesn't have to work. And the psychological comfort of the only one breadwinner in the house is important to him" [8]. Thus, the reason for conflicts is the distribution of gender roles.

Thus, over the past 30-40 years, the study of gender role stereotypes in psychology has not only been sharply intensified, but also qualitatively changed. If the first studies were limited to describing the main content features of the stereotype, now, in the foreground there is not only the desire to explain the nature and functions of gender role stereotypes, but also to explore trends related to changing role stereotypes, to study the impact of interpersonal changes on the intrafamilial relations.

The target group of our study included working married couples under the age of 35 living in Melitopol. The sample was formed by the method of stratification so that the activities of one of the spouses were characterized by increased employment in the professional sphere. Our study involved 30 married couples: 15 families where men have higher occupational employment than women (group 1) and 15 families where women have higher occupational employment than men (group 2). The study was conducted in 2020-2021. In the process of empirical research the following psychodiagnostic methods were used: Method of identifying the nature of the interaction of spouses in a conflict situation (authors Yu.E Alyoshina, L. Ya. Gozman, E. M. Dubrovska) [2]; Marriage Satisfaction Questionnaire, developed by V. V. Stolin. Respondents were also interviewed to find out their subjective satisfaction with marriage and behavioral strategies in resolving family conflicts. The interview involved revealing the couple's opinion about the level of stability and satisfaction with marriage before the emergence of increased occupational employment and at the time of the study.

Each method was used in two versions: for male and female. The level of stability of each family was identified on the basis of the obtained results, which allow classifying each married couple to one of three types:

1) stable couples - they successfully overcome conflict situations, are satisfied with marriage, and constructively solve problems. Spouses are characterized by a low level of conflict and positive family motivation, they emphasize the stability of positive relationships in the family and do not allow the possibility of its breakup.

2) problematic couples - in most cases they can constructively resolve conflicts, are dissatisfied with the marriage, but for various reasons do not want to dissolve it. These couples are characterized by a medium level of conflict.

3) unstable couples - couples with a high level of conflict, they do not overcome family conflicts because they have negative family motivation, they are not satisfied with the marriage and are ready for divorce or have already come to this decision.

As a result of the study and data processing, the following results were obtained.

1. Research of the nature of the interaction of spouses in a conflict situation according to the method of Yu. Alyoshina, E. Gozman, E. Dubrovska.

As can be seen from Fig. 1, the analysis of the empirical data revealed that the level of conflict between spouses in the families where women have higher occupational employment than their husbands is significantly high compared to families with higher professional employment of the men. This pattern has been traced in various areas of intrafamilial interaction, especially in mutual awareness of partners of different aspects of each other's lives in the family. In group 1 (men with a higher level of occupational employment) wives blame men for not trying to discuss with them their problems and plans for the future, for not being interested in the difficulties that women face in domestic life. The lack of attention of men to women in group 1 causes the disharmony of marital relations, promotes mutual mistrust. In group 2, men are dissatisfied with the fact that wives do not pay proper attention to home and family; not interested enough in family problems; are eager to transfer to the husband a lot of family responsibilities; do not share with them their successes and failures in professional activities; behave too independently, thus provoking intrafamilial conflicts. It was found that in the families of group 1 and group 2 couples often prefer to spend leisure time independently: attending corporate parties, restaurants and other places of recreation with work partners. In group 1, wives emphasized that husbands often come back home very late, and sometimes do not spend the night at home at all, without considering it necessary to explain their actions to their wives. Women in this group highlighted that this condition negatively affects the trust of the couple and leads to a high level of their conflicts: in the block of interaction in the field of leisure, the level of conflict in group 1 was 7.8 points (with a maximum of 10 points).

Fig. 1 Indicators of the level of conflict between spouses depending on their occupational employment

In group 2 the conflict of spouses in the field of leisure was even higher than in group 1-8.1 points. This can be explained by the fact that in the families where women have higher occupational employment, men, focusing on traditional lifestyles and role structure of the family, can't accept the fact that wives are rarely at home and they spend their spare time in the company of friends, work partners. This causes mistrust and jealousy of men, exacerbates marital conflicts. Often these conflicts arise due to women's alcohol consumption. In group 2, the number of families in which there were conflicts over the use of alcohol by spouses accounted for 50 % of the total number of families, and in group 1-25 %.

The greatest conflict in the interaction of spouses in both groups of respondents was found in the role sphere. In the families where women have a higher occupational employment than their men (group 2) the level of intrafamilial conflicts is the highest one, compared to other areas and is scored to 8.9 points. In families where men have higher occupational employment, this figure is 7.2 points (with a maximum of 10 points). It was found that in the families of group 2 the wives take a tough position concerning leadership in the family: they show toughness, authority, want to solve family issues alone. In the families where the husband traditionally considers himself to be a head of the family, this condition contributes to destructive marital conflicts. In group 1, where men have higher occupational employment in the professional sphere than their wives, conflicts in the role sphere are not as clear-cut as in group 2.

The results obtained empirically by collecting data on the nature of relationships in families by the method of identifying the nature of the interaction of spouses in a conflict situation allowed us to identify the number of stable, problematic and unstable families with high employment of men and women (table 1).

The data in table 2 show that in the families where women have a high level of employment, the number of troubled and unstable families is higher than in families where men are highly professionally employed, which actually confirms our hypothesis.

Table 1

Number of stable, problematic and unstable families in groups (group 1 - men with high occupational employment), (group 2 - women with high occupational employment)