Pregnancy in the Workplace: Stigmatization and Work Identity Management Among Pregnant Employees

As increasing numbers of women enter the workplace, more and more women and their employers are confronted with the issue of combining work, pregnancy, and childbirth. Unfortunately, very little management or organizational psychology research has examined the experiences of pregnant employees in the workplace. In this paper, I describe a qualitative, grounded theory study of the phenomenon of pregnancy and work, presenting a model of stigmatization and identity management among pregnant workers. I identify several work environment and job characteristics that may influence the likelihood that pregnant women perceive a threat of stigmatization, and I specify the relationship between that perceived stigmatization and efforts women make to manage their work identities.

Department dc:contributor.department

Psychology

Year dc:date.issued

2004

Author dc:creator

• Major, Virginia Smith

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Klein, Katherine J

Language dc:language.iso

en_US

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1903/1899

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:drum.lib.umd.edu:1903/1899