THE LATENT STRUCTURE OF JOB CHARACTERISTICS OF MEN AND WOMEN

Interesting gender differences are found in this article in the observ ed patterns of the job characteristics that are considered here charac teristics of men's jobs and characteristics of women's jobs. By applyi ng the methods of latent structure analysis to analyze data on job cha racteristics obtained in a British national survey, the authors find t hat, for both the men and women employees considered here, there are u nderlying latent variables that can explain the observed patterns of t he job characteristics that pertain to (1) payment conditions, (2) pro motion prospects, and (3) autonomy at work. The article describes how the underlying latent variables associated with the men's job characte ristics differ from the corresponding underlying latent variables asso ciated with women's job characteristics.