Author

Sara Narveson

Date of Award

January 2013

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Sociology

First Advisor

Krista Lynn Minnotte

Abstract

This study examines how aspects of family formation relate to coworker support and supervisor support. Studying both coworker support and supervisor support is valuable because they can give us a glimpse of how different people feel about the workplace. Using the theoretical perspective of homophily, which focuses on how people prefer to interact with others who are similar to themselves, it was hypothesized that people who are married or who have children will perceive more coworker support and supervisor support than others. The data set of the 2002 National Study of the Changing Workforce was used. It contained 3,368 cases for the analysis of coworker support and 2,506 cases for the analysis of supervisor support. Findings suggest that people who are married do perceive more coworker support than people who are not married, but parental status was unrelated to coworker support. It was also found that marital status and parental status were unconnected to supervisor support. Implications of these findings are discussed.

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