What is it about?
Concerns are rising over the heavy workloads and long shifts faced by many employees currently in the work force. An increasing number of studies explore various aspects of employee energy management and recovery, often focused on recovery after the workday is over. However, the potential effects of recovery processes during the workday remain unclear. The review was conducted on 22 previously published studies within the last 30 years, all of which examined the potential benefits of taking micro-breaks from assigned tasks. Tasks varied between experiments and included work simulations, real work-related tasks, and non-work-related cognitive tests. Types of breaks varied as well, including physical breaks, relaxing activities, and more engaging activities, such as watching videos. Statistical analysis of the combined study results revealed an overall association between micro-breaks, higher levels of vigor, and lower fatigue in participants, suggesting that taking micro-breaks—discontinuing a task for periods of 10 minutes or less—may contribute to wellbeing. No overall association was found between micro-breaks and better performance on tasks. However, when taking a closer look at the data, the researchers did find that longer breaks tended to be linked to better performance, especially for creative or clerical tasks, but less so for more cognitively demanding tasks. These findings support micro-breaks as a potential strategy for boosting wellbeing in the workplace. However, when it comes to job performance, longer breaks may be needed for recovery from more cognitively demanding tasks. Future research could investigate longer breaks as well as address other remaining questions, such as optimal activities to engage in during a micro-break.
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Why is it important?
The automation and digitalization of work is a pressing issue nowadays, which is changing drastically how we work and how we unwind from it. We are also more connected to our work from anywhere and anytime due to our little computers in our pockets which are notifying us constantly of new emails or communications with clients. This creates a pressure to power through the tasks each day and to remain available. Clearly, it is a more demanding environment than ever before. Here enters the recovery of own resources, depleted throughout working, because recovery from work is a process which can lessen the demands imposed by working .
Perspectives
To take breaks when needed is not so simple as one might think. Actually, we are frequently not doing this, and for more than one reason. For example, the always on culture powered up by new technologies are creating the expectation to be responsive and available anytime and anywhere. We can feel guilty or pressured to continue working and not take a well-deserved break. But it's something that we can do here. We can create environments fostering autonomy in work tasks, and thus conducive for taking micro-breaks when needed. We can focus more on the quality of our work and not so much on to finish it as quickly as possible. And managers can encourage such environments where taking a short break to gaze out of the window for a couple of seconds do not mean being lazy and skipping work. As a practical recommendation, when feel like it, do not fret and take a step back for a minute from the task.
Irina Macsinga
West University of Timisoara
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: "Give me a break!" A systematic review and meta-analysis on the efficacy of micro-breaks for increasing well-being and performance, PLOS One, August 2022, PLOS,
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0272460.
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