The Impact of Work–Family Conflict on Work Engagement among Services Sector Employees in Klang Valley, Malaysia

Aboramadan, M., Albashiti, B., Alharazin, H., and Dahleez, K. A. (2019). Human resources management practices and organizational commitment in higher education: The mediating role of work engagement. International Journal of Educational Management, 34(1), 154-174.
Al Badi, F. M., Cherian, J., Farouk, S., and Al Nahyan, M. (2023). Work engagement and job performance among nurses in the public healthcare sector in the United Arab Emirates. Journal of Asia Business Studies, 17(5), 1019-1041.
Alamri, M. (2023). Transformational leadership and work engagement in public organizations: promotion focus and public service motivation, how and when the effect occurs. Leadership and Organization Development Journal, 44(1), 137-155.
Allen, I. E., and Seaman, C. A. (2007). Likert scales and data analyses. Quality Progress, 40(7), 64-65.
Ashfaq, B., and Hamid, A. (2021). Person-organization fit and organization citizenship behavior: modeling the work engagement as a mediator. Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Administration, 13(1), 19-39.
Azim, M. T., & Al-Halawani, F. M. J. (2020). Perceived non-work social support and employee engagement: the mediating role of self-efficacy. Middle East Journal of Management, 7(2), 166-184.
Bakker, A. B., & Demerouti, E. (2017). Job demands–resources theory: Taking stock and looking forward. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 22(3), 273-285.
Bakker, A. B., Demerouti, E., & Sanz-Vergel, A. (2023). Job demands–resources theory: Ten years later. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 10, 25-53.
Bellamkonda, N., Santhanam, N., and Pattusamy, M. (2021). Goal clarity, trust in management and intention to stay: The mediating role of work engagement. South Asian Journal of Human Resources Management, 8(1), 9-28.
Bilal, H., Farooq, N., and Hayat, K. (2019). Empirically investigating the impact of employee engagement on counterproductive work behavior of academic staff. Global Regional Review, 4(1), 120-127.
Boccoli, G., Gastaldi, L., & Corso, M. (2022). The evolution of employee engagement: Towards a social and contextual construct for balancing individual performance and wellbeing dynamically. International Journal of Management Reviews, 25(1), 75-98.
Boonsiritomachai, W., and Sud-On, P. (2022). The moderation effect of work engagement on entrepreneurial attitude and organizational commitment: evidence from Thailand’s entry-level employees during the COVID-19 pandemic. Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Administration, 14(1), 50-71.
Breaugh, J. (2021). Too stressed to be engaged? The role of basic needs satisfaction in understanding work stress and public sector engagement. Public personnel management, 50(1), 84-108.
Brenning, K. M., De Clercq, B., Wille, B., & Vergauwe, J. (2020). Towards a fine-grained analysis of the link between borderline personality pathology and job burnout: Investigating the association with work-family conflict. Personality and Individual Differences, 162, 110030.
Cai, Y., Yusof, S. A., Amin, R. B. M., and Arshad, M. N. M. (2021). The Multi-dimensional Effect of Household Debt on Urban Individual Well-Being in Klang Valley Malaysia. Social Indicators Research, 158(1), 23-44.
Carlson, D. S., Kacmar, K. M., & Williams, L. J. (2000). Construction and initial validation of a multidimensional measure of work–family conflict. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 56(2), 249-276.
Chakravorty, A., & Singh, P. (2020). Work/family interference and burnout among primary school teachers: the moderating role of emotional intelligence. Decision, 47(3), 251-264.
Cheah, J.-H., Sarstedt, M., Ringle, C. M., Ramayah, T., & Ting, H. (2018). Convergent validity assessment of formatively measured constructs in PLS-SEM: On using single-item versus multi-item measures in redundancy analyses. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 30(11), 3192–3210
Chin, W. W. (1998). The partial least squares approach to structural equation modeling. Modern Methods for Business Research, 295(2), 295-336.
Darouei, M., & Pluut, H. (2021). Work from home today for a better tomorrow! How working from home influences work?family conflict and employees' start of the next workday. Stress and Health, 37(5), 986-999.
Demerouti, E., Bakker, A. B., Nachreiner, F., & Schaufeli, W. B. (2001). The job demands-resources model of burnout. Journal of Applied Psychology, 86(3), 499–512.
DOSM. (2022). “Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by State 2021.” Department of Statistics Malaysia Press Release. Retrieved November 16, 2022, from https://v1.dosm.gov.my/v1/index.php?r=column/cthemeByCat&cat=491&bul_id=L3NnMU44VnA0YjRxVXhuYUpZTmVnZz09&menu_id=TE5CRUZCblh4ZTZMODZIbmk2aWRRQT09
DOSM. (2023). Services Sector First Quarter 2023. Retrieved 3 August, 2023, from: https://www.dosm.gov.my/uploads/release-content/file_20230510113116.pdf
DOSM. (2023b). Employment Statistics, Fourth Quarter 2022. Retrieved 4 July, 2023, from https://v1.dosm.gov.my/v1/index.php?r=column/cthemeByCat&cat=439&bul_id=b2U1a3J2VnRuaFNpNmY0Mlh4aUdIdz09&menu_id=Tm8zcnRjdVRNWWlpWjRlbmtlaDk1UT09
Eissa, G., & Wyland, R. (2018). Work?family conflict and hindrance stress as antecedents of social undermining: Does ethical leadership matter?. Applied Psychology, 67(4), 645-654.
Eva, N., Robin, M., Sendjaya, S., Van Dierendonck, D., and Liden, R. C. (2019). Servant leadership: A systematic review and call for future research. The Leadership Quarterly, 30(1), 111-132.
Faul, F., Erdfelder, E., Lang, A.-G., & Buchner, A. (2007). G*Power 3: A flexible statistical power analysis for the social, behavioral, and biomedical sciences. Behavior Research Methods, 39, 175-191.
Frone, M. R., Russell, M., & Cooper, M. L. (1992). Antecedents and outcomes of work-family conflict: testing a model of the work-family interface. Journal of Applied Psychology, 77(1), 65-78.
Galletta, M., Portoghese, I., Melis, P., Gonzalez, C. I. A., Finco, G., D’Aloja, E., ... and Campagna, M. (2019). The role of collective affective commitment in the relationship between work–family conflict and emotional exhaustion among nurses: A multilevel modeling approach. BMC Nursing, 18(1), 1-9.
Geisser, S. (1974). A predictive approach to the random effects model. Biometrika, 61, 101–107.
Ghislieri, C., Molino, M., Dolce, V., Sanseverino, D., and Presutti, M. (2021). Work-family conflict during the Covid-19 pandemic: teleworking of administrative and technical staff in healthcare. An Italian study. La Medicina Del Lavoro, 112(3), 229–240.
Greenhaus, J. H., & Beutell, N. J. (1985). Sources of conflict between work and family roles. Academy of management review, 10(1), 76-88.
Gross, S., & Campbell, N. (2015). Central city vibrancy and new business venturing. Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy, 4(2), 257-271.
Gull, N., Asghar, M., Bashir, M., Liu, X., and Xiong, Z. (2022). Does a family-supportive supervisor reduce the effect of work-family conflict on emotional exhaustion and turnover intentions? A moderated mediation model. International Journal of Conflict Management, 34(2), 253-272.
Gulsen, M., & Ozmen, D. (2020). The relationship between emotional labour and job satisfaction in nursing. International Nursing Review, 67(1), 145–154
Gurugamage, S. R., Ramanayake, M. N., Iddagoda, A., & Dissanayake, D. H. S. W. (2022). Mediating Role of Employee Engagement on the Relationship between Workplace Spirituality and Employee Job Performance. Three Seas Economic Journal, 3(2), 1-12.
Hair, J. F., Hult, T., Ringle, C. M., & Sarstedt, M. (2022). A primer on partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Hair, J. F., Risher, J. J., Sarstedt, M., & Ringle, C. M. (2019). When to use and how to report the results of PLS-SEM. European Business Review, 31(1), 2-24.
Hair, J.F., Hult, G.T.M., Ringle, C.M. and Sarstedt, M. (2014), A Primer on Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM), SAGE, Los Angeles, CA.
Han, X., Chen, S., and Chen, B. (2022). From employee engagement to customer engagement: A multilevel dual-path model of engagement spillover effects in service ecosystems. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 64, 102815.
Henseler, J., Ringle, C.M. and Sarstedt, M. (2015), “A new criterion for assessing discriminant validity in variance-based structural equation modeling”, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 43(1) 115-135.
Herman, J. B., & Gyllstrom, K. K. (1977). Working Men and Women: Inter-and Intra-Role Conflict?. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 1(4), 319-333.
Ho, B. C., Mustamil, N. M., & Jayasingam, S. (2021). Quality of Work Life and Lifelong Learning Among Working Adults in Malaysia: The Mediating Role ff Employee Engagement. Malaysian Management Journal, 25, 99–142
Hofstede, Geert. 1991, Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind: Intercultural Cooperation and Its Importance for Survival, McGraw-Hill Publishing Co.
Holahan, C. K., & Gilbert, L. A. (1979). Conflict between major life roles: Women and men in dual career couples. Human Relations, 32(6), 451-467.
Islam, T., Ahmad, R., Ahmed, I., & Ahmer, Z. (2019). Police work-family nexus, work engagement and turnover intention: Moderating role of person-job-fit. Policing: An International Journal, 42(5), 739-750.
Jamaludin, N. H., Ibrahim, R. Z. A. R., Saputra, J., Dagang, M. M., & Johar, S. S. (2022). Work-Family Conflict as Predictor of Job and Family Satisfaction Among Malaysia Private Sector Employees. In Handbook of Research on the Complexities and Strategies of Occupational Stress (pp. 168-183). IGI Global.
Jankelová, N., Joniaková, Z., & Skorková, Z. (2021). Perceived organizational support and work engagement of first-line managers in healthcare–The mediation role of feedback seeking behavior. Journal of Multidisciplinary Healthcare, 3109-3123
Jia, C. X., & Li, J. C. M. (2022). Work-family conflict, burnout, and turnover intention among Chinese social workers: The moderating role of work support. Journal of Social Service Research, 48(1), 12-27.
Karatepe, O. M., & Karadas, G. (2016). Service employees’ fit, work-family conflict, and work engagement. Journal of Services Marketing, 30(5), 554–566.
King, M. J. (2018). A Quantitative Explanatory Analysis Examining the Moderating Effect of Family Care Responsibilities on Family-Work Conflict And Employee Engagement Among Employed Individuals in the United States [Doctoral dissertation, Capella University].
Kisi. (2020). Work-life balance: Best cities worldwide in 2022. Kisi. Retrieved July 5, 2023, https://www.getkisi.com/work-life-balance-2020
Kisi. (2022). Work-life balance: Best cities worldwide in 2022. Kisi. Retrieved July 5, 2023, from https://www.getkisi.com/work-life-balance-2022
Koroglu, ?., and Ozmen, O. (2022). The mediating effect of work engagement on innovative work behavior and the role of psychological well-being in the job demands–resources (JD-R) model. Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Administration, 14(1), 124-144.
Lee, M. C. C., Idris, M. A., & Tuckey, M. (2019). Supervisory coaching and performance feedback as mediators of the relationships between leadership styles, work engagement, and turnover intention. Human Resource Development International, 22(3), 257-282.
Li, J. C., Cheung, J. C., & Sun, I. Y. (2019). The impact of job and family factors on work stress and engagement among Hong Kong police officers. Policing: An International Journal, 42(2), 284-300.
Lim, P., Zawawi, D., Aziz, Y. A., (2024a). Nurturing Work Engagement: Unravelling the Impact of Servant Leadership, Employee Emotional Intelligence, and Work-Family Conflict. International Journal of Economics and Management, 18(3), 393-410.
Lim, P., Zawawi, D., & Aziz, Y. A. (2024b). Emotional Intelligence as a Moderator: Navigating Work-Family Conflict and Work Engagement in Malaysia’s Services Sector. International Journal of Academic Research in Economics and Management Sciences, 13(4), 718–737.
Lim, P., & Wang, G. (2025). Leveraging Autonomy, Feedback, and Social Support to Enhance Work Engagement and Mitigate Turnover Intentions: Evidence from Selected Services Sector in Malaysia. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 15(1), 937–960.
Malik, P., & Garg, P. (2020). Learning organization and work engagement: The mediating role of employee resilience. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 31(8), 1071-1094.
Margaretha, M., Saragih, S., Zaniarti, S., & Parayow, B. (2021). Workplace spirituality, employee engagement, and professional commitment: A study of lecturers from Indonesian universities. Problems and Perspectives in Management, 19(2), 346-356.
Maslach, C., Schaufeli, W. B., & Leiter, M. P. (2001). Job burnout. Annual Review of Psychology, 52(1), 397-422.
Mayuran, L., & Kailasapathy, P. (2022). To engage or not? Antecedents of employee engagement in Sri Lanka. Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, 60(3), 584–607
McMillan, H. S., Morris, M. L., & Atchley, E. K. (2011). Constructs of the work/life interface: A synthesis of the literature and introduction of the concept of work/life harmony. Human Resource Development Review, 10(1), 6-25.
Mohammed, Z., Nandwani, D., Saboo, A., and Padakannaya, P. (2022). Job satisfaction while working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic: do subjective work autonomy, work-family conflict, and anxiety related to the pandemic matter?. Cogent Psychology, 9(1), 2087278.
Netemeyer, R. G., Boles, J. S., & McMurrian, R. (1996). Development and validation of work–family conflict and family–work conflict scales. Journal of Applied Psychology, 81(4), 400-410.
Nordin, N. S., & Hamzah, H. (2021). Issues and Challenges of Work Engagement among Lecturers. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 11(7), 1619–1625.
Opie, T. J., & Henn, C. M. (2013). Work-family conflict and work engagement among mothers: Conscientiousness and neuroticism as moderators. SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, 39(1), 1-12.
Panda, A., Jain, N. K., & Nambudiri, R. (2022). Work–family conflict, affective commitment, leadership and job satisfaction: a moderated mediation analysis. International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, 71(4), 1469-1489.
Park, H. I., Jang, J., & Nam, J. S. (2023). Physical activity buffers the effects of work-family conflict on work engagement through mastery recovery experience. Current Psychology, 42(1), 348-358.
Pascucci, T., Hernández Sánchez, B., & Sánchez García, J. C. (2022). Being stressed in the family or married with work? A literature review and clustering of work-family conflict. European Journal of Management and Business Economics, 31(2), 239-265.
Petrovi?, I. B., Vukeli?, M., & ?izmi?, S. (2017). Work engagement in Serbia: Psychometric properties of the Serbian version of the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES). Frontiers in Psychology, 8, 1799.
Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., Lee, J. Y., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2003). Common method biases in behavioral research: a critical review of the literature and recommended remedies. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(5), 879-903.
Podsakoff, P.M. and Organ, D.W. (1986), “Self-reports in organizational research: problems and prospects”, Journal of Management 12(4), 531-544.
Priambodo, E. P., Darokah, M., & Sari, R. E. Y. D. (2019). Peran self efficacy dan iklim organisasi dalam membentuk employee engagement melalui komitmen organisasi. Psympathic: Jurnal Ilmiah Psikologi, 6(2), 213-228.
Ribeiro, N., Gomes, D., Oliveira, A. R., and Dias Semedo, A. S. (2023). The impact of the work-family conflict on employee engagement, performance, and turnover intention. International Journal of Organizational Analysis, 31(2), 533-549.
Robbins, S. P., & Judge, T. A. (2019). Organizational behavior (18th edition, global edition). Pearson.
?ahin, S., & Yozgat, U. (2021). Work–family conflict and job performance: Mediating role of work engagement in healthcare employees. Journal of Management & Organization, 1-20.
Sarstedt, M., Hair, J. F., Cheah, J.-H., Becker, J.-M., & Ringle, C. M. (2019). How to Specify, Estimate, and Validate Higher-Order Constructs in PLS-SEM. Australasian Marketing Journal, 27(3), 197–211.
Saunders, M., Lewis, P., and Thornhill, A. (2019). Study methods for business students. Pearson Education Limited. Harlow, United Kingdom. Eighth Edition.
Schaufeli, W. B., Salanova, M., González-Romá, V., & Bakker, A. B. (2002). The measurement of engagement and burnout: A two sample confirmatory factor analytic approach. Journal of Happiness Studies, 3, 71-92.
Sekaran, U., and Bougie, R. (2016). Research methods for business: A skill building approach. John Wiley and Sons. Seventh edition.
Sharma, A., & Nambudiri, R. (2020). Work engagement, job crafting and innovativeness in the Indian IT industry. Personnel Review, 49(7), 1381-1397.
Simães, C., Rodrigues, J., Gonçalves, A. M., Faria, S., and Gomes, A. R. (2021). Work–family conflicts, cognitive appraisal, and burnout: Testing the mediation effect with structural equation modelling. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 91(4), 1349-1368.
Soares, M. E., & Mosquera, P. (2019). Fostering work engagement: The role of the psychological contract. Journal of Business Research, 101, 469-476.
Stone, M. (1974). Cross?validatory choice and assessment of statistical predictions. Journal of the royal statistical society: Series B (Methodological), 36(2), 111-133.
Sumari, M., Baharudin, D. F., Khalid, N. M., Ibrahim, N. H., & Ahmed Tharbe, I. H. (2020). Family functioning in a collectivist culture of Malaysia: A qualitative study. The Family Journal, 28(4), 396-402.
Tensay, A. T., and Singh, M. (2020). The nexus between HRM, employee engagement and organizational performance of federal public service organizations in Ethiopia. Heliyon, 6(6), e04094.
Terry, D. L., and Woo, M. J. (2021). Burnout, job satisfaction, and work-family conflict among rural medical providers. Psychology, Health and Medicine, 26(2), 196-203.
Tomietto, M., Paro, E., Sartori, R., Maricchio, R., Clarizia, L., De Lucia, P., ... & PN Nursing Group. (2019). Work engagement and perceived work ability: an evidence?based model to enhance nurses’ well?being. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 75(9), 1933-1942.
UCSI Poll Research Centre. (2023). 89% Malaysians Are Concerned with The Cost of Living | UCSI Poll Research Centre. UCSI Poll Research Centre. Retrieved on July 9, 2023 from: https://www.ucsipoll.org.my/poll-finding/89-malaysians-are-concerned-the-cost-living
Vickovic, S. G., & Morrow, W. J. (2020). Examining the influence of work–family conflict on job stress, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment among correctional officers. Criminal Justice Review, 45(1), 5-25.
Vyas, L., and Butakhieo, N. (2021). The impact of working from home during COVID-19 on work and life domains: an exploratory study on Hong Kong. Policy Design and Practice, 4(1), 59-76.
Waizenegger, L., McKenna, B., Cai, W., and Bendz, T. (2020). An affordance perspective of team collaboration and enforced working from home during COVID-19. European Journal of Information Systems, 29(4), 429-442.
Wang, Y., Gao, Y., & Xun, Y. (2021). Work engagement and associated factors among dental nurses in China. BMC Oral Health, 21(1), 1-9.
Werbel, J., & Walter, M. H. (2002). Changing views of work and family roles: A symbiotic perspective. Human Resource Management Review, 12(3), 293-298.
Wu, T. J., Yuan, K. S., Yen, D. C., and Xu, T. (2019). Building up resources in the relationship between work–family conflict and burnout among firefighters: moderators of guanxi and emotion regulation strategies. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 28(3), 430-441.
Yang, F., Fei, Y., Guo, L., Bai, X., & Li, X. (2023). Job crafting intervention for job burnout and work engagement among young construction project management practitioners in China. Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management. https://doi.org/10.1108/ECAM-10-2022-0935.
Yang, Z., Qi, S., Zeng, L., Han, X., and Pan, Y. (2021). Work-family conflict and primary and secondary school principals’ work engagement: a moderated mediation model. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 596385.
Yucel, I., ?irin, M. S., & Ba?, M. (2021). The mediating effect of work engagement on the relationship between work–family conflict and turnover intention and moderated mediating role of supervisor support during global pandemic. International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, 72(3), 577-598.
Zainal, N. (2019). Moderating Effect of Emotional Intelligence and Social Support on the Relationship Between Work-Family Conflict, Psychological Well-Being and Job Performance [Doctoral thesis, Universiti Putra Malaysia]. Universiti Putra Malaysia Etheses.
Zheng, J., Gou, X., Li, H., Xia, N., & Wu, G. (2021). Linking work–family conflict and burnout from the emotional resource perspective for construction professionals. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, 14(5), 1093-1115.

Lim, P., Wang, G., & Hua, C. K. (2025). The Impact of Work–Family Conflict on Work Engagement among Services Sector Employees in Klang Valley, Malaysia. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 15(5), 370–391.

Copyright: © 2025 The Author(s)
Published by HRMARS (www.hrmars.com)
This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this license may be seen at: http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode