The word boundary is controlled by the syntax table. You can change the syntax of _ to be part of the word using modify-syntax.
Do C-h f modify-syntax RET to get help on the defun. This however may affect other features that depend on syntax table.

  "Joe Mama" <spartanquarters@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:mailman.209.1068653145.2005.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org...
  Hello:

  Given a variable like "employee_name" is there a way to make emacs treat this as one word.  Would be nice when doing commands like "forward-word" which treats employee_name as two words.  

  Thanks in advance.


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