Work-family enrichment and successful aging at work: The China context

Abstract

Existing research mainly analyzes the antecedents of successful aging at work from the perspective of the work field, ignoring that in the Chinese context of “familism,” the two fields of family and work permeate each other and may have an impact on successful aging at work. Thus, through a multi-time data collection approach, we obtained a sample of 338 older Chinese employees to examine the impact of work-family enrichment on successful aging at work, the mediating role of occupational future time perspective, and the moderating role of age-inclusive human resource practice. Results indicate that work-to-family enrichment was positively associated with successful aging at work through the mediation of occupational future time perspective. Family-to-work enrichment was positively associated with successful aging at work through the mediation of occupational future time perspective. In addition, age-inclusive human resource practice amplified the positive effects of work-to-family enrichment and family-to-work enrichment on occupational future time perspective. This is an exploration of successful aging at work in the Chinese context, broadening the theoretical research on successful aging at work and providing new ideas for managers on motivating older employees to achieve successful aging at work.

Fostering successful ageing at work: The role of cognitive job crafting, work certainty and perceived remaining time at work

“…Despite emerging evidence that, when defined in growth terms, successful ageing at work fits with broader nomological frameworks (cf. Taneva & Yankov, 2020a; Zhao et al., 2023), this area of investigation may need further attention. The matter is further complicated by the difficulty to operationalize (hence, to measure holistically) the construct of successful ageing at work (cf.…”

“…To address this limitation and based on Zacher and Frese's (2009) description of occupational future time perspective as a malleable construct, we propose that workers can modify their occupational future time perspective through cognitive job crafting. Specifically, occupational future time perspective is a construct of cognitive nature (Zhao et al., 2023) that can be shaped by individual characteristics, personal resources (e.g. subjective health) and job characteristics (e.g.…”

“…In addition, we build our first research hypothesis on propositions from past research that occupational future time perspective could play an important role in employees' successful ageing at work (e.g. Cheung et al., 2019; Grote & Pfrombeck, 2020; Rudolph et al., 2018; Zhao et al., 2023). According to the SST (Carstensen, 2006), when employees hold an extended future time perspective, they tend to select and pursue long‐term knowledge‐related goals (e.g.…”

“…Changes in future time perspective and their impact may vary across different timeframes (e.g. Cate & John, 2007; Kooij et al., 2017; Zhao et al., 2023). In this vein, it is critical to test if findings hold with both longer and shorter timeframes.…”