Abstract
What About Me? A Study About Women Emergency Managers andT heir Familial Challenges
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Contents Chapter 1: Introduction to the Study 3 Introduction 4 Background to the Problem 5 Statement of the Problem 8 Purpose of the Study 11 Research Questions 12 Conceptual Framework 12 Nature of the Study 15 Structured Interviewing 16 Social Role Theory 17 Conflict Theory 19 Attitude-Behavior Theory 19 Operational Definitions 20 Assumptions 21 Delimitations 22 Limitations 22 Significance of the Study 22 Summary 24 Chapter 2: Literature Review 25 Introduction 25 Literature Search Strategy 26 Organization of the Literature Review 26 Key Words and Terms Used in the Search 26 Conceptual Framework 27 Literature Review Related to Key Variables 28 The State of Women and Employment 28 Working Women and Family Responsibilities 29 Women Working in Emergency Response 31 Women as First Responders 33 Challenges for Women First Responders 35 Familial Challenges Facing Women First Responders 36 Women at the event of a pandemic 41 Effects of pandemics on Emergency management responders 43 Theoretical Framework 46 Social Roles Theory 46 Feminist Theory 47 Conflict Theory 48 Summary 49 The corona virus Pandemic 52 Effects of the pandemic to families 55 The schools closed for six weeks 56 Time to watch children and working at home 59 Employment and labor laws in use in an event of a pandemic 63 Chapter 3: Methodology 67 Introduction 67 Research Design and Rationale 68 Role of the Researcher 73 Methodology 76 Participant Selection 76 Sampling 78 Data Collection 80 Board Approval 80 Research methods 81 In-depth Interviews 81 Focus Group 82 Confirmability 83 Data Analysis 83 Theme formation from collected data 84 Trustworthiness 84 Credibility 85 External Validity 85 Dependability 85 Ethical Procedures 86
Chapter 1: Introduction to the Study
Introduction
Women with careers in the growing field of emergency management, such as firefighters, police officers, and medical responders, face challenges in accurately and efficiently responding to disasters while simultaneously not worrying about their families when actively deployed. Women in these critical, life-saving careers are currently faced with the choice of responding to emergencies as required by their employers or to evacuate or shelter-in-place with their families. The option is a difficult one, but can be resolved if a solution is made available to answer the problem, such as having another member of the household available to tend to the family, if a safe location is offered by the employer, or the organization operates without them so the responder does not have to choose between work and family. Alternate solutions often result in the responding woman being able to focus on response and recovery and the task at hand (Nakhaei et al., 2015, p. 170).
The need to respond during disasters is often quick, unscheduled, and unplanned. The need to find care for family members at home is often difficult if the planned solution involves a female with career responsibilities having to deal with a disaster. The problem is particularly acute for responders who are female parents without family support but with career responsibilities. Usually, there is an organizational policy that determines who in a company is required to respond to an emergency. These policies will sometimes state that women cannot take a role in active positions because these demands are contradictory to home life needs. A further issue is the new challenges being brought in by industry changes and varying degrees of emergent situation requirements (Gaillard et al., 2017, p. 445).
Women in roles that require their presence during emergencies or disasters are finding their support needs are different from their male counterparts and they are having to battle the attitudes of those that are not understanding of their family dynamic. Agocs, Langan, and Sanders (2015) argue that police who are mothers, for example, navigate challenges because of social expectations that inevitably come into place once their mother identify is known (p. 266). This stigmatism shows a general expectation for women to choose between work and family.
Background to the Problem
Emergency preparedness and response is a concept that has been around since 1803. It was not until the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 and the devastation from Hurricane Katrina, however, that the public truly understood what emergency management was, and saw the magnitude of responsibility that was on the workers responding to these events (Hubbs, 2016, p. 1).
Family make-up and dynamics have changed significantly over the past two decades. Since this time, more women are serving as primary earners in households. Medved notes 40% of U.S women a 30% increase from 1960 are primary breadwinners in families with children (Medved, 2016, p. 254). Additionally, more women are serving in occupations previously dominated by men, such as Emergency Medical Services (EMS), firefighting, and the police. Defined as occupations with less than 25% women, male-dominated careers include Emergency Medical Services (EMS), firefighting, and the police force (Azmat & Rentschler, 2017, p. 325). While this shift brings particular challenges, such as discrimination and sexual harassment, the problems facing women are more pronounced when it comes to work-life conflict (Helfgott, Gunnison, Murtagh, & Navejar, 2018, p. 240). The population of women in the labor market in the USA has increased by 25% since 2008. It is recognized that women are serving multiple working roles in their family and careers (Stanczyk, Henly, & Lambert, 2017, p. 251). These women may also experience time-based strife, including excessive family responsibilities, inflexible work schedules, and extended working hours. Women can also experience strain-based strife, including the absence of a spouse or other family support, role ambiguity and behavior-based conflict, namely, exceptions for a human, emotional, and warm relationships.
Women are venturing into fields where working conditions have not been made favorable to them in attempts to be equally represented in the labor market (Knörr, 2011, p. 101). Existing work policies fall short in recognizing that women will experience challenges while employed as emergency response personnel, particularly if familial challenges exist as well. While emergency response roles come with challenges that affect both male and female employees, the weight of female problems outweigh those of men (Messing, Tissot, & Lefrançois, 2016. p. 12).
These differences and difficulties create a work environment that automatically decreases the quality of output of women employees. Women want to work in these roles responding to emergencies or disasters. But the uncertainty of work schedules or negative attitudes from employers or co-workers may deter them into different careers (Beaty & Davis, 2012, p. 624). Policymakers and administrators, in general, however, are not aware of the issue as they prefer to address the work-life balance of employees, as opposed to focusing on addressing the type and nature of an employees emergency responding needs.
Women have become significant players in the industry and they actively participate in mainstream employment opportunities to contribute to their familys vital daily needs (Medved, 2016, p. 245). However, societal gender and family roles have not changed much and usually, the mother is still the one in charge of family needs and affairs. The mother ensures the family is socially knitted and bound tightly for the enriched environment of quality growth and affection.
Societal gender roles have forced many mothers, some acting as single parents and caretakers of elderly parents, to look for employment opportunities, sometimes in understaffed job areas like the military, the police force, firefighting, or hospitals (Hurley & Choudhary, 2016, p. 255). Mothers who seek solutions to achieve work and family conflict resolution have not yet got any lasting solution to the problems they face. These solutions are more pronounced for women who have reached the top of their career, such as organizational managers (Hurley & Choudhary, 2016, p. 259).
Research indicates that there are at least four in ten households where the mother is the sole breadwinner, and this trend is increasing (Medved, 2016, p. 249). This data is a significant worry for stakeholders who know that mothers, as critical players, have significant social and work ties. One of the critical challenges that women are realizing is they are becoming the primary breadwinners in their households. The familial dynamic is different from others in the same fields, especially for women serving in first responder roles. The challenges are due to people, and especially women, needing time to take care of their families. There is also the call to have them commit their time to carry out their duties at work (Gerson, 2016, p. 114). This conflict has prompted organizations to define times when people should be working and specifying times when employees report to and leave work. For vital roles that require continuous involvement, shift work has been developed to allow workers time to execute these roles.
However, there are still personal challenges with the needs of women executing a vital role that requires the use of emergency calls and reporting to work (Gerson, 2016, p. 117). Emergency response roles pose significant challenges for women in terms of the need for activation during disasters when they have to take care of families. This requirement may commit them beyond the time needed for work, especially where an emergency response is required. This research paper explores the position of women in the development of critical roles, leading to the need to realize the social role of family care in the execution of duties in the emergency services industry.
Statement of the Problem
The challenges that women face when needing to respond to emergency calls when they have family responsibilities is a significant factor that may impact their employment prospects. The critical challenge between the requirement to respond to emergencies and the family dynamic have prompted some employers to consider not employing women (Agocs et al., 2015, p. 274). This lack of understanding is, however, not only in particular industries like city management, but is more pronounced in areas that require a rapid response from employees, such as in disaster management departments, along with the medical profession, firefighters, military members or police officers. Gerson (2016, p. 118) gives various reasons why women choose not to work as city managers or other government officials and has compared the differences and similarities with male counterparts working in the same roles. Many women who have no one else to help them take care of their families may not respond to urgent calls to work. Mothers (single, or with other special family needs) who do double duty with roles in the police force usually find it very difficult to adequately address the needs of their family and their work requirements. The elements that drive this challenge include long working hours, constant schedule changes and little to no time off. Such mothers may have young children who cannot tend to themselves. When the mother leaves to respond to a disaster or emergency, the children are left alone or with a neighbor (Agocs et al., 2015, p. 269).
Also, when a policewomans motherhood status is revealed, they have a harder time with the job. Agocs et al. (2015, p. 270) acknowledged that research was also conducted on different types of work schedules that are special, but did not place police work in that category. Interviews with other policewomen occurred, and their experiences were offered in the article. Findings showed that police mothers may find it difficult to respond to emergencies when they have no one else to take care of the families they leave behind (Agocs et al., 2015, p. 272).
Sheikh et al. (2018) studied the incompatibility between the demands of a family of a working person and the needs of work creating life pressure. It is worth noting that women employees who had gained success in their careers had also managed to explore and achieve greater prosperity to the point where they had been considered for management roles. However, they were successful because their home life was not affected. The need to worry over family life was nonexistent and opened up their talent and drive for all types of roles. This was especially true for women in emergency management.
Almost every year, with the introduction of new policies regulating work and with changes in organizational work structures, there is always a reason for increased research. This knowledge can advise women employees with family considerations on the best direction to take to improve their job requirements (Al-Asfour et al., 2017, p. 195). These policies are the reason why a study like the current one is vital. It boosts the available information on how women employees can manage a career in emergency management and maintain their households.
The problem becomes critical in an event of a pandemic like the 2019 coronavirus (COVID-19) which created a lot of panic and unrest among nations with schools lock down and parents being asked to shelter-in self-quarantine. Mothers and women in general are affected by the pandemic greatly because responsibilities double when taking care of the children. Children care is of great need because no one can just play the nanny part as the infections are contagious and people need to take caution. The challenge is critical when boomers fear for their lives as they are more vulnerable to infections. Single parents how can they balance between job, child care and finances for upkeep in the time of crisis. Employment facilities do not offer opportunities to go with children at work. Emergency management responders at the same time need to balance between family and job with the services they offer being of great need and availability of essential supplies in shortage. How can parents especially women cope with the situation?
Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study is to improve understanding of the familial challenges facing women employed as emergency response personnel. In career fields that require rapid response, women are not well represented. Women in these roles face more problems than their male counterparts. This is because most males that have families also have someone else available to tend to their families if they have to respond to a disaster.
There is always a reason for increased research and knowledge. It can advise women employees with family considerations about the best direction to take to help them improve their job response times. These considerations are part of why a study like this one is vital. It helps to boost the available knowledge regarding how women can manage to make quick and equitable responses to their call of duty. After which, they can ensure that their families are safe while they are gone.
Several works of literature have investigated the challenges of work-life balance amongst female employees in different employment sectors. As a result, very few have addressed the role of women that respond to emergencies and their challenges. Over the years, some of these challenges have seen the output of female employees in emergency response roles deteriorate. As many women shy from these professions, with some termed as incompetent or unreliable (Stanczyk et al., 2017, p. 257), the need to address the problems facing women in emergency response roles is necessary to see more women embrace these careers. When the platform is made equitable for both genders, Sheikh et al. (2018, p. 13) argue, the competition ground of fair and quality output will be maintained across genders. The authors study shows that support from employers could benefit from a little more compassion for existing family dynamics.
Research Questions
1. What are the perceived underlying causes of work-life conflict for women serving in emergency response roles?
2. How can these perceived underlying causes of work-life conflict for women serving in emergency response roles be eliminated or minimized?
3. What are the challenges that women first responders experience in needing to respond to urgent work calls when they have no one else to look after their families?
Conceptual Framework
The most logical trajectory for this study would be a phenomenological approach. Derived from the works of Edmund Husserl, the phenomenological approach describes how human beings experience a given phenomenon (Giorgi, 2012, p. 6). This approach achieves an understanding of the experiences of people by putting aside the biases and preconceived assumptions about human feelings, experiences, and responses to certain situations. This approach allows the researcher to make an in-depth study of the perspectives, understanding, perceptions, and feelings of the people who have lived the phenomenon or situation (Smith, 2015, p. 15).
Accordingly, phenomenology is a direct investigation that describes a phenomenon through the conscious experience of people living the experience. Consequently, the phenomenological approach requires in-depth interviews with a small sample of participants. The typical sample size for a phenomenological approach is less than 10 participants (Vagle, 2018, p. 178). The approach allows the investigator to make valid generalizations on what it is like to experience a given phenomenon through the eyes and experiences of the people living it.
With no regard to traditions, preconceived ideas, cultural norms, and other factors, the phenomenological approach centers on the experiences of participants. Lived experience, including lived body, time, human relations, and space are the primary focus of phenomenology (Vagle, 2018, p. 174). The research uses open-ended questions to allow the researcher to understand the individual’s experience with qualitative data collected. Through identification of major common themes, generalizations are made on the data collected by the researcher. Only when generalizations are made can the results be useful indicators for further work (Vagle, 2018, p.176). The phenomenological approach allows for understanding the challenges women face while working in emergency roles. The lived experiences of women working in emergency management will form the themes about the challenges women face. These will be presented in a non-altered way without preconceived assumptions. They will help to understand the work-family conflicts of women emergency managers. As the information gathered evolves, the factors perceived will change, and the actual factors that are leading to work-life conflict will become apparent.
Through the phenomenological approach, the researcher can find the shared experiences of women working in emergency management. Because the responses to the interview questions are expected to be similar, their shared problems should also result in post-research expertise that can be shared with others. The shared experience, or essence of the shared experience, must exist in a phenomenological approach for it to be understood within the group (Patton, 2015, p. 116). If the experience is not similar, then how participants perceive the interview questions will differ as well.
Beaty and Davis have studied the reasons why women were venturing away from city manager positions (Stabile, Grant, & Salih, 2019, p. 207). One of the reasons was noted to be a lack of set scheduling and childcare. With the absence of overnight or odd hour childcare, needing to be on location for an emergency during off-hours was virtually impossible (Stabile, Grant, & Salih, 2019, p. 209). Whereas Gerson (2016, p., 112) has noted that more women are becoming the breadwinners of their families. They studied a growing trend that more women were becoming the leading or sole financial provider of their homes. The public is conflicted regarding the reception from managers and coworkers (Gerson, 2016, p. 118).
The general framework will identify the underlying causes of some challenges women face in the workplace, and their consequences. It is hoped the research contributes to eliminating the challenges of being a woman in emergency services management who are also heads of a household, when they are required to be on scene responding to emergencies and natural disasters (Gerson, 2016, p. 118). This will help in guiding the end goal of this research, which is increasing the quality of output for female employees (where it can be improved by changes to policy that recognize where inequitable family responsibilities are holding women back), as well as their morale.
As an additional benefit, the findings of the study hope to improve the situation for the population of women in this profession as the working environment will be brought to the attention of workers and their future employers. The research framework will focus on the causes of work-life conflict, the challenges for women serving in emergency response roles, their effects and measures. It will focus on policies to put in place that will motivate women to join these professions and increase the quality of their work.
Nature of the Study
This research uses a qualitative approach, focusing on in-depth interviews with female emergency responders. In-depth interviews aim to better understand the familial challenges for women serving in the emergency service roles they face. The qualitative approach seeks to tell a story of the experiences of a given group of people. With a focus on narrative rather than numbers, the qualitative research approach starts with an open mind. The qualitative approach mainly applies the inductive procedure where a researcher collects data then attempts to derive explanation from the available data. The approach is unlike the traditional deductive quantitative approach where a researcher starts with a specific hypothesis, then collects data to test it empirically. Accordingly, the qualitative approach is exploratory, with the aim of providing insights into how subjects of the study perceive a given situation.
In this study, the qualitative approach will be used to gain insights into the challenges women in emergency management face due to work-family conflict related to the nature of their work. The study will explore the nature of work in emergency management and how it affects womens ability to perform familial chores and responsibilities. The expectations from data collected through this study are minimal but will act as a guide to further specific study. Hopefully, the study will be used to make informed recommendations showing women in emergency response professions that a balance between family and work life is possible.
Structured Interviewing
The appropriate methodology for this study is the use of structured but relaxed interviews. Structured interviewing involves conducting an interview in a standardized manner. All participants are asked the same questions in the same order (Gubrium et al., 2012, p. 197). This standardization ensures there is a possibility of aggregating the answers and identifying common themes in the data collected. Structured interviews require an interviewer to administer the question rather than depending on the respondents to self-administer. Through structured interviews, the researcher ensures questions are answered within the same context. Accordingly, structured interviewing helps minimize context effects (Gubrium et al., 2012, p.199).
In the study, there will be questions to guide the researcher during in-depth interviews with respondents. Through structured interviews, the researcher can ensure minimization of the extreme effects of context from the data collected for the study. The rationale for discussions is to draw in-depth analysis and information on the opinions, feelings, and perceptions of women responders with regards to challenges in the work environment and their family balance. While structured interviewing provides an opportunity for controlling the interview, it may result in a narrow exposure to the topic by the researcher (Gubrium et al., 2012, p. 199). Consequently, relaxed interviews are necessary to increase the scope of information collected by the researcher. Through relaxed interviews, the investigator allows respondents to freely explore the subject and give as much information as possible through the interview. Therefore, time is required for the interview to take place using this method of data collection.
In a previous study investigating the willingness of first responders to work during disasters, focus groups and interviews were used (Smith, 2015, p.3). The reason given for the use of this methodology was to promote relaxation and build a relationship. In this study, the information gathered will be collected from a group of women who share the same challenges as the researcher. The focus will be on how the experience is described and detailed and the tone of the responses. The tone and articulation of the responses will act as indicators of emotions, hardships, and the importance that respondents place on experiences. The challenge will be to eliminate personal involvement. The need to remove self-prejudice and viewpoint is crucial for an objective study. The study will rely on tested theories that support the findings of the primary data of women responders.
Social Role Theory
Social role theory is one of the most utilized concepts that explain gender differences and stereotypes leading to the division of labor in society. The origin of social roles given to men and women lies primarily in the evolution of physical sex differences, mainly mens physical power and womens reproductive and gestational role (Stinchcombe, 2017, p, 12). These sexual differences and their interaction in society, where certain activities are more efficiently performed by men, while others are effectively carried out by women, cause further gender stereotypes. Through socialization, these sex-typical role performances are facilitated, enabling men to develop appropriate personality traits according to their sex (Stinchcombe, 2017, p. 27). Accordingly, the interweaving of biology and psychology facilitate role performance. Social role theory responds to the psychological vantage point that highlights social roles and interweaves processes related to the role. However, other perspectives show a strong analysis of sex differences and parallels.
Social role theory applies to interactions in all contexts addressing assertive power-related and social-emotional behavior. According to the theory, in similar contexts, women often act more communally and less instrumentally than men. Further, the theory posits that while in highly salient situations, the differences are great, they tend to be absent in informal institutions (Turner, 2016, p. 15). In this study, the theory will be used to predict expected behavior by women in emergency management. Since emergency situations happen in unexpected and unforeseen circumstances, these situations can be seen as highly salient and informal (Stinchcombe, 2017, p. 31). Consequently, women are expected to behave less instrumentally in an emergency situation. This means that the performance and productivity of women will be lower in an emergency situation than under normal circumstances, or than how they would behave in other situations.
Conflict Theory
Coined by Karl Marx, conflict theory suggests that society is in a state of perpetual conflict due to competition for resources which are limited by nature. According to the theory, social order is maintained by the domination of power, rather than conformity and consensus (O’Neil et al., 2017, p. 32). With people who own resources trying to hold on to them by all means possible, the poor and powerless are suppressed. The theory aims to explain the existing social arrangement, hence explaining why different institutions exist in society today. It mainly focuses on power and control of different resources in society. Conflict theory holds that among other things, an individual’s social status and the role they can take in society is determined by gender.
Conflict theory suggests that members of society are in conflict due to differences between groups and classes. The superior group aims to suppress the inferior one to keep power (O’Neil et al., 2017, p. 36). Due to their relatively low capacity to respond to an emergency, women in emergency management are the inferior group, while men are in power. Consequently, this theory suggests that men participate in making it hard for women to work in emergency management effectively. The study will seek to understand the mechanism that men, as the class in power, suppress the ability of women to work in emergency management.
Attitude-Behavior Theory
Attitude-behavior theory seeks to establish consistency between an individuals attitude and behavior towards a given situation or phenomenon. To a certain degree, peoples attitudes and opinions about a given phenomenon affect their actions and behavior towards it (Siegel et al., 2019, p. 211). An attitude is a set of emotions and beliefs that one has towards an event, object, person or thing resulting from experience and upbringing. Attitudes have a strong ability to influence behavior. Attitudes determine people’s evaluation of others, objects, and issues around them which may be negative or positive. While attitude is learned, it can
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