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| An undated photo of a man at home with his family talking on
a cell phone. |
The round-the-clock availability that cell phones and pagers have
brought to people's lives may be taking a toll
on family life, a new study suggests.
The study, which followed more than 1,300 adults over 2 years, found
that those who consistently used a mobile phone or pager throughout the
study period were more likely to report negative "spillover" between work
and home life -- and, in turn, less satisfaction with their family life.
Spillover essentially means that the line between work and home begins
to blur. Work life may invade home life -- when a parent is taking
job-related calls at home, for instance -- or household issues may start
to take up work time.
In the latter scenario, a child may call mom at work, telling her
"microwave exploded," explained Noelle Chesley, an assistant professor of
sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and the author of the
study.
The problem with cell phones and pagers seems to be that they are
allowing for ever more spillover between work and home, according to
Chesley's findings, published in the Journal of Marriage and Family.
This may be especially true for working women, the study found.
Among men, consistent use of mobile phones and pagers seemed to allow
more work issues to creep into family time. But for women, the spillover
tended to go in both directions -- being "connected" meant that work cut
into home time, and family issues seeped into work life.
And people who reported more negative spillover -- spillover of the
exploding-microwave variety -- tended to be less satisfied with their
family life.
The point, Chesley said, is that cell phones and pagers seem to be
opening more lines for stressful exchanges among family members, rather
than positive ones.
But there may be ways to stem the spillover, according to Chesley.
Employers, she said, could look at their policies on contacting employees
after-hours to make sure their expectations are "reasonable." For their
part, employees could decide that cell phones and pagers go off during
designated family time, Chesley said.
To ease the extra burden on working mothers, she added, parents could
have particular days when one or the other is "on call," so that moms are
not getting all of the appliance-disaster reports.
(Agencies)
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最新研究表明，手機和呼機的使用讓人處于二十四小時待命的狀態，這嚴重影響了人們的家庭生活。
此項研究觀察了1,300多個成年人在兩年內的生活。研究發現，在這期間頻繁使用手機或呼機的人常常會覺得他們的工作和家庭之間失去了平衡，也就是所謂的"擠占效應"，而他們對自己的家庭生活也感到了不滿。
這里所說的"擠占效應"，意思是工作和家庭之間的那條界限已經模糊不清了。工作會"侵占"到家庭生活，比如，由于工作需要，在家里接打電話；或者因為處理家庭瑣事而占用了工作時間。
威斯康辛密爾沃基大學的社會學助理教授諾艾爾·切斯利解釋說，比如后一種情況，小孩會給正在上班的媽媽打電話，說"微波爐爆炸了"。諾艾爾教授是此項研究報告的撰寫人。
研究報告發表在《婚姻與家庭》雜志上，根據研究結果，手機和呼機的問題在于它們使工作和家庭之間的界線變得越來越模糊。
研究發現，這種情況在已婚的上班族婦女中可能尤其突出。
對于男人們來說，手機、呼機的長期使用只是讓更多的工作占用了家庭生活時間，而對于女人來說，接打電話則會造成工作和家庭相互"侵占"，除了工作對家庭的影響，家庭瑣事也會讓她們分心。
抱怨家庭和工作失衡的人們對家庭生活往往會越來越不滿意，比如，發生類似"微波爐爆炸"事件的家庭。
切斯利說，問題的關鍵在于手機和呼機為家庭各成員之間交流令人緊張的事情提供了更多的渠道，這些事情要多于積極的事情。
切斯利說，但是也有解決的辦法，公司老板可以考慮改變下班時間打電話給雇員的方式，確保他們對雇員有一個合理的期望值。而對于雇員來說，他們可以在下班時間關掉手機和呼機，盡情享受家庭時光。
她說，為了減輕上班媽媽們的額外負擔，父母二人可以輪流"值電話班"，處理家庭瑣事。這樣，媽媽們就不會總是接到電器出事故的電話了。
(中國日報網站編譯) |
Updated: 2006-01-09 09:46
