Lived Experience of Female Faculty Members of Simultaneous Maternal-Occupational Roles: A Qualitative Study

Female faculty members who are mothers experience overwhelming pressures to comply with the standards of their institutions for promotion and at the same time fulfill their responsibilities as parents. One of the most important concerns of working mothers is creating a balance between the simultaneous roles of maternity and employment, which has received attention in recent decades. The present study aimed to examine the experiences of female faculty members who simultaneously play the roles of maternity and employment. The current research is a qualitative study of psychological descriptive phenomenology in which nine participants were selected through purposive sampling method in Ahvaz. In-depth interviews were used to collect data. The interviews continued until the data saturation emerged. The data analysis showed eight constituents, namely disorder and chaos, professional tension, feeling guilty about not being a good mother, demoralization, exhaustion of parenting, increased reactivity towards children’s misbehaviors, hope and meaning in the maternal role, and receiving support from the family. The analysis of the obtained results showed that the psychological consequences of playing maternal-occupational roles can seriously damage the mental health of working mothers. Thus, it is appropriate to pay attention to working women and prepare them to accept the roles through mental health programs and family-friendly plans.