REGULAR ARTICLE

Personal and Environmental Predictors of Academics’Work-to-Family Enrichment at Research Universities

Pouria Salehi • Roziah Mohd Rasdi •

Aminah Ahmad

� De La Salle University 2014

Abstract This paper aims to discover predictors of aca-

demics’ work-to-family enrichment at Malaysian Research

Universities. The underlying theoretical foundations of this

study are the work–family enrichment theory by Greenhaus

and Powell and the model of primary antecedents, conse-

quences, and moderators of facilitation by Wayne, Grzy-

wacz, Carlson, and Kacmar. The sample includes 295

academics from three Malaysian Research Universities,

and data were gathered via online and offline surveys. This

study found that all the selected personal factors (i.e.

extraversion, core self-evaluation, overall health), and

environmental factors (i.e. social support, job autonomy,

supportive work–family culture) were significantly related

to work-to-family enrichment among the academics. In

addition, extraversion and social support were the best

predictors of academics’ work-to-family enrichment.

Conclusion and implications for theory and practice are

discussed in the paper.

Keywords Work–family enrichment � Personal factors �Environmental factors � Research universities �Social support � Extraversion

Introduction

Work and family are two distinct institutions, and they

form the most central domains to an individual’s life (Clark

2001). The experience in tasks and roles associated in one

domain would either enrich or deteriorate the quality of life

in the other domain. This study focuses on the positive

work–family interface, which is known as work–family

enrichment (WFE). WFE is one of the three distinct con-

structs found in work–family studies (Allen and Kiburz

2011), and studies focussing on this construct is scarce

(Stevens et al. 2007). It is a new area of investigation either

in developed or developing countries (Shaffer et al. 2011).

However, due to recent changes within the work domain

such as the emergence of the multinational firms and

businesses especially in the Asian countries, it is important

to conduct more work–family research in the Asian context

especially studies related to WFE (Sim and Bujang 2012).

In the work–family interface literature, WFE is inter-

changeably used with a variety of different terminologies

such as enhancement, facilitation and positive spillover.

Following these terminologies, this study took a similar

approach in considering all these positive sides of work–

family interface as WFE (Carlson et al. 2006; Hanson and

Hammer 2006). Voydanoff (2004a, p. 399) defined WFE as

‘‘a form of synergy in which resources associated with one

role enhance or make easier participation in another role.’’

Her definition referred role as tasks, duties, outcomes,

privileges, benefits, and gains of work or family. Family

means the fundamental unit of society as well as the oldest

and most important element of all human institutions

(Zabriskie and McCormick 2001). In this study, work

refers to tasks performed within the context of an academic

career at a Research University. The academic career

context or specifically the Malaysian Research University

P. Salehi � R. Mohd Rasdi (&)

Department of Professional Development and Continuing

Education, Faculty of Educational Studies, Universiti Putra

Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia

e-mail: roziah_m@upm.edu.my

A. Ahmad

Institute for Social Science Studies, Universiti Putra Malaysia,

43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia

123

Asia-Pacific Edu Res

DOI 10.1007/s40299-014-0190-5

context was selected for two main reasons: (i) the academic

context is a large and growing sector, as well as receiving

limited attention among researchers, and (ii) the context

provides an actual leading career model or prototype for

the world of work with which other sectors may adopt

(Baruch and Hall 2004). In addition, academics at Research

Universities are facing a high level of work-related stress

(Ogbonna and Harris 2004) and in Malaysia there is a high

turnover among academics to leave the university. Aca-

demics at Research Universities have multiple major roles,

which comprised teaching, conducting research, publish-

ing, administering, student supervision, and providing

professional services such as consultancy for industry or

policy makers. Academics have to juggle in an environ-

ment with a high key performance index and more

emphasis given to research and publication. This scenario

reflects the hardship of academic work in Research Uni-

versities. Simultaneously, academics at Research Univer-

sities experience high-level of job flexibility (Shockley and

Allen 2011). Therefore, it is interesting to learn how these

experiences of work roles can be transformed into positive

forces or energies to facilitate the role or task in the family

domain. An example of this positive transfer could be a

mother who uses her participative management skill

learned at work in decision making with her children by

allowing them to share their opinion in planning a vacation

(Pathak 2011).

Despite the increasing attention devoted to work–family

interface studies in the past three decades, researchers still

note the significant lack of research in this area. First, there

is lack of studies on the positive side of work–family

interface, i.e. WFE (e.g. Powell and Eddleston 2012).

Second, limited data on WFE have been reported from

eastern countries (Qiu 2011). Third, the majority of work–

family research have concentrated on consequences of

WFE rather than its predictors, which results in lack of

understanding on WFE factors (Qiu 2011; Stevens et al.

2007). Fourth, most of the present studies normally do not

attend to the household structures, which implicated to a

marked lack of studies using specific household structures.

According to Lieke and Lippe (2010), employees’ specific

family background could affect the result of work–family

studies. For example, employees without children may face

different demands in their personal lives compared to dual-

earner couples with children. Hence, this study aims to

examine predictors of WFE among academics of Malay-

sian Research Universities who were married and had at

least one child.

Examination of the WFE predictors enables researchers

and practitioners to suggest significant factors that rein-

force the WFE process in order to obtain various positive

work outcomes such as fewer turnover, less absenteeism,

reduced work stress, and higher job satisfaction and

affective commitment. The following section of this paper

deals with the background of the study, followed by the

explanation on theoretical foundations underlying the

study. This is followed by the conceptual model and

hypotheses. Then, the article provides a description of the

method and findings of the study. Finally, the article con-

cludes with the limitations, implications of the empirical

findings, and directions for future research.

Work–Family Enrichment

In the theory of WFE by Greenhaus and Powell (2006),

WFE is defined as ‘‘the extent to which experiences in one

role improve the quality of life in the other role’’ (p. 73). In

this definition, role refers to tasks and duties in both work

and family domains, and experience refers to outcomes,

generated resources, privileges, benefits, or gains in one

domain that can facilitate functioning of the other domain,

whether work or family (Wayne et al. 2007). The above

definition clearly indicated that WFE has two directions,

i.e. work-to-family enrichment (WFE) and family-to-work

enrichment (FWE). WFE refers to a situation when some

work experiences enhanced quality of family life, and FWE

refers to a situation when some family experiences

improved work life quality (Qiu 2011). However, this study

limited its focus on examining WFE, i.e. to determine

whether working experiences of academics in the Research

Universities benefit their family domain experiences.

The theory of WFE extends Sieber’s (1974) and Marks’s

(1977) descriptions of WFE by including a wider range of

resources generated in one role and suggesting two dif-

ferent paths for the enrichment process (Greenhaus and

Powell 2006). Figure 1 depicts the theory, including the

illustration of paths and categories of resources. Instru-

mental path (arrow 1 ? arrow 6) relates to the effective

application of skills, abilities, and values from role A

(could be family or work) into role B (work or family). An

example of the instrumental path occurs when an academic

learns new skills to settle conflict through training at work

and applies that skill into the family domain to resolve

conflicts with the children, spouse or other family members

(arrow 1), and this behaviour would improve their family

satisfaction and cohesion (arrow 6) (Pathak 2011). On the

other hand, in affective path, affection or emotion is carried

over from role A (work or family) to role B. Specifically,

the positive affection in role B may be produced through

either high performance in role A (arrow 3 ? arrow

4 ? arrow 5 ? arrow 6) or positive emotions in role A

(arrow 2 ? arrow 5 ? arrow 6) (Greenhaus and Powell

2006). An example of the affective path through positive

emotions (arrow 2) is an academic who leaves family in a

positive mood and because of that, he or she is more

inclined to respond positively, with patience and joy, to his

P. Salehi et al.

123

or her students, co-workers, or supervisor (arrow 5).

Therefore, he or she could enhance his or her affection and

performance as an academic (arrow 6) (Pathak 2011).

The theory categorized resources into five types: com-

prising skills and perspectives, psychological and physical,

social capital, flexibility, and material resources. In this

study, we included variables such as extraversion, core

self-evaluation, overall health, social support, job auton-

omy and supportive work–family culture. Based on previ-

ous work–family studies, we conceptualized extraversion

as a factor in skills and perspectives category (Shein and

Charles 2011); core self-evaluation and overall health as

representing the psychological and physical resources

(Greenhaus and Powell 2006); social support as included in

social capital resources (Shein and Charles 2011); sup-

portive work–family culture (Beutell and Wittig-Berman

2008; Siu et al. 2010); and job autonomy as factors in

flexibility category (Clark 2001; Lieke and Lippe 2010;

Qiu 2011).

Besides the classification of resources used by Green-

haus and Powell (2006), other researchers such as Qiu

(2011), Wayne et al. (2007), Mauno and Rantanen (2012),

Beutell and Wittig-Berman (2008), and Steenbergen et al.

(2007) have used different categorizations. For example,

Wayne et al. (2007), in their model of primary antecedents,

consequences, and moderators of work–family facilitation,

focused on a classification which distinguished resources

into two major categories, comprising environmental

resources (e.g. social support), and personal resources (e.g.

self-esteem). Mauno and Rantanen (2012) noted that a

combination of high environmental with high personal

factors led to more positive outcomes of high WFE. This

study also employed Wayne et al.’s categorization of

resources to provide better understanding of the categori-

zation of WFE resources. Thus, this study classified

extraversion, core self-evaluation, and overall health as

personal resources, and social support, job autonomy, and

supportive family-friendly culture as environmental

resources.

Predictors of Work-to-Family Enrichment

Based on the above discussion, we classified the predic-

tors of WFE into two factors, namely personal factors

and environmental factors. These factors which com-

prised six variables were generally selected from the

literature based on their significance and recent presence

in previous work–family studies (e.g. Baral and Bhargava

2011a, b; Lieke and Lippe 2010; Mauno and Rantanen

2012; Qiu 2011; Wayne et al. 2004). Moreover, there is a

general lack of study on predictors of WFE (Qiu 2011).

Therefore, we included those variables to be tested in a

different study contexts i.e. Malaysian Research Univer-

sities. In this section, we discuss the effects of each

variable on WFE by providing related empirical evi-

dences. We also offer related hypotheses at the end of

each discussion.

Personal Factors

In this study, personal factors comprised extraversion, core

self-evaluation, and overall health. Extraversion is one of

the personality traits in the Big Five-Factor Model (Poropat

2009). It describes someone who is sociable, active,

assertive, energetic, enthusiastic, outgoing, talkative,

cheerful, and optimistic (Bruck and Allen 2003; Wayne

et al. 2004). Grzywacz and Marks’s (2000) study among

1,986 US citizens supported the positive and significant

relationship between extraversion and WFE. In addition,

Wayne et al. (2004) revealed that extraversion positively

predicted WFE. In a recent cross-sectional study of 1,312

Fig. 1 Theory of work–family enrichment source: Greenhaus and Powell (2006, p. 79)

Predictors of Academics’ WFE

123

non-institutionalized people aged 25–74 by Rotondo and

Kincaid (2008), they found that a higher level of extra-

version was significantly associated with a higher level of

WFE.

Core self-evaluation (CSE) is the second personal

factor in this study. CSE is a dispositional trait that has

been consistently shown to be associated with important

work attitudes and behavioural outcomes (Boyar and

Mosley 2007). CSE is defined as ‘‘the fundamental

assessments that people make about their worthiness,

competence, and capabilities’’ (Judge et al. 2005, p. 257).

In addition, CSE is the combination of four personality

dimensions, namely self-esteem, neuroticism, locus of

control, and general self-efficacy (Boyar and Mosley

2007). CSE directly relates to individuals’ perceptions,

attitudes, beliefs, decisions, and actions in organizational

and personal domains. For example, one who has more

positive CSE is predicted to perceive aspects of work and

family domains in a great positive manner, views life

events more positively and seeks more opportunities and

situations that enhance positive role fulfilment. Moreover,

individuals with positive self-evaluations are more likely

to engage in multiple roles (Baral and Bhargava 2011b).

Previous studies on the relationship between CSE and

WFE supported a positive and significant link between

core self-evaluation and WFE (Frone 2003; Parasuraman

and Greenhaus 2002). Bhargava and Baral’s (2009)

investigation among 245 managers of four organizations

in India showed that CSE and WFE have a positive and

significant relationship. Similarly, in another study on

485 employees from six organizations in India, Baral and

Bhargava (2011b) also reported significant and positive

relationship between CSE and WFE. However, it should

be noted that studies on the relationship between CSE

and WFE have not provided a consistent pattern of

results. For instance, Boyar and Mosley’s (2007) inves-

tigation on 124 employees at a retirement facility/nursing

home in the southern US did not find a significant rela-

tionship between CSE and WFE. The insignificant result

was probably due to the low reliability of less than 0.7

found for the WFE instrument utilized in their study.

Another personal factor is overall health. Following

Stoddard and Madsen (2007), and Beutell and Wittig-

Berman (2008), we referred to overall health as mental and

physical health. Beutell and Wittig-Berman’s (2008) cross-

sectional study on 7,056 people in the US found a strong

and positive relationship between mental and physical

health and WFE.

Based on the above discussion on personal factors and

WFE, we hypothesize that

H1. Personal factors, including extraversion (Ha1a),

core self-evaluation (Ha1b), and overall health (Ha1c), have

positive relationships with WFE.

Environmental Factors

In this study, environmental factors include social support,

job autonomy, and supportive work–family culture. The

first environmental factor in this study is social support.

Social support is derived from social capital. Greenhaus

and Powell (2006) suggested that influence and information

are the two resources gained from social capital. However,

Shein and Chen (2011) suggested that support could also

be considered as a social capital resource. This notion is

supported by many empirical findings in the work–family

literature (e.g. Qiu 2011; Rashid et al. 2011). Baral and

Bhargava (2011b) described social support as an interper-

sonal transaction that involves emotional concern, instru-

mental aid, information, and appraisal. They also asserted

that social support is generally conceived as a coping

mechanism in the stress literature. Nonetheless, in this

study, social support is defined as the resources, which are

derived from social relationships exist in family and work

domains. Encouragement, information, help and advice,

taking time out to sympathize, understand and listen to a

fellow employee’s problem, providing advice and infor-

mation are some examples of social support in family and

work domains (Baral and Bhargava 2011b). Grzywacz and

Marks’s (2000) study among 1,986 employed adults from

the National Survey of Midlife Development in the US

revealed a positive relationship between social support and

WFE such as having a higher level of social support

associated with a higher level of WFE and vice versa.

Similarly, Mauno and Rantanen’s (2012) study on 1,956

Finnish health care and service employees also confirmed a

positive relationship between social support from both

family and work and WFE. A local study on 689 nurses

employed in public hospitals by Rashid et al. (2011) pro-

vided empirical evidence on the positive relationship

between social support and WFE.

Job autonomy is the second environmental factor in this

study. Baral and Bhargava (2011a) classified job autonomy

as one of the job characteristics which is psychologically

enriching and gratifying. Clark (2001) addressed job

autonomy as an operational flexibility which simply means

having control over the conditions of work. Qiu (2011,

p. 1) defined job autonomy as ‘‘the extent that individuals

can control their job’’ and proposed that an individual with

a higher level of job autonomy at work owns higher level

of energy. Meanwhile, Siu et al. (2010, p. 472) defined it

with ‘‘the degree to which the job provides substantial

freedom, independence, and discretion to the employee in

scheduling the work and in determining the procedure to be

used in carrying it out.’’ They added that having higher

autonomy means having more freedom to opt for the spe-

cific time and procedures for work tasks. An autonomous

individual has skill discretion and is creative at work, and

P. Salehi et al.

123

consequently, all these encourage work engagement. Ear-

lier studies supported the positive relationship between job

autonomy and WFE (e.g. Bohen and Viveros-Long 1981;

Clark 2001; Galinsky and Stein 1990; Grzywacz and Marks

2000). Likewise, recent studies also supported the rela-

tionship (e.g. Baral and Bhargava 2011a; Bhargava and

Baral 2009; Qiu 2011; Siu et al. 2010). For instance, Qiu

(2011) found a positive and significant relationship

between job autonomy and WFE among 262 MBA students

who were also full-time employees in various industries in

China.

Another environmental factor is supportive work–

family culture. Both formal organizational work–family

support (e.g. work–life balance policies) and informal

organizational support (e.g. supportive work–family

culture) explain a greater variance in WFE and are

more noticeable to employee outcomes (Behson 2005;

Wayne et al. 2006). According to Baral and Bhargava

(2011b, p. 226), supportive work–family culture is

defined as ‘‘the shared assumptions, beliefs and values

regarding the extent to which an organization supports

and values the integration of employees’ work and

family lives’’. Wayne et al. (2006) argued that sup-

portive work–family culture refers to unwritten expec-

tations guiding behaviours that create resources such as

time, flexibility, advice, and psychological resources.

Supportive leadership and management, having fewer

organizational time demands, and little negative career

consequences of availing work–life balance practices are

indications of appropriate work–family culture in orga-

nizations (Baral and Bhargava 2011b; Wayne et al.

2007). Baral and Bhargava’s (2011b) investigation on

485 managers from six organizations in India compris-

ing manufacturing, telecommunications and information

technology sectors reported a positive and significant

relationship between supportive work–family culture and

WFE. Similarly, Beutell and Wittig-Berman (2008) in

their study found a positive and significant influence of

supportive work–family culture on WFE among 7,065

employees in the US. Other studies have also supported

this relationship (Clark 2001; Lieke and Lippe 2010;

Wayne et al. 2006).

Based on the above discussion, this study proposes

H2. Environmental factors, including social support

(Ha2a), job autonomy (Ha2b), and supportive work–family

culture (Ha2c) have positive relationships with WFE.

Based on the above two research hypotheses (Ha1,

Ha2), this study also postulated that

H3. The proposed regression model of WFE fits the

data, i.e. this study hypothesized that there are significant

contributions of environmental and personal factors

towards WFE.

Methods

Participants

In this cross-sectional study, data were gathered using self-

reported questionnaires from academics at the Malaysian

Research Universities. There are five Research Universities

in Malaysia (MOHE 2011), with a total population of 9,375

academics. However, only three universities were involved

in this study based on access given by the registrars of the

universities. A total of 450 questionnaires were distributed

to the randomly selected academics in these three univer-

sities. Respondents indicated their level of agreement to

each statement on a five-point scale ranging from 1

‘‘strongly disagree’’ to 5 ‘‘strongly agree’’. In total, 295

questionnaires were returned giving a response rate of

65 %. Table 1 presents the summary of academics’

demographic characteristics. The sample comprises 49.2 %

male respondents, 50.8 % female respondents, and all

samples were married and had at least one child, which

indicates the specific household structure of this study.

Most of the academics in this study have doctoral degrees

with age ranging from 28 to 68 years (mean = 44.28,

SD = 8.64), worked between 4 and 16 hours per day

(mean = 8.55, SD = 1.51), and had served their respective

universities for one to 40 years (mean = 14.10,

SD = 8.96).

Data Analysis

Data were analysed using Pearson Product Moment Cor-

relation Coefficient and Multiple Linear Regression. Since

multiple comparisons were involved in this study, Bon-

ferroni method was used to calculate the adjusted or cor-

rected alpha level for the six bivariate correlation

coefficients (Field 2009). It effectively raises the standard

of proof needed when several hypotheses were examined

simultaneously. In this study, the adjusted alpha was cal-

culated as follows: aadjusted ¼ 0:05 alhpa levelð Þ6 number of hypothesesð Þ ¼ :0083

Measurements

W–FE was measured using Carlson et al.’s (2006) ða¼:92Þscale. Lim et al. (2012) analysis of several WFE instruments

indicated that Carlson et al.’s (2006) instrument is the best

choice which satisfied contextual and statistical soundness

criteria. This scale has 18 items measuring both WFE

ða¼:92Þ and FWE ða¼:86Þ dimensions. For the purpose of

this study, only 9-item of WFE was used. A sample item is

‘‘My involvement in my work helps me to acquire skills and

this helps me to be a better family member’’, and the Cron-

bach’s a for WFE in this study was .95.

Predictors of Academics’ WFE

123

Extraversion was accessed using five adjective-items

developed by Grzywacz and Marks (2000) a¼:79ð Þ. A

sample item of this scale is ‘‘How well talkative describes

you?’’ In the current study, Cronbach’s a for extraversion

was .80.

Core self-evaluation (CSE) was determined using CSE

scale developed by Judge et al. (2003) ða¼:79Þ. CSE scale

has 12 items. A sample item of CSE is ‘‘Overall, I am

satisfied with myself’’, and the Cronbach’s a was .81.

Overall health was measured using Madsen, John, and

Miller’s (2005) seven items scale ða¼:85Þ. The scale

includes mental and physical health indicators. A sample

item is ‘‘I can handle stressful situations effectively’’, and

the Cronbach’s a for overall health was .88.

Social support was measured using Caplan et al.’s

(1975) scale ða¼:83Þ. The scale has eight items, and a

sample item is ‘‘How much do your co-workers go out of

their way to do things to make your work and life easier for

you?’’ In this study, the Cronbach’s a for social support

was .89.

Job autonomy was measured using Voydanoff’s (2004b)

4-item scale (a = 0.87). A sample item is ‘‘How often do

you have a choice in deciding how you do your tasks at

work?’’, and the Cronbach’s a was .87.

Supportive work-family culture was measured using

Lyness et al.’s (1999) nine items scale (a = 0.80). A

sample item is ‘‘In general, managers in this Research

University are quite accommodating of family-related

needs.’’ In this study, the Cronbach’s a for supportive

work–family culture was .80.

To assess common method variance, Harman’s single

factor test (Podsakoff et al. 2003) was conducted. In this

method, each item of study was entered into an exploratory

factor analysis using an unrotated principal axis factoring

procedure. In case a substantial amount of common method

variance had been shown, a single factor would have arisen

or one general factor would have accounted for more than

50 % of the covariance among variables. The result

showed that the first component only accounted for

37.49 % of the total variance. Therefore, it is evident that

common method variance was not of great concern in this

study.

Results

This study aims to determine the factors predicting WFE in

the Malaysian Research Universities. H1 posits that per-

sonal factors including extraversion (Ha1a), core self-

evaluation (Ha1b), and overall health (Ha1c) were posi-

tively and significantly related to WFE. Table 2 indicates

that extraversion (r = .387, p = .0001), core self-evalua-

tion (r = .303, p = .0001), and overall health (r = .154,

p = .004) were positively and weakly predicted WFE.

Hence, H1 was supported.

H2 postulates that environmental factors, including

social support (Ha2a), job autonomy (Ha2b), and sup-

portive work–family culture (Ha2c), have positive and

significant relationships with WFE. Specifically, social

support (r = .367, p = .0001), job autonomy (r = .383,

p = .0001), and supportive work–family culture (r = .208,

p = .0001) were positively and weakly related to WFE.

Given these patterns of findings, H2 was also supported.

Multiple Linear Regression analysis was employed to

determine the best predictors of WFE. H3 posits that the

proposed regression model fits the data. Table 3 shows that all

predictors significantly explain the variations of academics’

WFE except overall health (t ¼ �2:252; q ¼ :025) and sup-

portive work–family culture (t ¼ �0:429; q ¼ :668). The

significant predictors of WFE are extraversion (t = 5:099;

q¼:0001), core self-evaluation ðt = 3:568; q¼:0001Þ, social

support (t¼ 4:087; q¼:0001), and job autonomy

(t¼ 3:598; q¼:0001). Table 3 further suggests that the

strongest predictor was extraversion (b¼:275; t¼ 5:099Þ;

Table 1 Summary of demographic characteristics of the study participants

Personal characteristics Frequency % M SD Min Max

Gender:

Male 145 49.20

Female 150 50.80

Highest level of education:

Master 45 15.30

PhD 250 84.70

Age (years) 44.28 8.64 28 68

Number of children 3 2 1 11

Monthly gross income (RM) 8,599 3,461 4,000 25,000

Average daily working hours (h) 8.55 1.51 4 16

Tenure in current organization (years) 14.10 8.96 1 40

P. Salehi et al.

123

followed by social support ðb¼:220; t = 4:087Þ, core self-

evaluation (b¼:216; t¼ 3:568Þ and job autonomy

(b¼:202; t¼ 3:598Þ. These predictors explained 30.1 % of

the variance in academics’ WFE. Based on these findings, H3

was partially supported.

Discussion

The results of the study indicated that all personal and

environmental factors were significantly correlated with

WFE (H1 and H2 were supported). These results are con-

sistent with previous research conducted by Baral and

Bhargava (2011b), Qiu (2011), Siu et al. (2010), Rotondo

and Kincaid (2008), Boyar and Mosley (2007), Beutell and

Wittig-Berman (2008). Further analysis using regression

indicated that extraversion, social support, core self-eval-

uation and job autonomy were significant predictors of

academics’ WFE at Malaysian Research Universities.

This significant relationship between extraversion and

academics’ WFE was due to the nature of academics’

work. Teaching, research and consultation are parts of the

academics’ job that build up their confidence and make

them more articulate. Collectively, the academics’ working

experience urges them to be more extroverted, and extro-

verted people are more inclined for WFE (Wayne et al.

2004). This is because of their tendency to express their

feelings and views towards the betterment of their family

lives. Among previous research, which stated extraversion

as a significant antecedent of WFE (Grzywacz and Marks

2000; Rotondo and Kincaid 2008; Wayne et al. 2004),

Rotondo and Kincaid and Wayne et al. mentioned the

salient role of extraversion in predicting WFE. Grzywacz

and Marks (2000) used extraversion as a control variable to

study the work–family interface from the ecological per-

spective. They found that a higher level of extraversion

was associated with more WFE. Their study among 1,986

US citizens significantly supported the finding on positive

relationship between extraversion and WFE. In addition,

Wayne et al. (2004) examined the relationship between

extraversion and WFE. They reported that extraversion

positively predicted WFE. Their study utilized 2,130 US

citizens. In a cross-sectional study about facilitation and

individual coping styles across the work and family

domains by Rotondo and Kincaid (2008), they found that

extraversion was significantly associated with a higher

level of WFE. Their study was carried out among 1,312

non-institutionalized people aged 25–74 of the US popu-

lation. Similar to our study, these three studies found

extraversion as a significant predictor of WFE.

Among studies which found social support as one of the

significant WFE predictors (Baral and Bhargava 2011b;

Table 2 Inter-correlations, means and standard deviations

Variable Mean SD Y 2 3 4 5 6

1. WFE (Y) 3.93 .77

2. Extraversion 3.77 .56 .387**

3. Core self-evaluation 3.58 .50 .303** .239**

4. Overall health 4.09 .56 .154** .324** .518**

5. Social support 3.52 .68 .367** .254** .122* .191**

6. Job autonomy 3.87 .67 .383** .233** .270** .197** .342**

7. Supportive work–family culture 3.25 .66 .208** .001 .331** .145** .250** .378**

** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed)

* Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (1-tailed)

Table 3 Estimates of coefficients for the predictors of academics’ WFE

Variables B SE b

Constant .211 .384

Extraversion .375 .074 .275

Core self-evaluation .331 .093 .216

Overall health -.182 .081 -.133

Social support .250 .061 .220

Job autonomy .231 .064 .202

Supportive work–family culture .028 .065 .024

R ¼ 0:561; R2 ¼ 0:315; Adj:R2 ¼ 0:301;

F ¼ 22:074; q ¼ :0001; Durbin�Watson ¼ 1:957

Predictors of Academics’ WFE

123

Beutell and Wittig-Berman 2008; Grzywacz and Marks

2000; Mauno and Rantanen 2012; Qiu, 2011; Rashid et al.

2011; Siu et al. 2010), only Siu et al. and Rashid et al.

revealed social support as the best predictor of WFE.

Mauno and Rantanen’s (2012) study on 1,956 Finnish

health care and service employees found a positive rela-

tionship between work supports and WFE. Another study

on 689 nurses at public hospitals in Malaysia by Rashid

et al. (2011) provided empirical support for a positive

relationship between social support and WFE. This study

asserted that individuals with a higher level of WFE

experience higher levels of support from their friends,

family, supervisor, and co-workers. Our findings are con-

sistent with the above results and provide another signifi-

cant support for the relationship between social support and

WFE. In addition, this significant relationship between

social support and WFE is consistent with collectivist

worldview of Eastern people (Hofstede 2001), which is

associated with interpersonal harmony. Academics’ role as

teachers made them earn a great deal of respect from their

students, which later provides them opportunities for net-

working with a diverse range of people. All these links

could offer powerful resources to enhance the academics’

performances at work and family domains (Mohd Rasdi

et al. 2012, 2013). In another words, the support received at

work domain can spill over to the family domain and

leading to better WFE.

Overall, the proposed regression model fits the data at

.05 level of confidence and H3 was partially supported. In

other words, there are significant contributions of envi-

ronmental factors and personal factors towards WFE. The

findings of this study have provided support for the WFE

theory (Greenhaus and Powell 2006) and the model of

primary antecedents, consequences, and moderators of

facilitation (Wayne et al. 2007) by using a Malaysian

sample. Therefore, it is evident that the theory and the

model can be employed in the non-Western context in

order to investigate WFE.

However, this study did not support the findings of

previous research about the predictive roles of supportive

work–family culture and overall health. Specifically, this

study’s findings contradict Tang et al.’s (2012), Baral and

Bhargava’s (2011b), Lieke and Lippe’s (2010), and Beutell

and Wittig-Berman’s (2008) findings on supportive work–

family culture. It was probably due to some cultural dif-

ferences between the west and the east, since the majority

of those studies were conducted in western countries. The

finding of this study also did not support Pathak’s (2011)

and Beutell and Wittig-Berman’s (2008) results regarding

the relationship between overall health and W-FE. In this

study, the majority of the respondents’ age ranged between

35 and 45 years old (mean = 44.28, SD = 8.64). Based on

this finding, it is assumed that health was not a major

problem affecting the respondents’ work and family lives.

In addition, the difference in scale used to measure overall

health in WFE studies may lead to inconsistencies in

findings.

Limitations and Future Research

This study has several limitations. First, the sampling

population of this study was only confined to academics at

Malaysian Research Universities. Future studies could go

for more diverse population in order to reach more gen-

eralized results using the same research framework.

Results could be varied even between different nations

such as ASEAN countries and Middle East, where WFE

has been rarely studied. Second, WFE is a bidirectional

phenomenon. It has WFE and FWE, and this study limits

its focus on WFE phenomenon only. Furthermore, there are

lack of studies focusing on the directions of WFE phe-

nomenon (Bhargava and Baral 2009; Stevens et al. 2007);

therefore, future studies could focus on WFE and FWE

simultaneously to achieve a better understanding of the

work–family complexity. Third, this study did not support

the salient role of supportive work–family culture in pre-

dicting academics’ WFE. We suggest that future studies

could measure work–family culture using a more custom-

ized instrument, specifically one, which is suitable for the

Eastern culture. Cultural differences between east and west

may lead to inconsistencies in findings. Using a work–

family culture instrument which is more suited to specific

culture will probably produce accurate results.

Implications for Theory and Practice

This study suggests some implications for scholars and

practitioners. It was conducted in the work–family inter-

face of a non-Western context. Therefore, it is evident that

the WFE theory and the facilitation model can be adopted

and adapted in a non-Western context in order to investi-

gate WFE. The results of this study for academics as a

leading career prototype suggest the important roles of

extraversion, social support, CSE, and job autonomy for

the world of work. HR practitioners should pay more

attention to the positive side of the work–family interface

in order to gain benefit from the positive effects of WFE

and its consequences. For instance, if recruitment process

is based on the qualifications of a position, HR practitioners

could consider personal characteristics such as extraversion

in order to have fewer turnovers. They could also seek out

for environmental resources such as social support to

reinforce WFE during employees’ services in order to

improve their job outcomes. We found social support as

one of the best predictors of WFE among the academics.

Therefore, HR practitioners should be more cautious about

P. Salehi et al.

123

this environmental factor, and try to create, improve, and

maintain social networks. They should be aware of the role

of extraversion and CSE. An extrovert and high-core-self

evaluated academic would benefit more from the process of

WFE, and would be more successful in work and family

simultaneously. Therefore, HR practitioners could organize

workshops to enhance the extraversion and CSE abilities of

academics. Educational programs aimed at enhancing

employees’ extraversion and CSE could help guide

employees in managing conflict and problems encountered

in both realms of work and family.

Conclusion

This study concludes that all proposed personal and envi-

ronmental factors have significant relationships with WFE.

Personal and environmental factors play major roles in

work-to-family relationship. Extraversion and core self-

evaluation are significant personal resources, and social

support and job autonomy are critical environmental

resources for academics’ WFE at the Malaysian Research

Universities. Further, the best predictors of WFE are

extraversion, followed by social support.

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