One-Day Work Week Meets Employment-Related Mental Health Needs

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Employment benefits on mental health could be achieved from the job of just one day a week, study indicates.

Unemployment has earlier been associated with poorer mental health, with specialists implying that part of the reason might be that job provides advantages including time structure, social contacts, and sense of identity.

But there was a key question left unanswered. “Nobody seemed to have said how much of it you need to get those benefits,” said Brendan Burchell, a co-author of the research from the University of Cambridge.

Now researchers say they have found a positive impact on mental health on moving from unemployment to a paid job, and that this boost is gained from working up to eight hours, or about one day, a week. There is no extra mental health benefit from working longer than this.

Writing in the Social Science and Medicine journal, Burchell and collaborators explain how they came to their findings by evaluating responses to a UK study undertaken annually from 2009, focusing on data from over 71,000 people aged 16 to 64 who gave answers for two years or more.

(The Guardian)

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