Precarious Work Characteristics and Children’s Well-Being: Examining Mechanisms and Understanding Differences Between Families

• In Event: Parental Work Schedules and the Well-Being of Children and Families

Abstract

Over the past several decades, employment in the United States has become increasingly precarious, characterized by non-standard hours, overtime work, and unpredictable scheduling (Kalleberg, 2009; 2011; Lambert, 2008; Presser, 1999). Theoretical models suggest that these precarious job characteristics may influence children’s development through strain on parents (Conger & Elder, 1994; McLoyd, 1990; Schneider & Harknett 2019; Yeung, Livner, & Brooks-Gunn, 2002).
Characteristics of families, such as household income, parent education, marital status, race, and sex of the employed parent, may also serve to moderate these associations. Specifically, the influence of precarious job characteristics on children’s development may vary dependent upon economic, structural, and cultural characteristics of families. While empirical evidence exists to document associations between precarious employment characteristics and children’s development (e.g. Li et al., 2014), we know less about the specific aspects of precarious work associated with different aspects of children’s well-being, mechanisms that may explain any associations, and moderators of these relations between families.

The goal of this study was to examine associations between precarious job characteristics and children’s development, the mediating roles of worker health and stress, and moderation by worker characteristics. Using a sample of 144 workers employed in the Departments of Corrections and Transportation in a northeastern state, we examined associations between workers’ lack of schedule notice, lack of schedule control, days worked per month, and short time periods between shifts (< 11 hours), and worker reported measures of the parent-child relationship, child behavioral and academic risks, and child overweight status. Hypothesized mediators included worker reported stress at work and home, physical health, depressive symptoms, and life satisfaction. Moderators were comprised of worker sex, race, income, education, and marital status.

Results from OLS and logistic regression models (Table 1), controlling for worker and family characteristics, suggested that less schedule notice was associated with a lower parent-child relationship (.33 SDs) and higher child behavioral risks (.27 SDs). Less schedule control and more days worked per month was associated with a higher risk of overweight status (lack of schedule control OR = 1.77; days worked OR = 1.12). More frequent short time periods between shifts (< 11 hours) was linked with a lower parent-child relationship (.25 SDs) and higher academic risks (.23 SDs).

Worker reported health and stress were not found to mediate these associations. Conversely, several patterns of findings emerged from the moderation results to indicate that workers who were female, Black, or not married reported lower child well-being when they had more precarious job characteristics, whereas there were few associations between work characteristics and child well-being for male, non-Black, and married workers. Unexpectedly, workers with higher levels of education reported lower child well-being when they had more precarious job characteristics (see example Graphs 1a-b). Further analyses will refine these patterns and the results will be discussed with regard to understanding differences between families when considering the influence of precarious work characteristics on children.

Authors

• Caitlin S Lombardi, University of Connecticut
  Presenting Author

• Alicia G. Dugan, University of Connecticut
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jennifer M. Cavallari, University of Connecticut
  Non-Presenting Author