The most important information about the project and its content is summarized on this page.
A flyer with a summary of the project can be downloaded here.
The Project in Bullet Points
Title: Job Mobilities and Family Lives in Europe
Subtitle: Modern Mobile Living and its Relation to Quality of Life
Acronym: JobMob and FamLives
Funded by: European Commission, Sixth Framework Programme for research and technological development
Specific Programme: “Integrating and Strengthening the European Research Area”
Priority: 7, “Citizens and governance in a knowledge-based society”
Research Area: 2, “Options and choices for the development of a knowledge-based society”
Research Topic: 2.2.1, “Societal trends, quality of life and public policies”
Contract No.: CIT5-CT-2005-028349
Intsrument: Specific Targeted Reseach Project (STREP)
Total Budget: 1 277 350.00 Euro
Total Costs: 1 772 550.00 Euro
Duration: 31 months, from February 2006 to October 2008.
Participating countries: Belgium, France, Germany, Poland, Spain, Switzerland.
Participating institutes and scientists: see Project Members page.
Project Coordinator: Norbert F. Schneider (Mainz, Germany)
Summary
The project studies job-related spatial mobility, its causes, its obstacles, and its interaction with
job career and with the private sphere. This includes partnership and family development, social integration, and the
subjective well-being. In each of the six participating countries, a survey is carried out, collecting for the first time
representative data on job mobilities.
Aims
This project seeks to improve European work-life balance under conditions of contemporary mobility
requirements by gathering and disseminating information for individuals, employers, and policy makers regarding job-related
spatial mobility. The aims are to:
improve our understanding of structural and cultural conditions under which spatial mobility is realised,
enhance individual competencies at managing mobile lifestyle demands,
develop and strengthen political and economic strategies to reduce the strains caused by spatial job mobility.
The main outcomes of the project will be available through six national reports and in one comparative report.
Main Research Areas
The questions of interest cover three main research areas:
(1) Phenomenology: Describing the spread of mobility requirements and the affected social groups. Describing the
various forms in which Europeans meet labour market demands to become mobile (e.g. daily long-distance commuting,
weekly commuting, relocating, etc.). Describing the quantity and distribution of these realised job mobilities
in the participating countries.
(2) Explanation: Understanding decision processes regarding job mobility. Identifying individual motivations and
restraints as well as structural and cultural triggers and barriers to becoming mobile. Identifying motivations and
restraints, triggers and barriers to choosing a specific form of mobility,
(3) Consequences: Identifying the consequences of mobile living under various conditions: the advantages and
strains, the impacts on the job career and on the the private sphere.
For the goals (2) and (3), special attention is given to the interaction of job mobility with family formation,
partnership and family development, partnership and family relations, social integration, subjective well-being,
and quality of life. The explanation (2) draws additionally on individual charasteristics and attitides as well as
on macro and meso level structures and cultures.
Subject
The subject of the study is spatial mobility for occupational reasons. Of special interest
are all manifestations of job mobility over a relatively long distance.
These may be (1) in forms of singular events like:
relocating or migrating for job-reasons
or (2) in forms of recurring mobility like:
daily long-distance commuting to work,
long-distance relationship for job reasons,
staying often over-night away from home (seasonal workers, weekly commuters, people with varying work places, etc.).
Theoretical Background
Using a subjectively expected utility approach, the study assumes that individuals react
to occupational mobility demands, following own needs, which interact with subjective perceptions and priorities.
Reflecting rationally about how to handle mobility demands in their own best interest, individuals consider conditions
on the macro, meso, and micro level. Simultaneously they are influenced in their perceptions and priorities by
cultural settings on the macro, meso, and micro level. This framework is inspired by the concept of motility.
Macro level: Individuals take structural conditions into account, such as access to a transportation infrastructure
or labour market conditions. Furthermore, they are influenced by mobility cultures in society, such as a general
public opinion regarding how much time one should spend together with the partner and family.
Meso level: Individuals consider characteristics of their social network, work place, or town, such as the
local labour market or the attractiveness of spending time in local neighborhoods and clubs. Additionally they are
influenced by local sub-cultures in their network, work place, or town.
Micro level: Individuals consider their own skills and their life situation regarding job, family, etc.
Simultaneously, they are influenced by their individual beliefs and attitudes. Both, skills, life situation, beliefs,
and attitudes are shaped by socio-demographic characteristics (age, gender, etc.).
Between these phenomena and job mobility, reciprocal interactions are assumed. The understanding of these
interdependencies is enriched with stress theories and theories of quality of life.
Method
The project collects quantitative, representative, and comparable data for the six
participating countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Poland, Spain, and Switzerland) in a fully standardised
cross-sectional survey. The universe is defined as the residential population, aged between 25 and 54 years.
The interviews are carried out by survey institutes in spring 2007 as telephone interviews (CATI), with
the exception of Poland where face-to-face interviews (CAPI) are conducted.
The survey consists of two samples:
The first Sample (S1) collects data on mobile and immobile people. It allows representative statistics
regarding all variables. Analyses are possible also on those who refused to become mobile or never were
exposed to mobility demands. The intended sample size is n=5300.
The second Sample (S2) is conducted with mobile persons only, to get a sufficient number of cases for
analyses on the different forms of mobility. The interviewees are selected with screening interviews. Within S2,
which is a fully randomised sample for mobiles, the same questionnaire is used as in S1. The intended sample size
is n=2000.
S1 is considered to allow answers to questions of research area (1): the phenomenology. S2 is considered to
offer answers to questions of research area (2) and (3): the causes and consequences f mobilities.
