In the spring of 2020, Associate Professor Shawn Roll from the University of Southern California and his research collaborators spent two years developing the next generation of smart workstations to optimize the work efficiency of office employees. The team has diverse but complementary expertise in occupational therapy, ergonomics, built environment and adaptive technology.
Therefore, when the pandemic brought almost all office desk employees home—usually logging in from sofas, spare bedrooms, and kitchen tables, and the equipment and space were not ideal—researchers quickly realized an unprecedented opportunity to enrich Their research. real time.
"Last spring we all worked from home," recalled Rohr, who was the director of the Occupational Science Doctorate Program at the University of Southern California in Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy. "We said,'Why don't we conduct a survey to see how this affects people?' This shift to working from home is a perfect storm for all our areas of interest."
Researchers developed and deployed an extensive online survey, and received nearly 1,000 complete responses from late April to early June 2020. Over the next year or so, they reported their findings in a series of published papers, revealing the widespread impact of work, focusing on people’s physical and mental health, work efficiency and performance, and transforming them into their daily lives and time. use.
New physical and mental health issues; no productivity loss; 90 minutes more work at the workstation every day
About two-thirds (64.8%) of survey respondents reported new physical health problems, nearly three-quarters (73.6%) reported new mental health problems, and most (55.1%) said they had experienced at least two A new mental health problem.
Rolle said: "Although the pandemic has clearly disrupted our lives in a stressful way, we are still a bit shocked by the high incidence of new health problems in the workforce working from home in the early days of the pandemic."
Another surprising result is that working from home does not significantly reduce productivity. However, while overall productivity remains the same, people do report that they spend an average of 90 minutes on their workstations each day.
"This doesn't necessarily mean they work longer, but people actually work longer on their computers or workstations," Roll said. "It challenges the assumption that if you work from home, your productivity will decrease, which is a long-term obstacle for employers. We understand that we can work from home without losing overall productivity; however, It’s complicated, and everyone’s situation is unique."
In order to better meet these unique needs at home, 60% of respondents said they changed their daily work schedule.
"Office workers report that working from home has some benefits," said Burçin Becerik-Gerber, professor and chair of the Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Southern California's Viterbi School of Engineering. "They report that working from home provides them with flexibility by adjusting working hours and reducing commuting time, but on the other hand, the boundaries between work and life are merged and blurred."
Redefining the office space With the sudden adjustment to the home, it is now twice the size of the office. What Becerik-Gerber is most interested in is how changes in the physical environment affect work and health.
"Until March 2020, most of the work is done in the formal office," she said. "Then one day, we found out that we had a temporary office at home."
Professor Burçin Becerik-Gerber, Dean of the Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Southern California Viterbi School of Engineering (Photo/provided by the University of Southern California Viterbi)
As a mother of three children, Becerik-Gerber, like many parents, was suddenly busy with work and distance education. The whole family occupies the same small space. Approximately half of the survey respondents said they shared their home work space with others.
"We let the children play in the background, and we have to constantly negotiate who will work in which room-all of a sudden, my children are now my colleagues," she said. "Others have pets, parents, and other issues that need to be taken care of, so all these different situations are very interesting for us to study support or lack of support for productivity and healthy physical, social and organizational perspectives."
The survey also found that one-third of respondents had a dedicated office to work from home, but fewer people noticed that their physical workstations have ideal settings. Workers whose employers provided proper equipment—not only technology, but also ergonomic chairs, tables, screens, and monitors—also reported better productivity and health.
Becerik-Gerber said: “Employers must provide employees with a suitable environment at home to keep them healthy and efficient.” “So this is not just a formal office, but an extension of a more'mobile' office.”
Although distraction in the work space is associated with decreased happiness, those who engage in more social interaction with colleagues (albeit through online platforms) report that they are more productive and healthier.
"The difference with Burçin is that I live alone and have a complete house," Roll said. "But it also brings me different questions: how do I still communicate and interact with people?"
As Becerik-Gerber added, “We learned that these occasional conversations—coffee breaks, collisions in the corridors—are very important to our happiness and productivity.”
Influence of new technologies, environmental factors, and socioeconomic status
Research Assistant Professor Gale Lucas (photo/provided by USC Viterbi)
The survey identified many other factors that affect the well-being of workers.
"We are interested in studying the variability of adopting new technologies, but there is no variability," said Gail Lucas, a research assistant professor in the Viterbi Department of Computer Science and the Institute of Innovation and Technology at the University of Southern California. "In the process of transitioning to working from home, everyone has adopted new technology, which is a very productive effect."
Dissatisfaction with noise levels—which seems inevitable when the work space is shared with other adults or children—is a powerful predictor of fatigue and fatigue. Researchers also found that when people are dissatisfied with noise and indoor air quality at the same time, symptoms related to stress and worry are more frequent.
"This made us think that we need to customize our workstations to improve health and well-being and help increase productivity," said Viterbi PhD student Mohamad Awada, who studies building informatics and human-computer interaction.
However, revenue is not so easy to customize. Respondents with an annual income of less than US$100,000 generally report more health problems than those with higher incomes, and new mental health conditions are the most common among respondents with an income of less than US$50,000. Socioeconomic status is also related to satisfaction with the work space, because workers with higher incomes report being more satisfied with the environment at home.
"People with higher incomes can usually afford better housing, so the quality of the environment is better," Arvada explained.
Work in progress As many industries continue to work remotely or switch to hybrid models indefinitely, employers are looking for ways to promote employee health and productivity at home. But what this environment should look like depends on each employee.
"Working from home may affect some people differently than others, so we need to look at individual policies," Rohr said. "This is the way to build the social and physical environment, and the technology needed to support it."
Facts have proved that this ability to customize work organization across time and space is very beneficial to employees.
"The ability to personalize your schedule to meet your needs, your family needs, and your personal life is a major component, as is customizing your space," Yoko Fukumura MA '19, a professional science doctoral student at the University of Southern California, PhD '24 said Chen.
Since the solutions aimed at improving health and well-being are very personal, the team next needs to examine what is important and what is not on a personal level. But it turns out that this is particularly challenging because there is no one-size-fits-all recommendation.
"As an individual, how do you understand your health and how you participate in work in order to monitor and manage your own happiness and productivity?" Rohr asked. "This is where we are stuck; we don't know what the best advice is, except for the old alternatives, such as getting an ergonomic chair or table."
Unfortunately, only 11% of respondents said they understand how their workstations affect health or productivity. Roll said that encouraging self-reflection and generating insights, such as determining when and where is best for work, and paying attention to one's physical and mental health, may provide important clues.
"If you feel anxious or stressed, or musculoskeletal pain, really try to pay attention, then track these symptoms and try to determine the relationship between them."
Roll said that this process is not easy to complete intuitively. Therefore, no matter what day of the workplace, it is vital that employees have access to resources and services that can support their health at work. This is where occupational therapists like Roll can play a key role in the coming months and years.
"Occupational therapists can work with you, including through virtual consultations, so that we can observe your work space to determine individualized techniques and solutions," Roll said. "The pandemic is incredibly disruptive, but we know there are ways to better support the health and satisfaction of employees throughout the workday."
"Working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic: Impact on productivity and work experience of office workers" can be found on doi.org/10.3233/WOR-210301; "Negotiating time and space when working from home: During COVID-19 "Experience" is available on doi.org/10.1177/15394492211033830; "The impact of working from home on the physical and mental health of office workstation users during the COVID-19 pandemic" can be found on doi.org/10.1097/JOM.0000000000002097; "On COVID -19 When working from home during the pandemic, the relationship between home indoor environmental quality factors and worker health" can be found on doi.org/10.1115/1.4052822 [full text article access may require login].
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