Expatriates' identity salience, work stressors, and work–nonwork conflict: moderating role of gender and marital status

Drawing from identity theory, we proposed individuals with high work salience experienced high work stressors (interpersonal conflict, workhours, and workload), resulting in positive work‐nonwork conflict (WNWC), and individuals with high nonwork salience experienced lower work stressors, resulting in negative WNWC. Furthermore, we tested for the moderating role of gender and marital status in the relationship. The sample for this study consisted of 415 Indian expatriates working in the U.S. information technology (IT) industry. Findings supported the proposed model where work stressors completely conditioned the relationship between work/nonwork salience and WNWC. Work‐salient men worked longer hours compared to work‐salient women and were more prone to WNWC. In married individuals (in both work‐ and nonwork‐salient individuals), increased workload was positively associated with WNWC and long working hours were negatively associated with WNWC. These findings further suggested nonmarried individuals faced more WNWC when compared to married individuals when managing long working hours. Therefore, being married does not necessarily lead to higher levels of all forms of WNWC. Additionally, the participants in this study identified themselves to be more nonwork‐salient. We argue that identity salience predicts role behavioral intentions and emphasize the importance of differentiating expatriates based on their salience. This in turn could help organizations contextualize various challenges faced by work‐ and nonwork‐salient individuals and manage issues in a cost‐effective manner.