RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JOB AND FAMILY SATISFACTION - CAUSAL OR NONCAUSAL COVARIATION

Prior research supports a positive relationship between job and family satisfaction. Although this relationship has been taken as support fo r the spillover hypothesis, it is also consistent with an alternate hy pothesis that has received little attention. The congruence hypothesis states that job and family satisfaction are positively related becaus e they share a common cause or causes. Thus, the distinction between t he spillover and congruence hypotheses reflects the broader distinctio n between causal and noncausal (i.e., spurious) covariation. The goal of this study was to determine which hypothesis best reflects the rela tionship between job and family satisfaction. Data were obtained throu gh household interviews with a random sample of 631 individuals. Struc tural equation modeling techniques were used to estimate simultaneousl y a reciprocal relationship between job and family satisfaction and a noncausal correlation between their disturbance terms. Results support ed the congruence hypothesis, indicating that the relationship between job and family satisfaction is characterized best as noncausal.