Remote work boundary clashes tied to breakup thoughts in couples

Remote work can strain romantic relationships when couples disagree over how sharply to separate job and home life, according to research published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior. The findings matter as work-from-home arrangements remain common after the pandemic and now shape household routines as well as office policy.

The study, led by Alejandro Canek Hermida Carrillo and colleagues, examined dual-earner couples and found that remote work was linked to more relationship risk for some pairs, especially when partners had different preferences for managing work-life boundaries. The researchers reported that conflict spilling from work into home life was associated with loneliness and with greater odds that couples would think about or discuss separation or divorce.

The researchers focused on “segmentation preferences,” meaning how strongly a person wants to keep work and private life apart. Couples who differed on that preference were more likely to face work-to-home conflict when remote work was frequent, according to the study.

The pattern was not the same for every couple. The researchers found that work from home appeared to suit couples better when both partners were comfortable letting work and home routines overlap. Those couples were described as more able to adapt shared living space for work, tolerate interruptions and coordinate schedules, such as calls and breaks.

Two studies in Germany

The research drew on two studies of dual-earner couples. In the first, the team followed 170 couples in Munich during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, surveying them twice across eight weeks to assess remote work, boundary preferences and stress.

To test whether the results held beyond that early pandemic setting, the researchers then used a national database covering 1,561 couples across Germany over a one-year period. Phys.org reported that the second study supported the broader link between boundary styles, conflict, loneliness and relationship instability.

The study also found a gender difference in how mismatched boundary preferences played out. Men reported more conflict when their approach to separating work and home differed from their partner’s, while women reported less conflict in those cases. The researchers suggested women may have been more willing to adopt boundary-management strategies from a partner with a different style.

Loneliness as a warning sign

The researchers reported that work-to-home conflict can reduce the mental energy partners have for closeness, leaving one or both feeling lonely even while sharing the same home. That loneliness, in turn, was tied to a higher likelihood of thoughts or conversations about ending the relationship.

The study does not present remote work as uniformly harmful. Instead, the researchers said its effects depend on who is using it, how often they do so and whether partners’ expectations about boundaries fit together.

Phys.org reported that the researchers see limits to what employers can do, since companies are unlikely to account for each worker’s boundary preferences and those of a partner. The team suggested that employee assistance programs could help by making couples therapy more available for households dealing with remote-work conflict.

This story draws on original reporting from Phys.org.