Why Working from Home is More Stressful Than Working from An Office

The recent trend of accessing emails and completing work projects at home is gaining much popularity among corporate workers. Though the benefits of staying in your pajamas and working while watching TV sounds interesting, it may actually have a harmful effect on the health, reveals a new study.

A study by Professor Gail Kinman, an occupational health psychologist from the University of Bedfordshire and the British Psychological Association analyzed the effects of various employment practices like teleworking, working from home, flexible hours, part-time contracts, and unpaid time off by linking these to patterns of stress.

‘Flexible hours can make employees ill because they find it harder to switch off from their work. It also keeps stress hormones persistently high.’

He found that people who access things like work emails from home or regularly carry out work tasks in the home environment had increased stress and it also increases every time someone performs a work task.

Kilman stated, "If you keep picking at work, worrying about it, your systems never really go down to baseline so you don't recover properly. You might sleep, but you don't sleep properly, the effectiveness of your immune system reduces."

The study also showed that working away from the office or part-time can create an �always on' culture that keeps stress hormones persistently high. It also emphasizes a need for work-life balance.

"Work has become more intense as new technology enables, and even forces, people to work faster, do more, and multi-task," said Kinman.

Source: Medindia