It may not come as a surprise that working long hours has been linked to a higher likelihood of depression, but you may be surprised to hear that new research suggests that this is more of an issue for women. The excerpt below from ScienceDaily offers some insight into a new study. If you’re a woman in the greater Cleveland area working more than 55 hours per week, and you recognize yourself in this article, we hope you’ll reach out.
Women who work more than 55 hours a week are at a higher risk of depression but this is not the case for men, according to a new UCL-led study with Queen Mary University of London.
The study of over 20,000 adults, published today in the BMJ’s Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, found that after taking age, income, health and job characteristics into account, women who worked extra-long hours had 7.3% more depressive symptoms than women working a standard 35-40 week. Weekend working was linked to a higher risk of depression among both sexes.
Women who worked for all or most weekends had 4.6% more depressive symptoms on average compared to women working only weekdays. Men who worked all or most weekends had 3.4% more depressive symptoms than men working only weekdays.
“This is an observational study, so although we cannot establish the exact causes, we do know many women face the additional burden of doing a larger share of domestic labour than men, leading to extensive total work hours, added time pressures and overwhelming responsibilities,” explained Gill Weston (UCL Institute of Epidemiology and Health Care), PhD candidate and lead author of the study.