Introduction

Years of experience and research in higher education have underscored the critical need for strengthened efforts to recruit and retain faculty of color in academe. In addition to faculty of color comprising only about 21% of all full-time faculty and 16% of full professors (U.S. Department of Higher Education 2015), significant evidence has pointed to discrimination, racism, isolation, and marginalization as major influences shaping their experiences in higher education (Baez 2000; Bensimon and Tierney 1996; Fries-Britt et al. 2011; Hendrix 2007; Porter 2007; Sadao 2003; Stanley 2006; Turner 2002). A variety of promising practices focused on retaining faculty of color have been proposed to address these concerns, including mentoring programs, addressing inequalities in work commitments, and creating supportive administrative practices (Fries-Britt et al. 2011; Kelly and McCann 2014; Zambrana et al. 2015). However, existing knowledge around issues of work-life balance among faculty of different racial/ethnic backgrounds is limited (Kachchaf et al. 2015; Ong et al. 2010). Given that lack of work-life balance has been reported to be associated with a variety of adverse outcomes among employees and among faculty members specifically, ranging from absenteeism and job turnover to psychological, emotional, and physical illness (Jones et al. 2013; McCoy et al. 2013; Nohe et al. 2015; Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2012), we ground this study in the proposition that examining work-life balance among faculty from different racial/ethnic backgrounds, including an emphasis on the factors that help to promote work-life balance, may open new doors to efforts that improve the retention and experiences of faculty of color in higher education.

The majority of existing literature has studied faculty work-life balance with an emphasis on institutional policies and practices, culture, and agency in the context of gender (Lester 2013, 2015; Lester and Sallee 2009; O’Meara and Campbell 2011; Sallee 2012, 2013; Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2006). However, carefully examining racial/ethnic differences in work-life balance holds promise in not only expanding our knowledge base on the factors that create more welcoming climates for faculty, but also in pointing to practices and environments that may allow institutions to better address the retention of faculty of color. This study thus seeks to address the demographic and work-related factors that influence work-life balance among faculty members from various racial/ethnic backgrounds, including African American, Asian American, Latina/o, and White faculty. In our study, we use the “overall appraisal” approach to studying work-life balance, referring to the concept as “an individual’s general assessment concerning the entirety of his or her life situation” (Rantanen et al. 2011, p. 29). In this definition, the focus is placed on how individuals achieve or fail to achieve overall balance among their personal, family, and work lives, rather than focusing on specific components of the work-life balance construct that may refer to time commitments or psychological effort devoted to the various aspects of one’s life (Rantanen et al. 2011). The overall appraisal approach calls for general questions on surveys, an emphasis reflected in our interest in studying faculty’s responses to the statement, “I have been able to find the right balance, for me, between my professional life and my personal/family life.” The study is guided by the following research questions:

  1. 1.

    Are there differences in Asian American, African American, Latina/o, and White faculty’s perceptions of their ability to find balance between their professional and personal/family time?

  2. 2.

    To what extent are demographic characteristics (e.g., gender, household status) and work-related factors (e.g., academic area, departmental/institutional characteristics and support, satisfaction with work) associated with the ability of Asian American, African American, Latina/o, and White faculty members to find balance between their professional and personal/family life?

Literature Review

We bring together two bodies of literature in contextualizing our study of work-life balance among faculty from different racial/ethnic backgrounds. First, we review the major findings of studies on work-life balance among faculty members, a literature area that lacks significant focus on faculty racial/ethnic background. And second, we focus on research documenting the experiences of faculty of color in academe, where issues of work-life balance have not been generally considered as central emphases (Kachchaf et al. 2015).

Faculty Work-Life Balance

The nature of faculty work and challenges of work-life balance for faculty have been well-documented and debated in the literature (Boyer 1990; Fairweather 1996; Lester 2013; Lester and Sallee 2009; O’Meara and Campbell 2011; O’Meara and Rice 2005). Overall, studies of faculty work-life balance have revealed significant gender differences, with women faculty reporting lower levels of job satisfaction; more difficulty balancing teaching, research, and service responsibilities; and less work-life balance (Misra et al. 2012; Sadao 2003; Smith and Calasanti 2005; Stanley 2006; Turner 2002, 2003).

Existing studies have also shown that women faculty are disproportionally affected by care-giving and domestic responsibilities, have illuminated tensions for women academics wishing to start families by pointing out the lock-step positioning of the tenure clock and women’s biological clock, and have investigated parenthood and the complexities of balancing child-rearing with an academic career (Gatta and Roos 2004; Jacobs and Winslow 2004; Mason et al. 2013; Misra et al. 2012; Perna 2001, 2005; Suitor et al. 2001; Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2004; Winslow 2010).

Previous research has investigated the relationship between disciplinary background, rank, and tenure and constructs reflecting work and family stress, work-family conflict and interference, and work-life balance among faculty members (Fox et al. 2011; Misra et al. 2010; O’Laughlin and Bischoff 2005; Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2015). Although disciplinary backgrounds are understudied in relation to faculty work-life balance, a study on faculty in science and engineering fields showed no differences based on disciplinary affiliations in work-family interference (Fox et al. 2011). Similarly, in their research on disciplinary differences in the work and personal lives of faculty mothers specifically, Wolf-Wendel and Ward (2015) found considerable similarities among academic disciplines. The authors noted that “women faculty members with children, at both early career and midcareer stages, were able to manage their lives at home and at work and find joy in both realms” (p. 30). However, Wolf-Wendel and Ward (2015) also found notable differences in disciplinary cultures, especially with regard to how women in their study perceived “ideal worker norms” in different disciplines (p. 30). In the humanities, for example, faculty mothers based their work patterns on the individualized cultures of their fields, where they performed much of their work when children were engaged in other activities and late in the evening or early in the morning. In the sciences, by contrast, faculty mothers put emphasis on being present in their labs and worked to accommodate their lives to the strong focus on grant-seeking and productivity. Wolf-Wendel and Ward (2015) succinctly explained the important role of disciplinary differences in attaining work-life balance:

For women faculty members in STEM fields, attention goes to maintaining labs and carrying forward initiatives as the only women in their departments. In the humanities, the time crunch comes from service and teaching responsibilities associated with managing large classes, grading, and working with underprepared students. In the social sciences, this imbalance often comes from service responsibilities. In the professional fields, it often comes from staying current with advances in the field. (p. 31)

Importantly, the findings of Wolf-Wendel and Ward’s (2015) study also revealed a relationship between faculty rank and the ability to modify discipline-based ideal worker norms, with more established, tenured, women having more capacity to change those norms. Although tenured status may be important in promoting faculty members’ ability to more effectively balance their work and life commitments, it appears that tenure plays different roles based on the outcomes studied. For example, in their study of faculty, O’Laughlin and Bischoff (2005) found no differences in work and family stress by tenure status. Tenured faculty in this study, however, tended to be more involved in their families, which, the authors suggest, may be a result of greater workplace flexibility afforded by tenure.

In addition, existing research has revealed strategies used by faculty mothers to confront the challenges of academic motherhood. Ward and Wolf-Wendel (2004) noted the simultaneous shielding effect of work and family life. As the authors noted, “Movement back and forth between spheres gave the women in the study a sense of ‘time out’ which provided temporary respite from the stress and tension of one sphere. As professional women, the academic accomplishments of these women buffered them from consuming stresses at home. … In turn, the presence of a child buffered women from the harsh realities at work” (pp. 253–254). The practice of “satisfying” was also prevalent among the faculty mothers participating in Ward and Wolf-Wendel’s (2004) study, referring to the notion of making compromises in one’s work and accepting some aspects of their accomplishments as “good enough,” but not necessarily the best possible outcome. In addition, Misra et al. (2012) documented an often-used strategy by faculty mothers to continue their efforts in the areas of teaching and service, while jeopardizing their research and writing accomplishments. Although this approach was valuable in ensuring day-to-day survival, it put at risk mothers’ ability to attain promotion and tenure, given that faculty members’ scholarship record continues to be most highly regarded in personnel decisions.

Not surprisingly, institutional type plays a major role in faculty mothers’ ability to balance their professional lives with personal and family commitments (Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2006). As the authors summarized, each institutional type presents unique work-life environments:

At research universities, the pull comes from seemingly unending research expectations. At liberal arts colleges, the pull is towards being a great teacher and being available to your students at all hours as a way to create a family-like atmosphere on campus. The pull of striving comprehensives comes from multiple directions simultaneously – with heavy teaching loads, high service expectations and substantial research demands combined with few role models to demonstrate the feasibility of achieving these expectations. … The community college faculty members, in general, seemed more content about their situations, and were generally more positive about the ability to successfully combine work and family as compared to faculty at the other institutional types. (p. 514)

Amid the many challenges confronted by mothers in academe, some studies have pointed to the existence of subtle advantages, including increased efficiency that mothers experience in juggling professional and family roles. For some academic mothers, competing demands have meant having to be more task-oriented so that they can accomplish all their responsibilities in multiple aspects of their lives (Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2004, 2012). Further, faculty mothers have pointed to ways in which the flexibility of academic, as opposed to other, careers have allowed them to be more involved in their families (Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2012).

The finding related to faculty members’ higher family involvement also arose in the limited literature on the experiences of faculty fathers (Reddick et al. 2012; Sallee 2012, 2013; Sallee and Hart 2015). Although these studies have also shown that fathers experience challenges in accomplishing work-life balance as well, in research that includes samples of both faculty women and men, the conclusion is clear: having children poses significantly more professional challenges for women than men faculty at all stages of the academic career, challenges that are particularly pronounced in terms of career advancement for early-career faculty mothers in their pursuit of tenure (Mason et al. 2013).

In addition, existing research has also uncovered some important work-life balance complexities related to the number of hours spent on various tasks at work and at home (Jacobs and Winslow 2004). In particular, Jacobs and Winslow (2004) found that married women faculty with children spent 4 h less on work weekly than their single counterparts with no children. The difference among men was smaller, but even in that sample, married fathers put in 2 h less work than single men without children. When taking all aspects of work into account, one study found that Associate Professors at a research university worked between 90 (men) and 102 h (women), combining “paid work, housework, and carework totals” (Misra et al. 2010, p. 1). Others have reported that faculty work 55 h a week on average and that the average number of hours worked is significantly related to work-related stress among faculty members (O’Laughlin and Bischoff 2005).

Lastly, policies, culture, and agency have been at the center of attention in the literature on the environmental factors that promote and hinder faculty members’ efforts to achieve work-life balance. In terms of the policy climate, studies have shown the increasing availability of work-life policies, such as parental leaves, stop-the-tenure-clock arrangements, childcare support, or part-time work options at institutions of higher education (O’Meara and Campbell 2011; Welch et al. 2011; Williams et al. 2006). However, the literature has overwhelmingly demonstrated that such policies are underused by faculty members (Drago et al. 2005; Lundquist et al. 2012; Mason et al. 2013).

The often unsupportive work-life culture of higher education that is linked with significant stigma against parenthood and caregiving, as well as institutional standards aimed at furthering prestige, carry a significant portion of the blame for the underutilization of work-life policies (Lester 2015; O’Meara and Campbell 2011; Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2012). In contrast, support from senior colleagues at the department level and those in institutional and departmental leadership positions, as well as family-friendly department norms and role models play key roles in bolstering faculty’s agency as they make crucial decisions about balancing their professional and personal/family lives (Lester 2015; O’Meara and Campbell 2011).

Faculty of Color in Higher Education

An additional thread of the literature has been concerned with varying dimensions of the recruitment, retention, and workplace experiences of faculty of color, both in the aggregate and across different racial, ethnic, and gender categories (Turner et al. 2008). These studies have focused on topics including the intersection of race and gender and issues of identity (e.g. Harris 2007; Turner 2002), job satisfaction and intent to leave (e.g., Niemann and Dovidio 2005; Ponjuan 2005; Smith and Calasanti 2005), issues of marginalization and isolation (e.g., Smith and Calasanti 2005; Turner 2002, 2003) and, in a limited fashion, the work-life experiences of faculty of color (Kachchaf et al. 2015).

Importantly, much of the research on faculty of color has pointed to the racialized culture embedded in historically and predominantly White colleges and universities, and the accompanying “occupational stress” (Stanley 2006, p. 704) experienced by faculty of color, (Antonio 2002; Baez 2000; Sadao 2003; Smith and Calasanti 2005; Stanley 2006; Turner 2003; Weems 2003). Specifically, these studies show that faculty of color have disproportionally high service workloads (Bensimon and Tierney 1996; Antonio 2002; Baez 2000; Porter 2007) and experience the undervaluation and de-legitimization of their scholarship (Turner 2002, 2003; Williams and Williams 2006), challenges to competence by colleagues and by students in the classroom (Hendrix 2007; Turner 2002), and difficulties balancing academic life with family and community responsibilities (Misra et al. 2012; Sadao 2003; Stanley 2006; Turner 2002).

Studies exploring the workplace experiences of both women and men faculty of color have uncovered challenges and inequities when it comes to the balance of research, teaching, and service activities and responsibilities compared to their White counterparts. For example, Antonio (2002), Baez (2000), and Porter (2007) found that faculty of color of both genders are likely to have more service commitments and duties than their White colleagues, which presents workload inequities and can negatively impact tenure and promotion when service work is undervalued in such processes. In addition, the extensive demands for faculty of color to serve on committees and for other work requiring diverse perspectives can lead to feelings of exhaustion and “cultural taxation” (Bensimon and Tierney 1996; Padilla 1994).

Although work-life issues are mentioned briefly in some articles that focus more generally on faculty of color (Kelly and McCann 2014; Misra et al. 2012; Turner 2002; Turner et al. 2011), only one study has examined exclusively the work-life experiences of women of color from a higher education perspective (Kachchaf et al. 2015). Exploring the lives of three women of color in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields—including a postdoctoral fellow, an industry scientist, and a faculty member—Kachchaf et al.’s (2015) study stressed ways in which “underrepresented minority women in STEM experience cumulative disadvantage because of having multiple identities that deviate from the ideal worker norm” (p. 188). The authors further noted that the lack of correspondence with the ideal worker norm in the lives of the three women of color, defined as “commitment to the job through long hours, unbroken career trajectories, and constant availability and visibility” (Kachchaf et al. 2015, p. 176), often led to unpleasant and discriminatory interactions with colleagues, including deans and department chairs. For the women of color participating in the study, these interactions resulted in feelings of insecurity, the perceived need to focus entirely on work responsibilities and hide family interests and obligations, and career choices that sometimes harbored significant personal compromises.

Overall, although existing studies have provided a number of insights into how gender and parenthood intersect with the work-life balance of faculty (Mason et al. 2013; O’Meara and Campbell 2011; Sallee 2012; Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2012), they also point to the need for a focused examination of the correlates of work-life balance among faculty of color. Our study contributes to this emerging body of literature through a quantitative examination of faculty’s perceptions of their ability to find balance between their professional and personal/family lives in the context of demographic and work-related correlates, with a specific focus on race and ethnicity.

Conceptual Framework

Responding to our interest in examining the factors that contribute to faculty members’ perceptions of their ability to attain work-life balance, and because of the absence of a comprehensive theory that directly addresses work-life balance with attention to faculty, our conceptual framework builds on both our literature review and two theories that have been used to inform studies of work-life balance and conflict within and outside of faculty life, including social support resource theory and the theory of perceived organizational support (Allen 2001; Eisenberger et al. 1986; Hobfoll 1989; Hobfoll et al. 1990; Grandey and Cropanzano 1999; Shockley and Allen 2007).

Drawing on previous research that points to the importance of considering faculty’s personal backgrounds in the attainment of work-life balance, our conceptual framework incorporates a focus on gender and household status (Jacobs and Winslow 2004; Mason et al. 2013; Misra et al. 2012, Perna 2001, 2005; Suitor et al. 2001; Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2004; Winslow 2010), in addition to our overarching emphasis on race and ethnicity (Kachchaf et al. 2015). In terms of academic backgrounds, our framework considers faculty rank and academic area in investigations of work-life balance perceptions (Fox et al. 2011; Misra et al. 2010; O’Laughlin and Bischoff 2005; Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2015). Finally, we draw on the literature in specifying variables related to institutional type and control as possible correlates of faculty work-life balance (Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2006).

In addition to faculty backgrounds, our conceptual framework specifies the critical role of various resources and support in faculty’s attainment of work-life balance. We thus draw on social support resource theory (Hobfoll et al. 1990) and the theory of perceived organizational support (Eisenberger et al. 1986) to address these concerns. According to Hobfoll et al. (1990), the importance of resources, defined as “those objects, personal characteristics, conditions, or energies that are valued by the individual or that serve as a means for attainment of these objects, personal characteristics, conditions, or energies” (Hobfoll 1989, p. 516) can be viewed from the perspective of their role in aiding individual well-being (Hobfoll et al. 1990). As such, resources assist in the development of resistance or coping in a variety of situations.

Although all resources can be viewed as aiding in resistance and coping, from the perspective of our study, it is especially important to highlight the centrality of social support as a potential coping resource, as represented by social support resource theory. As Hobfoll (1989) noted, “social relations are seen as a resource to the extent that they provide or facilitate the preservation of valued resources, but they can also detract from individuals’ resources” (p. 517), depending on whether social support does or does not respond to situational needs. Along these lines, Eisenberger et al. (1986) referred to the concept of “perceived organizational support” (POS), defined as employees’ “global beliefs concerning the extent to which the organization values their contributions and cares about their well-being” (p. 501). Based on the POS concept, Allen (2001) developed the notion of family-supportive organizational perceptions (FSOP) to refer specifically to the extent to which employees perceive of their organizations as family-supportive. Importantly, Allen (2001) viewed FSOP as an important “coping resource for individuals to deal with balancing work and nonwork roles” (p. 417). In another study as well, FSOP was found to be negatively related to work interference with family and family interference with work (Shockley and Allen 2007), demonstrating the key role played by organizational environments that support family-related needs in the work lives of employees.

In accordance with these theories, we have included variables that refer to faculty members’ experiences with social support, including support they receive through mentoring and from colleagues. In addition, two of our environmental variables relate specifically to faculty members’ global perceptions of social support in the context of balancing their personal and professional lives—at both the departmental and institutional levels. We also included several variables that we consider as intermediate outcomes of social support, reflecting faculty members’ satisfaction with the time they spend on teaching, research, service, outreach, and administrative responsibilities. The inclusion of these variables is also supported by research that has demonstrated the inherent connection between faculty members’ ability to balance their personal and professional lives and time spent on various activities (Jacobs and Winslow 2004; Misra et al. 2010; O’Laughlin and Bischoff 2005).

Method

Data Source and Participants

We utilized data from the Collaborative on Academic Careers in Higher Education (COACHE) project housed at Harvard University (Benson et al. 2012). We used faculty data from the 2011 survey due to the fairly large samples of faculty of color in that year of the survey’s administration. Since White faculty represented the vast majority of the sample, we randomly selected a smaller subsample of White faculty. This sample consisted of 3803 faculty members from 69 institutions. We excluded faculty who had missing data on the outcome variable, as well as gender, household status, rank, and academic area. Thus, the percentage of missing data for the independent variables ranged from 0 to 23%. The majority of independent variables had either no missing data (seven variables) or had less than 10% missing data (four variables). Another five variables had between 10 and 20% missing data, and one variable had 23% missing data (i.e., satisfaction with time spent on outreach). Appendix provides the percentage of missing data for all of the independent variables. We replaced missing data using the expectation maximization (EM) substitution method, which obtains maximum likelihood (ML) estimates to replace missing data (Allison 2002). Given the relatively small sample sizes of faculty of color in each of the racial/ethnic groups, we were reluctant to exclude faculty who had missing data on independent variables (with the exception of gender, household status, rank, and academic area), as it would reduce our sample sizes even further. However, we are also aware that the percentage of missing data for some of the variables is relatively high and thus replacing missing data may not be appropriate. Thus, we repeated our analyses with and without missing data and compared the findings across both analyses (Tabachnick and Fidell 2013). The final sample without missing data consisted of 2953 faculty members. Of these, 1184 (40%) were women faculty and 1769 (60%) were men. In terms of racial/ethnic background, 1059 (36%) were Asian American, 512 (17%) were African American, 359 (12%) were Latina/o, and 1023 (35%) were White.

Measures

Our conceptual framework, shaped by past literature and theory (i.e., social support resource theory and the theory of perceived organizational support) informed our choice of variables included in the analyses.

Dependent Variable

The dependent variable was a single item which asked faculty to rate their level of agreement with the statement that “I have been able to find the right balance, for me, between my professional life and my personal/family life.” This item was on a 5-point Likert scale: 1 = strongly disagree; 2 = somewhat disagree; 3 = neither agree nor disagree; 4 = somewhat agree; and 5 = strongly agree.

Independent Variables

The independent variables can be categorized into faculty characteristics, departmental characteristics and support, institutional characteristics and support, and faculty satisfaction with work. Faculty characteristics consisted of gender, household status, rank, and academic area. Gender was a dichotomous variable (0 = male; 1 = female). Household status was a categorical variable that was recoded into several dummy variables: single without children, single with children, married without children, and married with children (reference group). Rank was an ordinal variable (1 = instructor/lecturer/other; 2 = assistant professor; 3 = associate professor; 4 = professor or full professor). Drawing on Wolf-Wendel and Ward’s (2015) work on disciplinary differences in academic motherhood, we used academic area as a categorical variable, coded into several dummy variables: humanities (reference group), social sciences, physical sciences, biological sciences, visual and performing arts, engineering/computer science/mathematics/statistics, health and human ecology, agriculture/natural resources/environmental sciences, business, education, medical school and health professions, and other professions.

Departmental characteristics and support consisted of collegial and supportive colleagues, departmental mentoring, and departmental supportive colleagues. Collegial and supportive colleagues was a 2-item index (α = .84) that asked faculty if their departmental colleagues “pitch in” when needed and whether their department is collegial as a whole. Departmental mentoring was a single item asking faculty to rate the effectiveness of mentoring they received from someone in their department (1 = very ineffective to 5 = very effective). Departmental supportive colleagues was also a single item, and asked faculty to rate their agreement that their departmental colleagues do what they can to make personal/family obligations (e.g., childcare or eldercare) and an academic career compatible (1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree).

Institutional characteristics consisted of institutional control (0 = public; 1 = private), and Carnegie classification (1 = very high and high research universities; 0 = all others). In addition, we also included an item that asked about faculty perceptions that their institution does what it can to make personal/family obligations and an academic career compatible.

Faculty satisfaction with work consisted of six items. Satisfaction with time spent on various activities was measured with five variables asking faculty to rate their level of satisfaction with the portion of their time spent on the following (all on a 5-point Likert scale from 1 = very dissatisfied to 5 = very satisfied): teaching, research, service, outreach, and administrative tasks. General satisfaction with institution and department was measured by a 3-item index (α = .87) that asked faculty to rate their satisfaction with their department and institution, and if they would choose to work at this institution if they had to do it all over again. All of these items regarding faculty perceptions of their institutions were on a 5-point Likert scale from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree. Appendix provides the descriptive statistics for the variables for all four faculty groups.

Analyses

We first examined whether there were any significant differences in work-life balance by racial/ethnic group. Specifically, we utilized Welch’s variance-weighted ANOVA and Tamhane’s T2 post hoc comparisons to examine the differences in work-life balance among Asian American, African American, Latina/o, and White faculty. We then conducted a series of blocked-entry regression analyses to examine how faculty characteristics (block 2), departmental characteristics and support (block 2), institutional characteristics and support (block 3), and faculty satisfaction with work (block 4) are associated with faculty work-life balance across each of the four racial/ethnic groups. As mentioned earlier, we repeated our multiple regression analyses with and without missing data (with the exception of the dependent variable, gender, household status, rank, and academic area), and compared the findings across both sets of analyses. Thus, we focus only on the findings which were consistent across both sets of analyses in the results section. We considered using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) due to the nesting of faculty within institutions; however, due to the small sample sizes of the faculty of color per institution (e.g., there were many institutions with fewer than four faculty members), HLM was not appropriate. We examined the tolerance and variance inflation factors (VIFs) to check for multicollinearity. Tolerance values less than or equal to .10 and VIF statistics greater than 10.0 indicate possible multicollinearity (Ethington et al. 2002). In this study, all tolerance values were greater than .20 and all VIF statistics were less than 5.0, so multicollinearity was not an issue.

Limitations

This study has some limitations that should be noted when interpreting the findings. First, the dependent variable of interest asked faculty to what extent they agree that “I have been able to find the right balance, for me, between my professional life and my personal/family life.” Thus, this variable refers to the perceptions of work-life balance for individual faculty members, which is a subjective, individual experience that implies no comparison with their peers or others. While their family and peers may not agree, it should be noted that these are valid self-perceptions of the individual faculty members in the study. Second, further disaggregation is needed in regards to the number of children along with their ages and whether the faculty member also cares for an adult dependent(s). While the COACHE data did have this information, the sample sizes were too small for any meaningful comparisons in this study. Third, some of the independent variables ask faculty about their satisfaction with time spent on various activities (i.e., teaching, research, service, outreach, administrative tasks), instead of actual time spent on these various tasks. Despite these limitations, this study provides a critical step toward understanding correlates of faculty work-life balance, and in particular, for faculty of color.

Results

Group Differences in Perceived Work-Life Balance

Table 1 presents mean comparisons among the four faculty groups by racial/ethnic background. Perceptions of work-life balance were highest for Asian American faculty, a finding that was significantly different from the other three racial/ethnic groups. There were no statistically significant differences in perceived work-life balance among African American, Latina/o, and White faculty. However, the fact that the mean rating of perceived faculty work-life balance for all the racial/ethnic groups is close to the “neither agree nor disagree” response option (i.e., between 3.0 and 3.5Footnote 1) should be cause for concern as all faculty appear to be ambivalent about their work-life balance.

Table 1 Mean differences in work-life balance by race/ethnicity (N = 2953)
Full size table

Correlates of Work-Life Balance Across Racial/Ethnic Groups

Table 2 presents the results of the multiple regression analyses, with missing data replaced, by the four racial/ethnic groups. Here, we focus only on the findings that were consistent across both sets of analyses (i.e., with and without missing data); these consistent findings are highlighted in the table. All of the predictors together explain from over one-third to close to half of the variance in perceived faculty work-life balance, ranging from 38% (White/Caucasian faculty) to 47% (African American faculty). In terms of gender, African American women faculty reported lower work-life balance as compared to African American men, while Latina faculty reported higher work-life balance than Latino faculty. Among Asian American and White faculty, our analyses detected no gender difference in work-life balance. Considering family/household status, there were no differences in perceived work-life balance between single or married faculty, or between faculty with or without children for both African American and Latina/o faculty. Among White faculty, however, across both sets of analyses, single faculty without children had lower perceived work-life balance than their counterparts who were married with children.

Table 2 Standardized beta coefficients predicting faculty work-life balance (N = 2953)
Full size table

Rank was consistently and positively associated with greater work-life balance in all groups. In terms of academic area, our analyses detected few differences across the racial/ethnic groups. For Asian American and Latina/o faculty, there were no differences in perceived work-life balance across the disciplines. African American faculty in Business had higher perceived work-life balance as compared to their counterparts in Humanities. For White faculty, those in the Biological Sciences reported higher work-life balance than their counterparts in Humanities.

As a whole, when looking at findings that were consistent across both sets of analyses, departmental characteristics and support did not appear to have any association with faculty perceptions of work-life balance in the final regression across all faculty groups. However, the last of the three variables, referring to departmental work-life balance support, was significant upon entry in Block 2 for all four faculty groups (β coefficients ranged from .29 to .34, ps all < .001), but became non-significant in Block 3 when institutional characteristics and support were entered into the regression analyses. This was the case across both sets of analyses. Also important to note is that although variables related to departmental characteristics and support were not related to faculty’s perceptions of work-life balance when all other variables were taken into account, this block of variables still explained a considerable amount of variance in the full model (from 9% among Latina/o faculty to 14% among Asian American faculty).

The block of variables indicating institutional characteristics and support explained slightly higher amounts of variance in the outcome, between 13% for White faculty to 16% for both African American and Latina/o faculty. Among these variables, when looking at findings consistent across both sets of analyses, institutional control (private versus public) was not related to work-life balance for three of the four faculty groups (i.e., all except for Asian American faculty). African American faculty employed at very high and high research universities (versus all others) reported lower work-life balance, whereas there were no differences for Asian American, Latina/o, or White faculty. The one institutional characteristic that showed a consistent and positive relationship with work-life balance perceptions for all faculty was whether their institution does what it can to make personal/family obligations and an academic career compatible (β coefficients from .32 to .40, ps all < .001).

In terms of faculty satisfaction with work, satisfaction with time spent on research had the most consistent, positive relationship with perceived work-life balance for faculty from all four racial/ethnic groups (β coefficients from .17 to .24, ps all < .001). Satisfaction with time spent on teaching was positively associated with perceived work-life balance for White faculty only, while satisfaction with time spent on administrative tasks was positively related to Asian American faculty’s work-life balance. Satisfaction with time spent on service and outreach had no association with work-life balance for any of the faculty groups. Lastly, general satisfaction with institution and department was positively related to work-life balance for Asian American and White faculty.

Discussion and Implications

The findings of this study bring new understandings to the growing literature on faculty work-life balance by shifting the focus from an overwhelming emphasis on faculty mothers and, to a lesser extent, fathers (e.g., Lester 2015; Mason et al. 2013; O’Meara and Campbell 2011; Sallee 2013; Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2012; Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2006) to considerations of the demographic and work-related factors that are associated with the ability of faculty from different racial/ethnic backgrounds to attain balance between their professional and personal/family lives. In doing so, the study also broadens the scope of existing literature on faculty of color (e.g., Fries-Britt et al. 2011; Stanley 2006; Turner et al. 2008) by focusing on critical, although heretofore rarely considered, aspects of their lives in higher education that bring together the professional and personal domains (Kachchaf et al. 2015; Ong et al. 2010). In this section, we review the central findings of our study (focusing on the findings that were consistent across both sets of analyses) and present implications for higher education practice and research.

Interestingly, our analyses did not detect wide-ranging racial/ethnic differences in faculty’s ability to attain work-life balance, with only Asian American faculty’s perceptions being significantly higher than those of the other three faculty groups included in this study. However, it is notable that faculty members across the four racial/ethnic groups reported less-than-satisfying work-life balance, with the responses of all faculty groups nearing the “neither agree nor disagree” response option for the statement: “I have been able to find the right balance, for me, between my professional life and my personal/family life.” This finding highlights that the issues associated with the attainment of work-life balance cut across faculty racial/ethnic backgrounds. Given that lack of work-life balance has been associated with negative consequences in terms of emotional and physical well-being, retention, advancement, and job satisfaction among faculty (McCoy et al. 2013; Misra et al. 2012), our findings reaffirm the importance of higher education institutions placing increased emphasis on creating environments that make it possible for faculty members to attain both personally and professionally satisfying lives.

Although as our findings suggest, achieving higher levels of work-life balance is important for all faculty, it is critical to note that the inability of faculty of color to achieve better balance between their personal and professional lives is to be seen in the context of the multiple inequities faculty of color experience in academia, from discrimination to the undervaluation of research to unreasonably high service expectations (Antonio 2002; Baez 2000; Bensimon and Tierney 1996; Porter 2007, Turner 2002; Turner et al. 2008; Williams and Williams 2006). Indeed, a lack of strong work-life balance perceptions among faculty of color may add significantly to the other pressures and inequities they encounter in the academic workplace, presenting a tipping point for their decisions to stay in or leave academe. For this reason, although our findings make clear the need for colleges and universities to become workplaces where faculty members of all racial/ethnic backgrounds can report higher than average work-life balance, considering our findings in light of the broader literature on the challenges faculty of color face (Porter 2007, Turner 2002; Turner et al. 2008), we stress that such efforts hold special importance in relation to faculty of color. Future research is also needed to explore the ways in which faculty of color conceptualize work-life balance and how they experience issues related to balancing their personal and professional lives in relation to other aspects of their experiences in colleges and universities.

When it came to examining how demographic and work-related factors were associated with faculty’s perceptions of their ability to attain work-life balance, our findings pointed to important similarities and differences in our analyses involving faculty from the four racial/ethnic groups. In contrast with the vast literature indicating the challenges that women faculty experience in their efforts to achieve work-life balance (e.g., Jacobs and Winslow 2004; Mason et al. 2013; Misra et al. 2012; Ward and Wolf-Wendel 2004; Winslow 2010), gender did not make a difference in the work-life balance perceptions of Asian American and White faculty members. Although these findings are in stark contrast with African American faculty, among whom women scored significantly lower than men, Latina women indicated significantly higher work-life balance than men after controlling for all other variables in the model. Since the results of our study do not describe the specific reasons behind these gender-based disparities in work-life balance among African American and Latina/o faculty, nor the reasons for the lack of a gender difference in our Asian American and White samples, future research in both the qualitative and quantitative traditions is necessary to explore the factors that shape the work-life perceptions of faculty women and men in various racial/ethnic groups.

In relation to household status, our finding indicating that single White faculty with no children were significantly less likely to report having work-life balance than their married counterparts with children warrants further investigation as it points to substantial struggles for work-life balance in this faculty group. This finding may be related to the higher amount of time single faculty without children as opposed to married faculty with children spend on work-related tasks, a finding that was highlighted in Jacobs and Winslow’s (2004) study. Although actual time spent on work was not measured by the COACHE survey, uneven time allocations by faculty with different household statuses may explain differences in perceptions of work-life balance among White faculty in our study as well. It is important to note, however, that the negative relationship between being single with no children is only present among White faculty (consistent across both sets of analyses), a finding that would benefit from future investigations. Similarly, future research should provide more in-depth analyses of the relationship between faculty work-life balance and the presence of children of various ages, with specific attention to whether faculty from various racial/ethnic backgrounds report different work-life balance perceptions if they have children who are younger than school-age, school-age, or over the age of 18.

Additionally, our study shows that for faculty from all four racial/ethnic groups, advancing in rank was accompanied by stronger perceptions of work-life balance. These findings support previous research that found faculty at higher ranks and with tenure to be more involved with their families (O’Laughlin and Bischoff 2005) and to have more capacity to change work-life expectations in the academic workplace (Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2015).

Academic area has rarely been considered in investigations of faculty work-life balance (Wolf-Wendel and Ward 2015). Interestingly, our findings related to academic area did not show many statistically significant differences in any of the four racial/ethnic groups. In fact, only in two instances was a particular academic area (Business among African American faculty and Biological Sciences among White faculty) distinguished from the Humanities, when looking at findings that were consistent across both sets of analyses. In order to get a more complete picture of differences by academic area, future research should focus more specifically on how each academic area compares with every other field in relationship to faculty members’ reported work-life balance.

As one of its central foci, this study also highlights the importance of various sources of support in making personal/family obligations and an academic career compatible. Our findings in this regard are in line with the concepts of organizational support and family-friendly organizational perceptions outlined in our theoretical framework, pointing to the importance of various forms of support as coping resources in the lives of employees (Allen 2001; Hobfoll 1989; Eisenberger et al. 1986; Shockley and Allen 2007). In terms of faculty members’ perceptions of their institutions’ support for work-life balance, our findings shed new light on the relative importance of support from the perspective of the department and the institution. At the department level, none of the variables indicating mentoring and support were significantly related to faculty work-life balance when considering our findings that were consistent across the two sets of analyses. What is important to underscore, however, is that the block of variables indicating departmental characteristics and support explained from 9% (Latina/o) to 14% (Asian American) of the variance in the full model. In addition, our analyses also showed that before entering the variables indicating institutional characteristics and support—explaining from 13% (White/Caucasian) to 16% (for both African Americans and Latina/os) of the variance in the full model—faculty perceptions of departmental support specifically for work-life balance were positively and strongly related to faculty work-life balance in all four racial/ethnic groups. The positive association of departmental support with work-life balance disappeared only when we entered the variables indicating institutional characteristics and support, pointing to the need to interpret our findings related to faculty perceptions about departmental and institutional work-life balance support in relationship with each other.

Faculty perceptions of institutional support for making personal/family obligations and an academic career compatible were consistently the strongest positive correlate of perceived work-life balance in all faculty racial/ethnic groups. These findings suggest that perceptions of strong support for work-life balance from the institution as a whole are paramount to the success of faculty from all racial/ethnic backgrounds in achieving balance between their professional and personal/family lives. As the variable related to institutional work-life balance support reflects faculty members’ global perceptions of institutional support (Allen 2001), our findings underscore the importance of colleges and universities promoting a range of initiatives by creating a generally supportive institutional environment for work-life balance. Such environments include both policies and a culture that is reflected in the overall work-life-related outlook of the institution.

Taken together, our findings concerning departmental and institutional work-life balance support point to the importance of departments and institutions working together to create supportive environments that promote better work-life balance among all faculty. In this regard, our findings underscore the importance of colleges and universities carefully creating and promoting institutional policies and cultures that conceptualize work-life balance as shaping the lives of faculty broadly, including faculty from all racial/ethnic backgrounds, women and men, faculty from all types of household statuses, and faculty at all ranks, thereby continuing to stress, but also intentionally becoming more inclusive than a focus on the work-life experiences of faculty members with children would suggest. Examples of such policies may focus on reviews of faculty workload at different stages of the faculty career, accompanied by institutional action aimed at more equitable work distribution and the reconsideration of tenure and promotion criteria that consciously consider the work-life balance needs of faculty members at all stages of their careers. These larger institutional commitments then need to be translated, equally carefully, into the functioning of departments.

As demonstrated by the original positive association between departmental support and work-life balance, only reduced to non-significance when considering institutional support, departmental support for work-life balance is to a great extent a reflection of larger institutional commitments to faculty members’ attainment of work-life balance. In other words, institutional support for work-life balance is critical in promoting faculty members’ ability to attain both personally and professionally satisfying lives, which should then reach the level of departments through expressions of support and collegiality among colleagues. In addition, that departmental and institutional work-life balance support had similar associations with faculty perceptions of work-life balance across faculty from diverse racial/ethnic groups is a promising finding that stresses higher education institutions’ ability to provide comprehensive supports that address the work-life needs of faculty members across racial/ethnic backgrounds.

The study’s results also bring to light the importance of faculty satisfaction with time spent on research, a variable that had positive associations with work-life balance for all faculty. This finding not only highlights how faculty from all racial/ethnic backgrounds value being able to spend enough time on their own research, but also sheds light on an additional beneficial outcome—i.e., stronger work-life balance—of departmental and institutional support structures for research. The positive relationship between satisfaction with time spent on research and faculty work-life balance is especially significant in light of the absence of significant associations between satisfaction with time spent on teaching (for faculty of color), and service and outreach (for all faculty), and administrative tasks (for African American, Latina/o, and White faculty) and the outcome, underscoring the importance of strong support structures for research over and above support for other aspects of faculty work.

Overall, the findings of our study depict a complicated picture of faculty work-life balance, a picture where faculty racial/ethnic background lends important, previously unexplored, nuances to our understandings of faculty work-life balance. Perhaps most importantly from the perspective of creating supportive environments, our findings underscore the critical role of departments and institutions interacting with each other in finding the best ways of relying on inclusive notions of work-life balance as they build the environments that support faculty members. It is especially important for future research and practice to explore the specifics of how such supportive work-life environments can be developed and sustained effectively to benefit faculty from different racial/ethnic backgrounds.