Teletrabalho: do sonho ao caos - vivências de pais e mães na pandemia

Abstract

The covid-19 pandemic led to the sudden implementation of the home office. For many people, it was difficult to balance work and personal life. During the health crisis, fathers and mothers had to assume the full care of their children, including monitoring remote teaching. Several studies have been carried out on this subject, however, here emphasis has been placed on families with children in early childhood (up to six years of age), who require more care and attention. The overload of domestic work combined with the pandemic context (fear of contagion, social isolation, and spread of the disease) affected the mental health of individuals. In this context, the present dissertation aimed to investigate and discuss the impact of the home office on the work-family balance and on the mental health of male and female workers with children in early childhood during the pandemic period. To achieve this, two studies were carried out. The first was a survey with 234 professionals working from home, 158 (67.5%) of whom were mothers. Data collection was performed online, using four scales with prior evidence of validity, namely: the Current Perception of Professional Development Scale, the Skills for Telework at Home Scale, the Scale of Interference of Work in the Family and Interference of the Family in the Work, and the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale. Student’s t-test for independent samples was used to compare means to identify possible gender differences in scale scores, with effect size calculations made considering Cohen’s d. The results indicate a significant difference between fathers and mothers of children up to six years of age, in terms of depression, stress, and work-family family-work conflict, with unfavorable scores for women and noteworthy effect sizes. Conversely, men presented more positive indicators for the perception of professional development and telework skills during the pandemic. For the second study, we opted for semi-structured interviews, with the script previously analyzed by judges and in compliance with the COREQ protocol guidelines. The interviews were conducted with 12 participants, six fathers and six mothers, who worked full-time in person and had their first experience with telework during the pandemic, while their partner continued working in person. The sample size was defined by the saturation criterion. The interviews took place digitally, with recording and subsequent transcription. The results emerged from categorical content analysis. The results indicate a greater domestic overload in women’s daily lives, showing increased work-family conflict and impacts on the physical and mental health of fathers and mothers of children in early childhood during the pandemic, with more harmful effects for women. The results obtained in both studies are discussed from the literature on telecommuting in the pandemic, work-family balance, and gender stereotypes. The study's contribution is significant for designing organizational policies and people management strategies that recognize the importance of women in the workplace and strive to achieve a balance between their personal and professional lives.