Experiences of married working women about the effects of work on the sexual life: A qualitative study

Context and objective. - Due to the relationship between sexual life and working life in women, a study was conducted to explain the experiences of married working women about the effects of work on their sex lives. Methods. - The information of study was obtained through interviews with 25 women working in Iran. The sampling method was purposive and data analysis was performed using qualitative content analysis and the reliability and validity of the findings were considered. Results. - From the interviews, 204 primary inferential codes, 1 main category and 4 subsets were extracted. The main category included "Job, an effective factor in sexual life''. This main category includes four sub-categories: "career-psychological achievements that promote sexual & marital satisfaction'', "occupational side effects that reduce sexual & marital satisfaction'', "sexual violence in the workplace'' and "gender view towards working woman in the workplace''. Conclusion. - Explaining the experiences of working women showed that job satisfaction and job security are career- psychological achievements that promote sexual and marital satisfaction. Job exhaustion, the nature of the job, job Conflicts and the negative impact of income differences with the husband can be occupational side effects that reduces sexual and marital satisfaction. Tangible and intangible sexual violence in the workplace seems to be among the factors that affect the sexual life of working women. And the existence of a gender view towards working women in the workplace, the existence of discrimination between men and women, and attention to the femininity of working women by men in the workplace, were among the occupational harassment cases that could affect the sexual life. (C) 2021 Published by Elsevier Masson SAS on behalf of Sexologies.