Skip to main content
University of Oxford Saïd Business School 25

Top menu

  • Oxford Answers

Main navigation

Main menu
  • Research
    Research
    • Research overview
      Research overview
      • Research seminars
      • Research strategy
    • Research areas
      Research areas
      • Accounting
      • Finance
      • Health Care
      • Impact
      • Innovation
      • International Business
      • Management Science
      • Marketing
      • Major Programme Management
      • Organisation Studies
      • Professional Service Firms
      • Strategy
      • Technology and Operations Management
    • Centres and initiatives
      Centres and initiatives
      • Creative Destruction Lab Oxford
      • Entrepreneurship Centre
      • Oxford Future of Finance and Technology Initiative
      • Oxford Future of Marketing Initiative
      • Oxford Future of Real Estate Initiative
      • Oxford Initiative on AI×SDGs
      • Oxford Initiative on Rethinking Performance
      • Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation
      • Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation
      • Private Equity Institute
      • Responsible Business
      • Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship
    • Networks
      Networks
      • CABDyN
      • Oxford Institute of Retail Management
  • Oxford experience
    Oxford experience
    • Coming to Oxford
      Coming to Oxford
      • College experience
      • Living costs
      • Partners and families
      • Visas
    • Scholarships and funding
    • Life at Oxford
      Life at Oxford
      • Learning at Oxford
      • Exploring Oxford
      • Activities, clubs and groups
      • Oxford Union
    • Blogs
    • Career development
      Career development
      • Your career journey
      • Our expertise
    • Life after Oxford
      Life after Oxford
      • Alumni
      • Elumni
  • Events
    Events
    • Events listing
    • Past events
    • Future of Business
    • Oxford Smart Space
  • About us
    About us
    • The School
      The School
      • Our history
      • Our community
      • Diversity and inclusion
      • Climate emergency
      • Rankings, achievements and accreditation
      • School Board and Global Leadership Council
      • Global Leadership Centre
      • Covid-19 information
    • Support us
      Support us
      • Fundraising priorities
      • Donate online
      • How to give
      • Corporate partnerships
      • Community giving
      • Impact and recognition
    • Our people
      Our people
      • Faculty
      • Associate Fellows
      • Academic visitors
      • Recruit our graduates
      • Work for us
    • News
      News
      • Media coverage
      • Media relations contacts
    • Venue hire
      Venue hire
      • Park End Street
      • Egrove Park
      • B&B accommodation at Egrove Park
      • Our services
  • Programmes
    Programmes
    • MBAs
      MBAs
      • MBA
      • 1+1 MBA
      • Executive MBA
    • Degrees
      Degrees
      • BA Economics and Management
      • DPhil Finance
      • DPhil Management
      • MSc Financial Economics
      • MSc Global Healthcare Leadership
      • MSc Law and Finance
      • MSc Major Programme Management
    • Executive Diplomas
      Executive Diplomas
      • Artificial Intelligence for Business
      • Financial Strategy
      • Global Business
      • Organisational Leadership
      • Strategy and Innovation
    • Executive Education
      Executive Education
      • On-campus open programmes
      • Online programmes
      • ​Custom programmes
    • Programme finder
  1. Home
  2. News
  3. Lonely U.K workers 43% less happy during pandemic
  1. Home
  2. News
  3. Lonely U.K workers 43% less happy during pandemic
""

Lonely U.K workers 43% less happy during pandemic

Sat, 20th March 2021

Published


Related news

  • Research

Associate Professor Jan-Emmanuel De Neve to present findings to House of Lords Covid-19 Committee on 23 March

  • Work and Well-being During Covid-19: Impact, Inequalities, Resilience, and Lessons for the Future of Work published today in World Happiness Report
  • Furloughed workers experienced decline in wellbeing, even when fully paid
  • Sense of belonging, flexibility and inclusion are key drivers of wellbeing, not pay

New research published in the World Happiness Report today has laid bare the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on workforce well-being. It finds that, amongst people who could not work due to furlough or redundancy, those that reported being lonely to begin with became 43% less happy than people who were not lonely.

Loneliness is also predictive of a slower pace of wellbeing recovery once the worker returns to their job. “Non-lonely respondents had recovered to 95 percent of their baseline life satisfaction five weeks later. Lonely respondents had still not reached this milestone eight weeks on,” explain the authors.

These findings were drawn from the UCL Social Study, which has documented changes in social behaviour and mental health in the U.K. since April 2020.

The authors also studied the wellbeing impact of the U.K’s furlough scheme, which initially provided 80% of workers’ wages while forbidding them to undertake work for their organisation.

Furloughed workers reported a drop in wellbeing compared to those remaining in work, even in instances in which they retained their full salary. Those on 80% pay experienced the more significant decline, with an average 10% drop in life satisfaction. Workers who lost their jobs reported an average 21% drop in life satisfaction.


Related news

  • Research

These findings point towards a ‘hybrid’ future of work, that strikes a balance between office life and working from home to maintain social connections while ensuring flexibility for workers.

Jan-Emmanuel De Neve

Associate Professor of Economics and Strategy

Despite the broad impact of Covid-19 on our wellbeing, the drivers of wellbeing at work have mostly stayed the same, but they are not what many business leaders would expect.

The authors find that a feeling of belonging, workplace flexibility and a sense of inclusion are more important to people than the contents of their paycheck. This finding was drawn from the largest ever survey of workplace wellbeing, which was conducted by Indeed.com exclusively for the World Happiness Report and surveyed over 4.5 million workers in the U.S.

Co-author Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, Associate Professor of Economics and Strategy at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford states: ‘My previous research showed how happy workers are 13% more productive. This paper proves that happiness is not driven by pay, and that the social connections and a sense of identity are more important. These findings point towards a ‘hybrid’ future of work, that strikes a balance between office life and working from home to maintain social connections while ensuring flexibility for workers, both of which turn out to be key drivers of workplace well-being.’

Image by Andrew Neel.

Footer menu

  • Contact us
  • Find us
  • Press
  • Jobs
  • Website policies
  • Alumni
  • Donate
  • Covid-19

Follow us

  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • WeChat
  • Blogs
  • Advance HE Opens in new tab
  • EFMD Equis accreditations Opens in new tab
  • Global Network for Advanced Management Opens in new tab

Website & Privacy Policies © Saïd Business School 2023 All rights reserved

Back to top