Distressful to work for a woman? It is if you're a woman, a study finds.
Women who work for female bosses develop more mental and physical health problems than those who work for a man, according to the study.
In fact, women working for women reported up to 20 per cent more anger, anxiety, headaches and depression than women who worked for men, University of Toronto sociology professor Scott Schieman found, based on a survey of 1,800 U.S. working adults.
Women also had similarly higher distress levels with two bosses, one male and one female, over a single male boss.
Men, meanwhile, had no differences in levels of physical or mental problems working for a male or female boss. And men who worked for two bosses, one male and one female, reported up to 30-per-cent fewer health complaints than men who work for men.
What's behind the women's distress? It isn't because of cat fights, Prof. Schieman says. His study results disputed notions that women are prone to have more conflict with other women. He and PhD candidate Taralyn McMullen found no statistical difference in women's and men's reports of workplace conflicts with supervisors of either gender.
It also wasn't because the working conditions for women were any more stressful, demanding or unhealthy than those for the men studied. Those polled were matched for occupations, job sectors and working conditions, as well as job pressures and satisfaction with their role and co-workers, Prof. Schieman says.
The researchers posit that the differences are probably due to either the kind of work that women choose, or to the expectations that women have of other women, he says.
"For example, women who work with a women supervisor might tend to cluster in the kinds of work or in certain sectors that involve stressful activities that our survey didn't identify. This might be in the caring sector or in jobs that tend to be under-resourced, under-funded, or under-valued," he says.
"Moreover, women supervisors in these jobs might be particularly stressed by the responsibilities and challenges. This could trickle down to influence the quality of working life for subordinate women."
Another possibility relates to the nature of relationships between female supervisors and their subordinates, Prof. Schieman says.
Women may perceive female leaders to be less legitimate than male ones. Or women may expect female supervisors to be more caring than male ones but not get the support they expect.
Women supervisors may also play up to male subordinates more than they do other women.
But he says that the current study can't draw any firm conclusions.
"There is definitely something good for men working for a woman and something bad in the same scenario for women. We just don't know what it is," Prof. Schieman says.
The researchers plan a follow-up study that looks more closely at how female bosses handle both their male and female subordinates.
The current study's findings are published in the September edition of the Journal of Health and Social Behaviour.