Sensemaking through the storm: How postpartum depression shapes personal work-family narratives.

Many women experience psychological and emotional challenges during their transition to becoming a working mother. Postpartum depression (PPD) is one common, salient aspect of motherhood that can serve as a work-life shock event and profoundly shape women's work and nonwork lives yet has evaded discussion in the organizational sciences. Taking a grounded theory approach, we interviewed 41 women who experienced PPD as well as key informants who provided additional insights about PPD (e.g., an obstetrician, women working for organizations that support postpartum health). Our analysis highlights how being diagnosed with PPD activates a complex sensemaking process in which women process an imposing identity-a concept we introduce to the identity and work-family literatures reflecting an unexpected, undesirable identity that imposes upon existing (e.g., work) and/or provisional identities that may or may not be fully elaborated (e.g., motherhood), ultimately shifting how women think about the intersection of work and family. We also delineate how supports and antisupports (i.e., overt acts dismissive of women's PPD) shape the aforementioned processes. Combined, our research aims to advance the discussion of PPD within organizational scholarship, rendering significant implications for both theory and practice. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Pushed out or opting out? Integrating perspectives on gender differences in withdrawal attitudes during pregnancy.

In light of recent research suggesting mothers are more likely to withdraw from work than fathers are, we assess the relative contributions of popular "pushed-out" and "opting-out" perspectives over the course of their pregnancies. As pregnancy is a pivotal time for the reevaluation of work and life roles, we investigate the degree to which gender differences in changes in turnover intentions and intentions to return to the workforce are explained by changes in perceived career encouragement from organizational members (a pushed-out factor), as well as changes in the employees' own career motivation (an opting-out factor), throughout pregnancy. We also examine the relationships between these pushed-out and opting-out variables over time. Using latent growth modeling, we find support for the notion that women's perceptions of being pushed out may lead to women's opting out of their organizations. We find that gender (being female) indirectly relates to an increase in turnover intentions and a decrease in career motivation throughout pregnancy, as explained by decreases in perceptions of career encouragement (for women) at work. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Managing the harmful effects of unsupportive organizations during pregnancy.

Unfortunately, not all organizations are supportive of employees' family lives. Family unsupportive workplaces can be stressful for all employees and particularly for pregnant women, who carry a physical reminder of their family life. In the present study, we draw on conservation of resources (COR) theory (Hobfoll, 1989, 2001) to investigate how women manage family unsupportive organizational perceptions during pregnancy via social identity-based impression management behaviors as well as how these strategies relate to changes in stress and changes in conflict between work and family. Specifically, we find that image maintenance strategies-impression management strategies aimed at maintaining one's prepregnancy image-are associated with decreases in work stress and work-family conflict over the course of pregnancy, while decategorization-impression management strategies aimed at avoiding negative outcomes by hiding the pregnancy or dodging the issue-are related to increases in work-family conflict. These results suggest strategies for both organizations and pregnant workers to decrease stress during a time when health is vital for both mother and baby. (PsycINFO Database Record

The moderating effects of task complexity on the relationship between regulatory foci and safety and production performance.

Regulatory foci of promotion and prevention have been shown to relate differentially to occupational safety and production. This research proposes that task complexity can help explain the differences reported between these 2 self-regulatory processes and safety and productivity performance. Results revealed that promotion is positively related to production and prevention is positively related to safety regardless of task complexity. However, when task complexity is high, promotion negatively relates to safety and prevention negatively relates production. Implications for work motivation theory and research, as well as avenues for future research, are discussed. Practical implications for managerial interventions to optimize both safety and productivity are also presented.