MAKASSAR, Indonesia August 02 2026 /IOP/–Ever come home from a brutal day at work, snap at dinner, and later wonder why your child seemed quieter than usual? A new study suggests that connection is real, measurable, and passes through more steps than most parents realize.
A study published in Community, Work & Family (Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 30 September 2024), titled “The indirect effect of parents’ work-family conflict on students’ psychosocial well-being,” examines precisely this chain reaction. Conducted by Hillman Wirawan, Novina Sabila Zahra, Abdul Saman, and Farida Aryani, the study surveyed 351 parent–child dyads from eastern Indonesia, where parents had children aged 10 to 17 living in the same household. Using a three-wave longitudinal design with one-week intervals between surveys — first capturing work-family conflict, then parents’ well-being and parenting style, then children’s own reports of their psychosocial well-being — the researchers were able to trace how stress travels from workplace to living room to a child’s inner world.
The findings reveal a domino effect. When parents struggle to balance work and family demands, their own well-being suffers first. That decline in well-being then erodes something specific: their capacity for “positive discipline” — a parenting approach built on firmness paired with warmth, rather than punishment or withdrawal. And when positive discipline weakens, children’s psychosocial well-being — their emotional stability, self-perception, and sense of support at home — weakens too.
Two theoretical lenses explain why. Conservation of Resources theory holds that people protect and hoard their psychological resources under threat; when work-family conflict drains a parent’s cognitive and emotional reserves, there’s simply less left over for patient, engaged parenting. Emotional contagion theory adds a second layer: children don’t just miss out on attention, they actually absorb their parents’ stress, as emotional states quietly synchronize between people in close relationships.
Notably, the study found the effect wasn’t only indirect. Work-family conflict also directly predicted lower psychosocial well-being in children, independent of the parenting pathway — suggesting kids pick up on household tension through channels beyond discipline style alone.
This research speaks directly to Sustainable Development Goal 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), which recognizes that psychological health — not just physical health — is foundational to human development, and that protecting it requires looking at entire family systems, not just individuals in isolation.
The practical implications extend beyond any single household. The researchers argue that workplaces and schools need to start collaborating rather than operating as separate worlds. Employers who support employees through family-friendly supervision policies aren’t just improving morale — they may be protecting a child’s emotional development several steps removed from the office. Meanwhile, schools equipped to recognize early signs of psychological distress in students could catch problems rooted not in the classroom, but in a parent’s overwhelming workload at home.
Reference:
Wirawan, H., Zahra, N. S., Saman, A., & Aryani, F. (2026). The indirect effect of parents’ work-family conflict on students’ psychosocial well-being. Community, Work & Family, 29(3), 473–492. https://doi.org/10.1080/13668803.2024.2409697
Contact:
Hillman Wirawan
hillman@unhas.ac.id | Telp: +62 853-9812-0801
