Exploration of the Socioecological Determinants of Hong Kong Workers’ Work-Life Balance: A Grounded Theory Model

Ka Po Wong and Alan Hoi Shou Chan
Additional contact information
Ka Po Wong: Department of Advanced Design and Systems Engineering, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Alan Hoi Shou Chan: Department of Advanced Design and Systems Engineering, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 20, 1-15

Abstract: Background: Although a growing body of research has investigated the theoretical and empirical models of work-life balance (WLB), the propositions of this phenomenon remain nonunified. Thus, a grounded theory approach was adopted to explore the viewpoints of workers regarding WLB and its determinants and consequences. Methods: Individual face-to-face interviews were conducted to investigate the attitudes and experiences of Hong Kong workers towards WLB, in which 50 workers were interviewed. All data of interviews were transcribed verbatim and coded into five levels of the socioecological framework (i.e., intrapersonal level, interpersonal level, organisational level, community and government policy). Results: The grounded theory model established that work-life balance and personal context mutually affected each other, and work-life balance was unidirectionally affected by the environmental context. The ability to maintain a continual satisfied physical and mental states among multiple roles under the emergence of unexpected environmental factors was proposed as the definition of work-life balance. Conclusions: The findings of this study offer essential research insights into the importance of WLB, the dynamic features for workers to sustain balance and constructing a reliable and exhaustive assessment model for work-life balance for future studies.

Keywords: work-life balance; grounded theory model; personal context; physical and mental states; qualitative research (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/20/10732/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/20/10732/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:20:p:10732-:d:655200

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().