Parenting Journal · Volume 1 · Issue 4 · Licensed source edition
“It Is Not Possible to Balance It Easily”: A Phenomenological Study Exploring the Experience of Work–Family Conflict in Contemporary Chinese Society
Originally published 2025-12-30 · Behavioral Sciences
Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI) · DOI 10.3390/bs16010063 ↗
Working-family evidence
Work, care and the whole person.
Relevant to decisions about a culturally attentive conversation about work and family pressures; the original evidence concerns 16 purposively selected Chinese employees.
Directly examines work and family life, parenting, caregiving or employment policies for families.
Editorial reading guide · Respect
How do family obligations both support and stretch us?
This reading brings culturally shaped obligations and coping with work-family conflict into the respect pathway. The qualitative phenomenological interview study offers a specific workplace lens on how employment and family life meet.
Study context
16 purposively selected Chinese employees
Age / stage: Working adults; family roles varied
Read with three questions
- How did the researchers define and assess participants' descriptions of conflict and coping?
- What does the study design allow us to conclude about the role of filial obligations and comparison with Western literature?
- What would need to be checked before adopting a culturally attentive conversation about work and family pressures?
Keep the limits in view
A small purposive qualitative sample illuminates experiences without estimating prevalence or representing all Chinese households.
The text below is the original article’s licensed repository edition. Its wording is not rewritten. Use the Paper Agent beside the text to locate evidence; open the source for figures, tables and complete context.
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Follow the original.
Original authorship, publication date, journal and DOI are preserved. This issue’s TRICK placement and reading questions are editorial additions, not claims made by the original authors.
Shujie Chen; Mei-I Cheng; Shira Elqayam; Mark Scase (2025). “It Is Not Possible to Balance It Easily”: A Phenomenological Study Exploring the Experience of Work–Family Conflict in Contemporary Chinese Society Behavioral Sciences. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs16010063
Permissions checked against the saved article notice; repository publication notices screened 2026-11-05. This is not a new peer-review decision. The source authors and publishers are not represented as endorsing this issue.