Fit as a mediator of the relationship between work hours and burnout.

The authors studied number of hours worked and estimated its relationship to burnout in a nonrandom sample of 141 married physicians. It was hypothesized that this relationship is mediated by a process called fit, conceptualized as the extent to which workers realize the various components of their work-family strategies. Results of structural equation modeling supported the mediation hypothesis. Employees whose work hours are more or fewer than they and their partner prefer and whose work hours are distributed differently than they and their partner prefer will be more disengaged, distracted, and alienated at work than will their counterparts who are working their preferred schedules. Thus, the relationship between number of hours worked and burnout depends on the extent to which work schedules meet the needs of the worker, her or his partner, and their children, if any.