This study investigated the role of spirituality in working Christian mothers coping with tension due to interrole conflict, in light of past research suggesting a relationship between spirituality and coping constructs. Interviews with 32 mothers working in Christian academia were examined using a post hoc analysis of content informed by principles of grounded theory (Strauss & Corbin, 1998). Several aspects of a sense of calling emerged that appeared related to the experience of interrole tension: a sense of certitude, collaboration, and a context of purpose. It was theorized that for these women, the sanctification of work, through experiencing a sense of calling, was related to coping with interrole tension.

This study applies the construct of sanctification to working mothers' experiences of work. Women (N = 200) who had completed a master's, doctoral, or professional degree and were employed with at least one child under the age of 18 years residing in the home, completed an online survey investigating their sanctification of work, intrinsic religiosity, religious commitment, positive and negative affect, interrole conflict, and satisfaction with work. The results indicated that greater levels of sanctification of work show incremental validity over intrinsic religiosity and religious commitment in predicting higher positive affect, lower interrole conflict, and higher satisfaction with work. Implications of these results for religious working mothers are explored.

We investigated whether names in common promote altruistic behaviour, predicting that this would be especially so for relatively uncommon names, for surnames (which are better kinship cues than ® rst names), and among women (who, although less willing than men to help strangers, according to prior research, are also the primary`kin keepers' ). We solicited help from 2960 email addressees, with the request ostensibly coming from a same-sex person sharing both, either, or neither of the addressee's ® rst and last names. As anticipated, addressees were most likely to respond helpfully when senders shared both their names (12.3%) and least likely when they shared neither (2.0%), and this was especially true for relatively uncommon names. A shared surname was more effective than a shared ® rst name only if it was relatively uncommon. Women were substantially more likely to reply than men. These results indicate that names elicit altruism because they function as salient cues of kinship.