A Study On The Relationship Between Work-Family Conflict And Parental Burnout

Parental burnout is a unique syndrome,a chronic fatigue of parents caused by prolonged exposure to family needs and parental activities.It is different from job burnout,it is a way of burnout that occurs in parenting field.Specifically,there are four forms as follows:(1)emotional exhaustion related to parental roles;(2)self-comparison with previous parental roles;(3)boredom of parental roles;(4)emotional alienation from children.There have been many related studies on parental burnout abroad,but due to the differences in educational environment and social background at home and abroad,foreign researches cannot represent the current situation of parental burnout in China.Therefore,there is a lack of research on nurturing burnout in China.Work and family are the two most important areas in people's life,and the relationship between them is closely linked.As the antecedent variable of parental burnout,work-family conflict also has an interaction with parental burnout.Understanding the relationship between parental work-family conflict(including work-family conflict and family-work conflict)and parental burnout enriches the research on parental burnout in the Chinese context.It is of great significance to explore the influence process of work-family conflict on the formation of parental burnout to prevent and intervene the level of parental burnout of parents.In this study,the parents of 12 classes of students in grade 8 in a middle school in Henan Province were selected as the research objects,and 614 families in total were selected.Data were collected for three times in April,May and September respectively.Descriptive statistics,correlation analysis,paired sample t test and regression analysis were used,and the research conclusions were as follows:(1)For fathers,there was a significant positive correlation between the first father's work-family conflict and parental burnout(r =.300,p <.01),there was a significant positive correlation between father's family-work conflict and parental burnout(r =.317,p <.01),there was a significant positive correlation between the second father's work-family conflict and parental burnout(r =.348,p <.01),there was a significant positive correlation between father's family-work conflict and parental burnout(r =.243,p <.01),fathers has higher levels of work-family conflict than fathers;(2)For mother,there was a significant positive correlation between work-family conflict and parental burnout for the first time(r =.268,p <.01),there was a significant positive correlation between mother's home-work conflict and parental burnout(r =.266,p <.01),there was a significant positive correlation between the second mother's work-family conflict and the work-family conflict and parental burnout(r =.362,p <.01),there was a significant positive correlation between mother's home-work conflict and parental burnout(r =.309,p <.01),the mother's level of work-family conflict was higher than that of the mother's work-family conflict;(3)The work-family conflict of mothers in the second test played an intermediary role between the work-family conflict of fathers in the first test and the parental burnout of mothers in the third test(?=.208,p <.01).The mediation model holds.The results show that there is a significant positive correlation between parental work-family conflict and parental burnout,and that work-family conflict affects the formation of parental burnout.This study not only enriches the research on parental burnout in the Chinese context,but also helps to reduce the level of parental burnout and improve the parenting experience.