Research on the feasibility of the work-life balance in the organization of a "women's job"

2011 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20730352
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Research Field: Sociology
• Research Institution: Nihon University
• Principal Investigator: KOTANI Sachi 日本大学, 生産工学部, 助教 (30453872)
• Project Period (FY): 2008 – 2011
• Keywords: 組織 / 看護職 / ジェンダー / ワーク・ライフ・バランス / 柔軟な勤務体系

Research Abstract

This research aims at seeking the feasibility of change for the realization of work-life balance in the corporate culture of the nursing profession, commonly regarded as a "women's job", and investigating its mechanism, with special attention to the flexible working hours. To achieve this goal, we have accomplished (1) the examination of literature and (2) the construction of theoretical framework.
The examination of literature reveals the long working hours the nurses are engaged in and their high turnover in the event of marriage and childbirth. When they continue working, the nurses' work polarizes between a daytime part-timer serving only outpatients and a shift worker in the hospital ward upon the end of the maternity leave. We have found that the corporate culture of the nursing profession has idealized the "male regular employee model."
For the purpose of understanding how that culture has been constructed in the nursing profession, we deem it important to construct the methodology based upon the following two analytical viewpoints. First, in order to examine the differences in working patterns among female nurses, we rely on the argument of R. Connell, "the transition of attention from differences to relations". Second, in order to take account of the care responsibility the nurses have within their own families, we adopt the viewpoint that harmonizes paid-work with other part of life.