Over the past years, digital technologies and media made our lives easier, safer, healthier, and longer. In the last decade, however, especially in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, there is a new paradigm of technological transformation brought into effect by the radical digitalization revolutionizing professional eco-spaces. This has, on one hand, imparted flexibility and eased routine tasks, on the other, counter-intuitive effects like encroachment on the fundamental rights of employees by work-family interferences (WFI) have asserted themselves. We examine WFI as a bi-dimensional construct with conceptually distinct dimensions of work-to-family conflict (WFC) and family-to-work conflict (FWC). While WFI is well-recognized, the military, police, healthcare, and teaching context provide a particularly unique landscape for such conflicts to manifest themselves owing to the critical nature of their jobs where a moment of dysconnectivity might mean the difference between life and death. Using the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, we examined the WFI arising due to professionals in these sectors remaining connected to their work from remote locations via technological means, known as professional digital intrusion (PDI). We also investigated the effect of active organizational support (AOS) and passive organizational support (POS) on the WFI experienced by them. The role of the individual is critical in managing conflicts; hence, we investigated the potential moderating role of cognitive reappraisal in these relationships. India provides a natural setting for our study where comfort with using technology at work still largely depends on sharp geographical divisions, age, experience, education, and technological training. The prevalent socio-economic and cultural conditions lead to our predicting that socio-demographic variables would also play an important moderating role in the relationships, hence these were also investigated. A pilot study was conducted in phase 1, followed by phase 2 which comprised of empirical investigation of the relationships with data gathered from 507 professionals across India. Covariance based structural equation modelling was conducted using AMOS (v22), and moderation analyses were conducted using Process Macro (v 4.2). Our results confirmed that PDI has a direct positive relationship with WFI, and Perceived OS has a direct negative relationship with WFI. We also found differences in the WFI experienced by employees based on cognitive reappraisal, organization, age, income, occupation, gender, number of children, city of residence and experience. Specific populations may have a stronger association with WFI. Our study goes beyond the research in the existing body of literature, by integrating and jointly examining the concepts of PDI, perceived OS, bi-directional work-family conflict and cognitive reappraisal. In doing so, our research contributes to a more holistic understanding of how these factors interact and mutually influence each other, particularly within the specific context of employees in the military, police, healthcare and teaching sectors. The results of this research have important practical implications for human resource management based on which we put forward several policy recommendations. This is an area ripe for future research avenues, which are suggested.
Keywords: Professional digital intrusion, Work-family interference, Perceived organizational support, Cognitive reappraisal