Comparison of Marital Satisfaction and Work/Family Conflict among Nurses with Fixed and Changing Shifts

Two important areas for every life are job and family. Work/family conflict is described as the incompatibility between work and family roles. It seems that this conflict is highlighted in the staff with shift works. Therefore, this study aimed to compare the marital satisfaction and Work/Family conflict among the nurses with fixed and changing shifts.
This study was a cross-sectional and descriptive-analytical study. The study statistical population comprised of 264 nurses. Among them 242 who had the conditions for entering the study were selected through census method. To examine the samples, Enrich marital satisfaction questionnaire and Carlson work/family conflict questionnaire were used. Data were analyzed using SPSS 18 by using Pearson correlation coefficient, t-test and multivariate regression analysis with a significant level of p The results showed that the average marital satisfaction in the constant shift nurses was 171/27 ± 30/57 and in nurses with changing shifts was 164/06 ± 23/99. In fact, based on the obtained results, significant differences were observed in marital satisfaction between fixed and changing shifts (p=0/017). Marital satisfaction was higher in nurses with fixed working shifts. Also the results showed that the mean of work / family conflict in nurses with constant shifts was 3/26 ± 0/85 and in the nurses with changing shifts was 3/34 ± 0/69. Therefore, there was no significant difference between the two groups in this field (p= 0/38).
According to the results, teaching the necessary skills to the shift workers about management of job and familial and marital satisfaction is essential.