Women who work after office hours are more prone to depression

Well, not everyone enjoys slogging for long hours at the office every day but a recent study has pointed out how working long hours can impact men and women differently. The study, conducted by researchers from the University College London, suggests female employees who slog after office hours on weekdays are more prone to having ‘depressive symptoms’. Here are all the details of this research

The study indicated how not maintaining a good work-life balance can wreak havoc on your mental health. As per the findings, women who work for 55 hours or more every week and those who work on almost every weekend are more prone to developing depressive symptoms in comparison to those who work part time or full time but for fewer hours.

The researchers from the University College London studied around 11,215 men and 12,188 women and designed a special questionnaire to study their psychological distress. This study was published in the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health.

The researchers defined 35-40 hours as ‘standard’ working week and found that male participants tended to work for longer hours than females. Interestingly, almost half of these men slogged longer than the defined standard working hours and there was no major increase in their depressive symptoms even if they worked for the ‘longest’ hours.

About two-third of the men and half of the women participants worked on weekends and it had an impact on both the genders. However, men with ‘poor psycho-social working conditions’ (like being unhappy with salary) were more prone to being depressed than others.

Another research done by the University College London concluded that married women with children were less likely to work for very long hours and men in a similar situation tended to work for longer hours. Does this indicate women are more likely to be burdened with the household responsibilities?

The researchers shared how the work done by women outside their office is generally not taken into consideration. This includes unpaid housework, caring for other family members and other domestic duties. They even referred to the previous studies done on this subject that mentioned how women worked more than men on an average every day because of unequal work distribution and linked it to their poorer physical health.

(All images used here are representational)