Working from Home during COVID-19: Does Work-Family Conflict Mediate the Relationship between Workplace Characteristics, Job Satisfaction, and General Health?

Objective The aim of the study is to investigate whether work-family conflict and/or family-work conflict mediated the relationship between workplace characteristics and general health and job satisfaction in a sample of workers working from home in a recommended/mandatory context due to COVID-19 measures. Methods Data were collected via online questionnaire as part of the Employees Working from Home study. Analyses in this article used data collected at 2 time points 6 months apart, including 965 complete responses from the first questionnaire and 451 complete responses from the second questionnaire. Results Relationships between predictor and outcome variables were in the directions expected, and both work-family conflict and family-work conflict mediated these relationships. Conclusions Work-life interaction partly explains the relationship between work characteristics and general health and job satisfaction health in a population undertaking involuntary working from home.