Abstract
The present study examined the relationships between experiences of working in sexually objectifying restaurants and job-related outcomes in a sample of 313 waitresses working in restaurants located in the United States. In addition, we investigated the potential mediating roles of unwanted sexual advances, power, and support in these links. Supporting our hypotheses, results indicated that sexually objectifying restaurants were positively correlated with waitresses’ feelings of burnout and intentions to leave their job. Our findings also supported a theorized multiple mediation model in which higher levels of sexually objectifying restaurants were related to more unwanted sexual advances, lower levels of personal power and control in the work environment, less organizational support, and lower levels of coworker support, which in turn were related to more feelings of burnout. Contrary to our hypotheses, gendered structural/organizational power did not mediate the sexually objectifying restaurants → burnout link. In addition, our findings also revealed that personal power and control, organizational support, and coworker support (but not unwanted sexual advances or structural/organizational power) mediated the link between sexually objectifying restaurants and intention to leave.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Alarcon, G. M. (2011). A meta-analysis of burnout with job demands, resources, and attitudes. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 79, 549–562. doi:10.1016/j.jvb.2011.03.007.
American Psychological Association, Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls. (2007). Report of the APA Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Retrieved from www.apa.org/pi/wpo/sexualization.html.
Ashford, S. J., Lee, C., & Bobko, P. (1989). Content, cause, and consequences of job insecurity: A theory-based measure and substantive test. Academy of Management Journal, 32, 803–829. doi:10.2307/256569.
Associated Press. (2012). Breastaurant boom: Hooters-style eateries experience a mini-boom. Retrieved from http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/06/24/breastaurant-boom-hooters-style-eateries-experience-mini-boom/.
Baruch-Feldman, C., Brondolo, E., Ben-Dayan, D., & Schwartz, J. (2002). Sources of social support and burnout, job satisfaction, and productivity. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 7, 84–93. doi:10.1037/1076-8998.7.1.84.
Chamberlain, L. J., Crowley, M., Tope, D., & Hodson, R. (2008). Sexual harassment in organizational context. Work and Occupations, 35, 262–295. doi:10.1177/0730888408322008.
Chan, D. K. S., Lam, C. B., Chow, S. Y., & Cheung, S. F. (2008). Examining the job‐related, psychological, and physical outcomes of workplace sexual harassment: A meta‐analytic review. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 32, 362–376. doi:10.1111/j.1471-6402.2008.00451.x.
Crawford, E. R., LePine, J. A., & Rich, B. L. (2010). Linking job demands and resources to employee engagement and burnout: A theoretical extension and meta-analytic test. Journal of Applied Psychology, 95, 834–848. doi:10.1037/a0019364.
De Haas, S., Timmerman, G., & Höing, M. (2009). Sexual harassment and health among male and female police officers. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 14, 390–401. doi:10.1037/a0017046.
Eisenberger, R., Huntington, R. H., Hutchison, S., & Sowa, S. (1986). Perceived organizational support. Journal of Applied Psychology, 71, 500–507. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.71.3.500.
Eisenberger, R., Cummings, J., Armeli, S., & Lynch, P. (1997). Perceived organizational support, discretionary treatment, and job satisfaction. Journal of Applied Psychology, 82, 812–820. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.82.5.812.
Field, A. (2013). Discovering statistics using IBM SPSS statistics. Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Fitzgerald, L. F., Drasgow, F., Hulin, C. L., Gelfand, M. J., & Magley, V. J. (1997). Antecedents and consequences of sexual harassment in organizations: A test of an integrated model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 82, 578–589. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.82.4.578.
Fredrickson, B. L., & Roberts, T. (1997). Objectification theory: Toward understanding women’s lived experiences and mental health risks. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 21, 173–206. doi:10.1111/j.1471-6402.1997.tb00108.x.
Gettman, H. J., & Gelfand, M. J. (2007). When the customer shouldn’t be king: Antecedents and consequences of sexual harassment by clients and customers. Journal of Applied Psychology, 92, 757–770. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.92.3.757.
Gutek, B. A., Cohen, A. G., & Konrad, A. M. (1990). Predicting social-sexual behavior at work: A contact hypothesis. The Academy of Management Journal, 33, 560–577. doi:10.2307/256581.
Halbesleben, J. R. (2006). Sources of social support and burnout: A meta-analytic test of the conservation of resources model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91, 1134–1145. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.91.5.1134.
Hayes, A. F. (2013). Introduction to mediation, moderation and conditional process analysis: A regression based approach. New York: Guilford Press.
Kozee, H. B., Tylka, T. L., Augustus-Horvath, C. L., & Denchik, A. (2007). Development and psychometric evaluation of the Interpersonal Sexual Objectification Scale. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 31, 176–189. doi:10.1111/j.1471-6402.2007.00351.x.
Lee, R. T., & Ashforth, B. E. (1996). A meta-analytic examination of the correlates of the three dimensions of job burnout. Journal of Applied Psychology, 81, 123–133. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.81.2.123.
Leonard, D. (2014). Twin peaks: ‘Hooters just wasn’t racy enough.’ Bloomberg Businessweek. Retrieved from http://finance.yahoo.com/news/twin-peaks---hooters-just-wasn-t-racy-enough-180858794.html.
Mallinckrodt, B., Abraham, W. T., Wei, M., & Russell, W. (2006). Advances in testing the statistical significance of mediation effects. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 53, 372–378. doi:10.1037/0022-0167.53.3.372.
Maslach, C., & Jackson, S. E. (1981). The measurement of experienced burnout. Journal of Occupational Behavior, 2(2), 99–113. doi:10.1002/job.4030020205.
Moffitt, L. B., & Szymanski, D. M. (2011). Experiencing sexually objectifying environments: A qualitative study. The Counseling Psychologist, 39, 67–106. doi:10.1177/0011000010364551.
Moradi, B., & Huang, Y. (2008). Objectification theory and psychology of women: A decade of advances and future directions. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 32, 377–398. doi:10.1111/j.1471-6402.2008.00452.x.
National Restaurant Association. (2014). Serving up career opportunities for women. Retrieved from http://www.restaurant.org/News-Research/News/Serving-up-career-opportunities-for-women.
O’Connor, B. P. (2000). SPSS and SAS programs for determining the number of components using parallel analysis and Velicer’s MAP test. Behavior Research Methods, Instrumentation, and Computers, 32, 396–402. doi:10.3758/BF03200807.
Parent, M. C. (2013). Handling item-level missing data: Simpler is just as good. The Counseling Psychologist, 41, 568–600. doi:10.1177/0011000012445176.
Preacher, K. J., & Hayes, A. F. (2008). Asymptotic and resampling strategies for assessing and comparing indirect effects in multiple mediator models. Behavior Research Methods, 40, 879–891. doi:10.3758/BRM,40.3.879.
Rhoades, L., & Eisenberger, R. (2002). Perceived organizational support: A review of the literature. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 698–714. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.87.4.698.
Riggle, R. J., Edmondson, D. R., & Hansen, J. D. (2009). A meta-analysis of the relationship between perceived organizational support and job outcomes: 20 years of research. Journal of Business Research, 62, 1027–1030. doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2008.05.003.
Rosin, H. M., & Korabik, K. (1991). Workplace variables, affective responses, and intention to leave among women managers. Journal of Occupational Psychology, 64, 317–330. doi:10.1111/j.2044-8325.1991.tb00563.x.
Santoli, M. (2014). Olive Garden, Applebee’s struggle to stay relevant as consumers change dining habits. Retrieved from http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/michael-santoli/casual-dining-chains-struggle-to-adapt-to-changing-consumer-tastes-203955971.html.
Steel, R. P., & Lounsbury, J. W. (2009). Turnover process models: Review and synthesis of a conceptual literature. Human Resource Management Review, 19, 271–282. doi:10.1016/j.hrmr.2009.04.002.
Szymanski, D. M., & Feltman, C. E. (2015). Examining sexually objectifying environments and experiences among female waitresses and their links to psychological and job related outcomes. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 39, 390–404. doi:10.1177/0361684314565345.
Szymanski, D. M., Moffitt, L. B., & Carr, E. R. (2011). Sexual objectification of women: Advances to theory and research. The Counseling Psychologist, 39, 6–38. doi:10.1177/0011000010378402.
Tabachnick, B. G., & Fidell, L. S. (2001). Using multivariate statistics (5th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon/Pearson Education.
Tetrick, L. E., & LaRocco, J. M. (1987). Understanding, prediction, and control as moderators of the relationships between perceived stress, satisfaction, and psychological well-being. Journal of Applied Psychology, 72, 538–543. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.72.4.538.
Tett, R. P., & Meyer, J. P. (1993). Job satisfaction, organizational commitment, turnover intention, and turnover: Path analyses based on meta‐analytic findings. Personnel Psychology, 46, 259–293. doi:10.1111/j.1744-6570.1993.tb00874.x.
United States Labor Department. (2014). 25 Most common occupations for women by selected characteristics. Retrieved from http://www.dol.gov/wb/stats/25mostcommon_occs_employ_women_txt.htm.
Weston, R., & Gore, P. A. (2006). A brief guide to structural equation modeling. The Counseling Psychologist, 34, 719–751. doi:10.1177/0011000006286345.
Yagil, D. (2008). When the customer is wrong: A review of research on aggression and sexual harassment in service encounters. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 13, 141–152. doi:10.1016/j.avb.2008.03.002.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of Interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Funding
The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Informed Consent
The research involved human participants and included an informed consent that was approved by the University of Tennessee’s Institutional Review Board.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Szymanski, D.M., Mikorski, R. Sexually Objectifying Restaurants and Waitresses’ Burnout and Intentions to Leave: The Roles of Power and Support. Sex Roles 75, 328–338 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-016-0621-2
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-016-0621-2