http://france.elsevier.com/direct/ERAP/

Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée 56 (2006) 5–13

Original article

E-ma1

Dr. JTeessideShe is afor Peop

1162-90doi:10.1

Homeworking and work-life balance:

does it add to quality of life?

Travail à domicile et équilibre travail-vie quotidienne :est-ce un plus pour la qualité de vie ?

J. Moore 1

Psychology Section, School of Social Sciences and Law, University of Teesside, Middlesbrough TS1 3BA, UK

Received 20 May 2004; received in revised form 25 November 2004; accepted 20 February 2005

Abstract

Work–life balance has recently emerged as part of a wider focus on quality of life issues. This paper adopts a personal well-being approach tothe quality of life suggesting that a positive relation between self and place is essential to well being. The aim of this paper is to examine thepotential contribution of homeworking to the quality of life. This paper draws from a recent study of homeworkers, funded by the ESRC. Inter-views and questionnaire data are presented, with 123 homeworkers and 371 women working in the North East. The paper concludes by suggest-ing the benefits of flexible working are equally experienced and are differentiated by gender and type of work.© 2006 Elsevier SAS. All rights reserved.

Résumé

L’équilibre entre le travail et la vie privée est apparu récemment comme un aspect particulier de la qualité de vie. Cet article adopte uneapproche de la qualité de vie centrée sur le bien-être individuel, suggérant qu’une relation positive entre le soi et le lieu de vie est essentielle pourle bien-être de l’individu (Lynch, 1981; Grayson and Young, 1994; Moore, 2000b). L’objectif de ce travail est d’examiner les apports du travail àdomicile à la qualité de vie de l’individu. L’analyse est fondée sur une récente recherche auprès des personnes travaillant à leur domicile financéepar le ERSC. Les résultats sont issus de questionnaires et d’entretiens auprès de 123 hommes et 371 femmes travaillant à domicile dans le nord-est de l’Angleterre. Les conclusions suggèrent que les avantages du travail à la carte est perçu de la même manière par l’ensemble de l’échantil-lon, tout en étant différencié par sexe et par type de travail.© 2006 Elsevier SAS. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Home; Work–life balance; Well-being; Working from home; Health

Mots clés : Chez soi ; Équilibre travail et vie privée ; Bien-être ; Télétravail ; Santé

1. Introduction

The current debates on the balance between work and fa-mily life have been strengthened by policy initiatives adopted

il address: j.m.moore@tees.ac.uk (J. Moore).eanne Moore is Senior Lecturer in Psychology at the University ofin the UK.Chartered Psychologist and Secretary of the International Associationle-Environment Studies

88/$ - see front matter © 2006 Elsevier SAS. All rights reserved.016/j.erap.2005.02.013

in the UK and across the EU (DTI, 2002). No longer is thefocus on an individual’s personal quest for a balanced life,but rather a societal effort to instill broad-based support for aworkforce which makes time for family, and a workplace thatfacilitates this. From an economic perspective, the wave of fa-mily-friendly policies have at their heart, a drive to increaseemployment retention, cut office costs and reduce stress inthe workplace, as well as encourage families to care for theirown. However, this trend also rides on a more humane accep-tance each life has to be balanced between work and homeresponsibilities for maximum harmony. Work–life balance has

J. Moore / Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée 56 (2006) 5–136

been debated as part of the wider focus on quality of life is-sues. This mysterious, apparently immeasurable balance israrely defined or clarified (Crosbie and Moore, 2004).

One of the flexible initiatives that have been promoted aspart of a range of family-friendly policies is homeworking.Although not new, it is increasingly offered to workers as partof their working schedule, with some being encouraged towork from home one day a week, to those who have beenrelocated to their homes. This paper will examine homework-ing as part of a wider move to improve the work–life balanceand quality of life through an examination of data from a recentESRC study.

1.1. Work–life balance and homeworking

There has been a recent policy debate on work–life balance,replacing earlier discourses surrounding family friendly poli-cies (Bryson et al., 2000; Duncan, 2002; Hartley, 2002). Ac-cording to the DTI, “regardless of age, race or gender, every-one can find a rhythm to help them combine work with theirother responsibilities or aspirations, and the work life balanceinvolves adjusting working patterns in ways which allow peo-ple to achieve this rhythm” (DTI, 2002).

Work–life balance has been interpreted as a range of flexibleworking patterns, including part-time work, job sharing, timeoff in lieu and staggered hours which can help people balancetheir work and home commitments (DTI 2001a, 2002). Home-working is presented positively in these documents, despite ac-knowledging the potential for isolation. This forms part of awider trend in which homeworking is presented as the answerto the stresses of working life; that being at home, in itself, cancounter the stressors of working life and positively tip thework–life balance. Lewis et al. (2003) have argued that worklife balance has been constructed as a personal problem inwhich an individual has to co-ordinate the different aspects oftheir personal life. But they argue that these decisions are notjust based on individual choices, they are related to social andsocietal values and assumptions. They suggest the term ‘inte-gration of paid work with the rest of life’ instead of work lifebalance to counter this emphasis.

The current policy view endorses the idea that the opportu-nity to work at home can help reconcile work and home obli-gations. This has been supported to some extent by research(Aldrich, 1982; Bulos and Chaker, 1991; Carsky et al., 1991;Duxbury et al., 1998; Galinsky et al., 1993; Hill et al., 1996;Hutchinson and Brewster, 1994; Mahfood, 1992; Mirchandani,1998; Qvortrup, 1992; Sullivan and Lewis, 2001). There aremany assumptions which have taken hold as part of this pre-vailing view. Most significantly there is a benign view of homeas a positive and rewarding part of the balance, providing awholesome counterpoint to the more negative workplace. Thisis however an assumption worth challenging. There has beenother work suggesting that there are potential difficulties andtensions that come with this practice (Ahrentzen, 1992; Gur-stein, 1991; Gurstein, 2001; Haddon, 1998). Homeworkingcan increase the permeability of the boundary between workand family domains, causing attempts to juggle work and fa-

mily schedules to become more difficult (Crossen, 1990; Foe-gen, 1993; Olson and Primps, 1984). Sullivan (2000) reportedthat homeworkers found similar levels of work–family conflictto on-site workers and that more negatively, work can intrudeinto home and family life.

Another element to challenging the benign role, equitableand achievable that home plays in relation to work–life bal-ance, is the absence of gender in ongoing debates. Clearlywork–life balance has been a reality for women even beforethe industrial revolution. The term has evolved to be genderneutral in recent years. However, women’s experience of bal-ancing work and family life is shaped by their over-riding re-sponsibility for caring for children and domestic work. There islittle doubt that women bear the brunt of family responsibilitiesand this has had a noted effect on women’s careers and pro-gression in the labor market. (Cabinet Office, 2001; Fagan andBurchell, 2002; Hogarth et al., 2001; Opportunity Now, 2000;Walby and Olsen, 2002). Hogarth et al. (2001) found that39.1% felt that women’s commitments to care for others hadprevented them from getting work or progressing in work. Inthe UK, with expensive childcare and inflexible full-time work,women have sought out part-time, flexible working hours(Hakim, 1997; Rubery et al., 1999). While this can help wo-men personally, it does little to change the culture of full-timework. Kodz et al. (2002) identified key aspects of a more flex-ible approach as including the ability to vary their workinghours, the flexibility to work from home when necessary orbeing able to come into work later or leave earlier after work-ing long hours.

Managerial and professional women find the work–life bal-ance problematic, and experience stress, because their partners,if they have them, are more likely to be working full-time. Arecent study found that 58% of men working full-time and 72%of women working full-time agreed that ‘there are so manythings to do at home, I often run out of time before I get themall done’ and women were more likely to report stress at work(69% as compared to 64% of men); lower levels of work–lifestress were reported by routine and manual respondents(Crompton and Brockmann, 2003). Another study reported that47% find it easy to separate their working life from their homelife but more than 56% feel that separation is important.(Facilities Innovation, 2003).

In a recent ESF funded study of women’s working lives inthe North East of England, juggling work and home was some-thing many women were finding a challenge (Green et al.,2003). 22% of women worked on average 30 hours or underper week, the majority worked between 31 and 40 hours. Wo-men often mentioned the need to consider the needs of theirchildren and partners in relation to their working lives. Theirchoices and patterns of work were shaped by childcare andtheir partner’s employment, location, transport among otherthings. Women talked about feeling guilty when they were atwork and how home can be a barrier to work. A third of wo-men wanted to change their working hours. This was evenhigher, 42%, for the sample as a whole. Almost a quarter ofwomen (23.5%) felt that lack of flexible working hours hadbeen a barrier to their employment or progression. Others men-

2 The focus on each of these types is supported by the findings of Phizack-lea and Wolkowitz (1995) who demonstrated the diversity of experience be-tween low-skilled and high-skilled homework.

J. Moore / Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée 56 (2006) 5–13 7

tioned the balance they were seeking between the right job andprogression, their children and childcare, and having time as afamily. Women generally did not view work in isolation, butmade employment choices in the context of wider roles andresponsibilities (Green et al., 2003).

Drawing from psychological frameworks of home experi-ence developed in previous work, this study will examinehomeworking from an environmental psychological perspec-tive (c.f. Bonnes and Secchiaroli, 1995; Canter, 1977; Gifford,2002; Moore, 1998; Sixsmith, 1986). Such an approach un-iquely examines the multivariate relationship between peopleand the physical, social, cultural and personal home and work,rather than on the impact of one on the other. The way home-working is experienced is therefore placed within its social,physical and cultural context. The tensions and difference with-in this experience are as important as the positive experiencesand consensus (Moore, 2000a). Environmental psychology isuniquely placed to provide some theoretical and practical illu-minations on the relationship between home and work. Increas-ingly these activities are not place-bound. Work is the newhome, with UK workers spending the longest hours workingin Europe and home is the new workplace with rising numbersof homeworkers (Felstead and Jewson, 2000). This is predictedto rise to at least a third of the workforce by 2006 (HenleyCentre, 1998).

1.2. Quality of life

Quality of life indicators are used across the developedworld to assess the personal, social and physical environmentin which people are living. In the UK, the Audit Commissionco-ordinates the voluntary collection of data from local autho-rities which covers economic, social and environmental well-being (Audit Commission, 2003). These include perceptions ofcrime, housing quality and noise pollution among others. Qual-ity of life is most often used in a health context. However, ithas a more general use. Beyond crude aggregates, quality oflife has individual meaning as much subjective as objective.Quality of life refers to subjective and objective aspects ofwell-being and satisfaction with life (Interdisciplinary Centrefor Quality of Life, 2000). It is a term with many potentialinterpretations. Ambiguous, it can refer to how well an indivi-dual’s life is going, but also capturing the quality of living con-ditions, including environment and culture. (Megone, 1990, p.28). In this sense, there are tangible environmental factorswhich can shape quality of life but these are filtered throughan individual’s goals and purposes (Canter, 1983). In otherwords, there can be no fixed checklist of factors or conditionsapplicable for everyone but rather that all environments canonly be understood through their interaction over time withparticular individuals. At root, quality of life is about a senseof well-being (Grayson and Young, 1994). This paper adopts apersonal well-being approach suggesting that a positive rela-tion between self and place is essential to well being (Graysonand Young, 1994; Lynch, 1981; Moore, 2000b). The other fac-tor to consider is that quality of life may not be equitable with-in the family as it may be others who benefit from having a

homeworker at home. For example, the domestic chores maybe carried out as part of spending more time at home. There-fore, quality of life has to be treated as subjective, time andcontext dependent. For this paper, quality of life is subjectivelyassessed in terms of well-being but also viewed as a product ofthe balance between home and work.

The overall aim of this paper is to explore the experience ofhomeworking and to identify which what factors contribute toa greater work–life balance, sense of well-being and quality oflife. To do so, it needs to seek out inequalities and differencesin the homeworking experience as well as commonalities.

2. Method

This paper presents results from a study funded by the Eco-nomic and Social Research Council in the UK, which exploredthe experience of homeworking in the North of England andWales. The main focus of the homeworking research was onthe potential impacts of homeworking on home and family life.

This ESRC study used semi-structured interviews, focusgroups and a questionnaire. This triangulated approach (Jick,1983) strengthens the findings presented here as Knafl andBreitmayer (1989) have argued that ’multiple data collectiontechniques contribute to the completeness function of triangu-lation by providing explanatory insights about data from vary-ing sources (pp. 234–5). However this is not to suggest thatthere is one fixed homeworking reality, but rather that thereare strong core themes in this experience shaped by a varietyof factors. In total 123 homeworkers took part in this research.45 homeworkers were interviewed in person, and additional 16took part in focus groups discussions and a further 62 com-pleted a postal questionnaire. This mixed methodology pro-duced a small but rich data set.

The interview sample was selected purposefully to reflect awide range of homeworking experience in the North of Eng-land and Wales and is therefore not fully representative ofhomeworkers nationally. It was stratified by profession andgender, targeting homeworkers in the North of England(82%) and Wales (18%), living with others and working fromhome for at least 20 hours a week for at least a year. Threetypes of workers were targeted and broadly defined as: 36%(22) professional/managerial workers; 33% (20) skilled (e.g.craft, programming); 10% (6) semi-skilled (sewing) and 21%(13) unskilled (e.g. assembly).2 While every effort was made toencourage men to take part in the research the numbers of men(17) and women (44) offer further evidence that there are morewomen than men working from home. Over half (54%: 33) hadchildren aged 18 or under at home. 8% (5) had disabilitieswhich prevented them working outside the home. The inter-view schedule focused on the experience of working fromhome and its impact on home and family life. It explored theirreasons for homeworking and expectations for the future. Theinterview lasted an hour on average and was normally con-

Table 1GHQ scores compared across occupational and other groups

GHQ 12-item

Likert scoring

N Mean S.D.

Moore et al., (1995) Homeless people 470 13.52 7.74Winefield et al. (2003) Australian universitystaff

8,467 13.2 6.0

Goddard et al. (2001) case managers workingwith unemployed

86 12.35 6.53

This study (homeworkers) 60 11.48 6.272Propper et al. (2004) British Household PanelSurvey

9334 10.639 4.79

Banks et al. (1980) single employed 431 8.67 5.07

J. Moore / Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée 56 (2006) 5–138

ducted in the interviewee’s home. The interview material wasanalyzed thematically. NUDIST software was used. In order toassess the significance of a particular category the greater num-ber of participants’ quotes coded to that category was used as ageneral indication of general salience.

The questionnaire was developed from a pilot version. TheGeneral Health Questionnaire (GHQ12) and the Work Locus ofControl Scale (Spector, 1988) were added. The GHQ assesseslevels of well being (Goldberg, 1978) and detects minor psy-chiatric disorders and high stress levels. The GHQ-12 has beenused in a variety of occupational and community settings as ascreening measure for psychological ill-health (see Banks etal., 1980). The GHQ-12 asks respondents to report how theyfelt recently on a range of variables, including self-esteem, an-xiety and depression, on a four-point scale, using endpoints of‘better than usual’ to ‘much less than usual’. A sample item is,‘Have you recently been able to concentrate on whateveryou’re doing?’ Two methods of scoring the GHQ-12 are pos-sible, the binary method and the Likert method. The Likertmethod was utilized in this study. The Likert method scoresthe four-point scale as 0-1–2-3, such that higher scores corre-spond to increasing stress and ill-health (range = 0–36).

In total 330 questionnaires were sent to homeworkers andmessages placed with homeworking organizations mailing listsand Internet based advertisements. The overall response ratewas 19% but there was considerable variation. 80% of thequestionnaires sent out to those who responded to online ad-verts were returned while 10% sent out by homeworking orga-nizations were returned. The data was analyzed descriptively,correlated with additional inferential tests and multivariate ana-lyses to explore scaled responses. The questionnaire sampleconsisted of 62 homeworkers from across the UK: 34% ofwhom were male and 65% female. 66% of the sample wasaged between 30 and 50. 54% (34) of the sample worked inbroadly traditional occupations and 46% (28) in professionaloccupations 3. 55% were traditional homeworkers, of whom,85% were female. Only 39% of the professional homeworkerswere female. 29% (18) of those who filled in the questionnairewere from the Northeast, 38% (24) from the South, 19% (12)from the Midlands, 1% (4) from Scotland and 1% (4) fromWales.

Similar results were produced from the interviews and ques-tionnaire data for the most part. However, where these diverge,these will be highlighted and examined.

3. Results

3.1. Homeworking, stress and well-being

Stress is defined as “a particular relationship between theperson and the environment that is appraised by the individual

3 On the whole, traditional homeworkers have skilled or unskilled occupa-tions which are predominantly low discretion forms of employment in thatthey are predictable, routine, standardized and rule dominated, while profes-sional homeworkers have high-discretion occupations which are variable,complex and choice dominated.

as taxing or exceeding his or her resources and endangeringhis or her well-being” (Lazarus and Folkman, 1984, p. 19 citedin Tse et al., 2004). When applied to different occupations andoccupational settings, it is evident how important the workingenvironment can be to affect psychological health. The GeneralHealth Questionnaire revealed average results for the question-naire sample suggesting that homeworkers were not over-stressed in general. There was no significant difference inGHQ scores across gender or occupation. The Likert scoringmethod was used (total score range 0-36) with a higher scoreindicating greater distress. Table 1 presents these GHQ scorescompared with other studies.

The mean score for the GHQ for this sample of homewor-kers was 11.48 (SD = 6.272). Comparing this with other re-search this mean is lower than caseworkers working with theunemployed and levels reported for hospital and community-based mental health staff (Prosser et al., 1996), and the unem-ployed themselves (Winefield et al., 1991, cited in Goddard etal., 2001). It was, however, notably higher than the averagereported by Banks et al. (1980) for single employed workersand Propper et al. (2004) for the British Household Panel Sur-vey, the largest average sample data set presented. This sug-gests that at least for the questionnaire sample, homeworkerswere experiencing average stress levels as compared with stan-dard scores but hey were certainly no less stressed than averagebecause of working from home.

The questionnaire data suggests, therefore, that homework-ing in general is neither a positive or negative factor in well-being. However, the qualitative data suggests that particularsub-groups of homeworkers are more vulnerable to stress.Eighteen of the forty-five who were interviewed (40%) saidthat they found some aspect of working at home stressful orfrustrating. This was not differentiated by occupation. In otherwords, traditional homeworkers were not generally findinghomeworking more stressful than professionals. However, theyounger the children of homeworkers the more susceptiblethey seemed to be to stress. A father who ran his own calendarbusiness from home said: “One of the frustrations is I think,you feel you’re not doing anything particularly well” (Inter-view 45, Derke, calendar businessman).

While traditional homeworkers as a group were not moremarkedly stress, it is clear that the experience of homeworkingis obviously shaped by the nature of the work to be done. For

J. Moore / Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée 56 (2006) 5–13 9

one home-based worker, the pressure was too much and shegave up the job.

“[I was] exhausted from sticking the slappers on thesecrackers itself, gave us so much hassle you know. If you don’tput them on right you’ve go to take them off and then slap itback on again. I used to get really down you know….. Like Icouldn’t do the sticking because of the fumes they would get onmy chest.” (Interview 32, Millie, cracker packer).

Many homeworkers found that, on balance, working fromhome suited them overall.

“Umm, I you know, there are difficult times, if I’m under youknow, a lot of stress, but umm you know, on the whole I thinkthe benefits hugely outweigh the disadvantages…I mean for meit’s hugely advantageous to spend so much time around mychildren.” (Interview 44, Adam, graphic designer).

3.2. More time with the family? The reasons for homeworking

Given this diversity in experience, it is necessary to explorethe differences in experiences of homeworking as well as thereasons why people work from home. These can throw light ontheir work–life balance goals.

The homeworkers from the questionnaire study workedfrom home for a variety of reasons. Table 2 presents the firstreason given by homeworkers, divided into traditional (lowerpaid, low skilled) and professional/managerial categories.Overall, there was a difference between traditional and profes-

Table 2Reasons for homeworking by type of homework

Reason Professional TraditionalFlexibility 21.4% (6) 12.12% (4)Financial/economical 14.3% (4) 12.12% (4)Family 10.7% (3) 33% (11)Less commuting 10.7% (3) 3.03% (1)Convenience 10.7% (3) 18.18% (6)Work availability 10.7% (3) 9.09% (3)More work satisfaction 7.1% (2) 0% (0)Lifestyle 7.1% (2) 3.03% (1)Health/age 3.6% (1) 6.06% (2)More peaceful/comfortable at home 3.6% (1) 0% (0)Autonomy 0% (0) 3.03% (1)Total 100% (28) 100% (33)

Table 3Primary reason for working from home

Reason Professional/ManagerialMale F

N % NFlexibility 5 29.4 1

Less commuting 3 17.6 0

Convenience 2 11.8 1

Lifestyle 2 11.8 0

Work availability 2 11.8 1

Health/age 1 5.9 0

More peaceful/comfortable at home 1 5.9 0

More work satisfaction 1 5.9 1

Financial/economical 0 0 4

Family 0 0 3

sional homeworkers as more traditional homeworkers (33%)mentioned family as the first reason, than professional home-workers (10.7%). For professional homeworkers the most fre-quently cited reasons were flexibility, financial, family, lesscommuting, convenience and work availability. For traditionalhomeworkers, the reasons were family, convenience most sig-nificantly, followed by flexibility and finance.

Table 3 presents this data by gender. The most frequentlymentioned reason given by male professionals was flexibility(29.4%) but financial/economic reasons were most cited by fe-male professionals (36.4%). For traditional homeworkers therewas also a gender differences with 50% of men citing workavailability and 37.9% of women referring to family as theprimary reason. This is despite there being no difference be-tween professional and traditional homeworkers in the numberwho had children (67.9% and 64.7%, respectively).

The interview data further revealed that the homeworkingexperience was shaped by gender role and type of work (c.f.Huws, 1994; Olson and Primps, 1984; Sullivan and Lewis,2001). The samples were broadly categorized into professionaland traditional categories drawing on Felsted and Jewson’s(2000) categorization.

Homeworking was experienced differently by professionaland traditional homeworkers. Those in traditional homework-ing employment felt they were both paid less than contempor-aries working outside of the home and that they had feweremployment benefits. Table 4 shows that traditional homewor-kers were taking care of the children themselves, more thanprofessional homeworkers.

Traditional homeworkers tended to care for their childrenthemselves (63.6% of the questionnaire sample) thus combin-ing work with childcare more directly than professional home-workers (26.3%).This suggests that traditional homeworkers,mostly women, are more likely to be working from homeand taking care of their children, as opposed to professionalhomeworkers whose children are cared for elsewhere. Thishas implications for the role of homeworking in shaping theirwork–life balance. For some, it is an activity that enables child-care, and for others, it is a primarily motivated by financialreasons.

Traditionalemale Male Female

% N % N %

9.1 1 25 3 10.3

0 0 0 1 3.4

9.1 0 0 6 20.7

0 0 0 1 3.4

9.1 2 50 1 3.4

0 0 0 2 6.9

0 0 0 0 0

9.1 0 0 0 0

36.4 1 25 3 10.3

27.3 0 0 11 37.9

Table 4Percentage of professional and traditional respondents with children

Professional/Managerial TraditionalN % N %

School 9 47.4 7 31.8Self 5 26.3 14 63.6Spouse/partner 5 26.3 6 27.3Nursery/crèche 3 15.8 2 9.1Family 2 10.5 2 9.1Childminder 1 5.3 1 4.5Friends 0 0.0 1 4.5

*These percentages/numbers of respondents exceed the total as respondentsoften indicated more than one way in which their children were cared for.

J. Moore / Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée 56 (2006) 5–1310

The interview data revealed that the homeworking experi-ence was not an equal experience. Primary carers, often wo-men, with low skills, low employment choice and little workcontrol found the practice of working from home more challen-ging. Table 5 presents an overview of some of the differencesfound in the study as identified from the thematic analysis.

Homeworkers with young children found it difficult to bal-ance home and work responsibilities. Traditional homeworkershad less choice and control over the work they did and oftenhad fewer spatial resources to support the work. Both of thesegroups were finding homeworking more difficult, contributingto a potential reduction in well-being and quality of life.

Homeworking was further influenced by the ways in whichhomeworkers coped with motivation and stress and how thesefactors tended to shape their expectations of themselves andtheir work (c.f. Tietze, 2002 for coping strategies). Most ofthe men in our sample primarily saw themselves as wage earn-ers and found fewer difficulties in mixing home and work thanwomen. Some people, particularly women in professional oc-cupations said they expected working from home would allowthem to do more in all aspects of their lives, without having toreduce the time spent on any of their roles, such as a worker orparent. These homeworkers felt dissatisfied with the reality.Others, especially mothers in traditional occupations, tendedto have a more realistic view of the advantages of workingfrom home and accepted the low pay as they prioritised stayingat home with their children. Women in professional or manage-rial occupations tended to see their home and work responsi-bilities as equal. These women experienced more tensions be-tween their roles as homemakers and workers. Women inprofessional occupations often expected working from homewould allow them to do more in all aspects of their lives. Wo-men in the questionnaire sample more frequently gave familyas the reason for working from home than men. This suggests

Table 5Differences in homeworking experience

Skills

occupation

Work Gender role

Low

(traditional)

Low paid, no control,little choice

Mostly femalePrimary carerFew supports

High

(professional)

High paid, control and choice Mostly men

Primary/shared cHigh supports

that a key element in the different experience of homeworkingmay be the initial motivation to work from home and the ex-pectations of homeworking.

3.3. A healthy balance between home and work?

For every positive side of homeworking, there was also anegative side. From the interviews, most frequently mentionedwere flexibility in time and work and independence. Manyhomeworkers found they could manage many tasks more ea-sily. These included paid work; the care of others such asspouses, children and elderly or disabled relatives, as wellhousehold tasks such as cleaning, cooking, washing, shopping,gardening and paying bills. In general, homeworkers oftenfound that working from home meant they could more easilycarry out their home tasks and contribute to a healthier life-style.

“I can chuck the washing in, remember to get it out and putit in the drier and sometimes actually put it back, or iron it,mainly not actually. But at least do that. Clean clothes areappearing kind of thing. We eat much much more healthily.We used to be Tesco’s packet food people. Now everything isjust about fresh and freshly cooked and everything, which waspart of the plan actually…And also being able to choose whenI want to do it. You have to juggle, you have to make a priorityof decisions all the time”. (Interview 42, Debbie, inspector/mediator).

Forty-one of the forty-five homeworkers interviewed saidhomeworking afforded them flexibility in and control overthe in the ways they used their time. Nearly half (46%) of thequestionnaire sample also mentioned flexibility as a reason forworking from home. This reason was most frequently cited andalthough lower than the qualitative data, this is still significant.The lower level of response may reflect the different methodol-ogies with the questionnaire offering three short open-endedspaces in contrast to an hour long interview where reasonswhere discussed. In addition the qualitative analysis consistedof grouping responses into themes, whereas the questionnaireresponses were treated more literally.

“Home life is less stressful because there’s no time con-straints really. [Before] I knew that if I didn’t get finished athalf past four in the afternoon, then I would have had to leaveto get the train. [Now] work can carry on in the evening or thenext day or whatever” (Interview 2: Female Cartographer).

Most of the samples felt they had greater independence intheir working life, however some also found it difficult to keepmotivated and focused. Most of those who found flexibility to

Key motivationto work from home

Expectation/Orientationto work

FamilyFamily oriented

arer

Flexibility Family-work oriented

J. Moore / Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée 56 (2006) 5–13 11

be a benefit also felt they worked longer hours. One of thebiggest challenges facing professional homeworkers was a ten-dency to overwork.

“Umm, you’re your own boss, you can do things in yourown time and if I want to work really late at night I can do,it means I’m not like getting stressed umm rushing about thecity. I know that if something interrupts me I can stop and I’llcatch up later. Because I can do this work at anytime of the dayor night” (Interview 14, Tina, caterer/craft worker).

Many of those homeworkers in professional occupations re-cognized that negotiating the homework boundary was essen-tial to successful homeworking (c.f. Sullivan, 2000).

“Umm it’s almost a schizophrenia… You’ve got to be able toput work in a box and yes, my family might argue that I don’tput it in a box, but I do in as much as yes I’m always workingumm, but that work is in a box” (Interview 38: Female Profes-sional).

For some, working from home contributed to a greater senseof self and an internal balance.

“There is a lot less dissonance between who I am and who Iwas at work now. I am me at home and at work now and that ispartly to do with the work I’ve chosen to do, as much as work-ing from home. But there isn’t this separation; I don’t put on adifferent persona when I leave the house, and have to do a jobfor an organisation. I think that’s partly it.” (Interview 42,Debbie, inspector/mediator).

For others, their work and home lives blurred.

“I mean I don’t think most people think a home is the placeto work in, you see this has always been like that..its alwaysbeen a place where I work. It’s had to be done. You know Ithink most people don’t combine the two, home is just a placeto switch off, to relax in. I combine the two. I do, I combine thetwo.” (Interview 5: Mandy, 50’s, audio-typist).

Quality of life for homeworkers is therefore not an auto-matic result but shaped by type of work, personal motivationamong other factors. What is important is whether or not work-ing from home can ease the tension between work and homelife and reduce stress.

4. Conclusion

Does homeworking increase quality of life?

If quality of life concerns subjective and objective well-being, homeworking in general does not increase quality oflife. Rather, working from home has both a positive and nega-tive impact on particular homeworkers, varying by type ofhomework, reason for homeworking and expectations as muchas by psychological factors such as motivation and control.This research found that homeworking was not experiencedin the same way for everyone (Moore and Crosbie, 2002) andwas markedly gendered, mirroring the broader experience ofwork–life balance. The homeworking experience was shapedby gender and type of work. Traditional homeworkers had dif-ferent reasons for homeworking and were more likely to becaring for children as well as working. Homeworkers in profes-

sional occupations tended to find the experience more positivethan those in traditional occupations.

Homeworking is being promoted as part of a repertoire ofinitiatives to enhance the work/life balance without clear indi-cation or definition of their value or limitations. This researchsuggests that the quality of life of homeworkers may not beany better than other workers. They experience average stresslevels, and report the same difficulties of having to balancechildcare with work, particularly for women. There is however,evidence to suggest that it is a stressful experience for home-workers with young children, doing menial low-paid work. It isalso shaped by personal factors. Homeworking can offer great-er flexibility and independence but can lead to people carryingwork into evenings and weekends. Homeworkers work longhours, not shorter ones. In other words, homeworking is not apanacea for working life.

This paper argues that the concept of quality of life has yetto be fully examined. While there is a need to take environ-mental factors into account, this cannot happen uncritically.In particular, giving people more time at home does not in turnlead to greater quality of life. Home environments have yet tobe problematized in relation to quality of life. Home is gen-dered, ripe with unequal experiences and potentially negativeexperiences (Moore, 2000a).

In relation to homeworking, there are potential supports,which, if understood, can be useful in improving the workinglives of many. The social supports include appropriate child-care and a social network that can sustain homeworking prac-tices. Furthermore, there is a need for personal supports to en-able homeworkers to cope with periods of loneliness, potentialstress and to maintain high levels of self-motivation. There is afurther need to help homeworkers develop boundaries in timeand space between the worlds of home and work, counteringthe tendency to work longer hours as a homeworker. These incombination with physical supports, such as sufficient space towork and negotiated use of this space with family members,would help to foster a greater balance between home and workfor homeworkers.

In conclusion, homeworking provides an opportunity formany to combine work with other areas of their lives success-fully as part of any work–life balance initiative. However,working from home has an impact on home and family life,which is not yet understood fully as it seems to have a variedimpact. More research examining working from home from theperspective of homeworkers is needed so that we can gain agreater understanding of the ways in which it shapes people’shome and work lives and contributes to their quality of lifeHuws et al., 1996.

Acknowledgements

The homeworking research was funded by the Economicand Social Research Council as part of the project “Qualityof home experience for homeworkers” (R000223592). Mythanks to Dr Tracey Crosbie who was the researcher on the

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project and the National Group on homeworking who sup-ported the research.

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