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Associate Article

 13 May 2008 13:23 BST

High stress jobs doubling the chances of depression

One of the big issues surrounding high-stress jobs recently has been the announcement that holding one of these positions could double your chances of suffering from depression.

According to a survey of young professionals, high-stress jobs – such as, at the top, head chefs and construction workers – are much more likely to induce serious anxiety or depression. This is for a number of reasons, often combined: deadlines; working in an environment where, if you fail, everyone sees; serious physical labour in extreme conditions, and sometimes without encouragement or support.

At the other end of the scale are the jobs without deadlines, where rewards are frequent, there are flexible hours and no fear of failure in front of your peers. The single most contributory factor towards stress and symptomatic anxiety and depression is the pressure of time. Not having enough of it to do what your job demands. This is a particularly prevalent issue in today’s workplace. Most people would agree that there are too many things to do and not enough time to do them in. People working too much overtime just to cope with their allotted workload; eating lunch at their desk – diminishing time for their social and family lives. Britain has the longest working hours in Europe, and we are beginning to reap the bitter fruit. These latest findings run contrary to previous research, which reckoned that a lack on control was the most likely contributor to stress in the workplace.

It seems that positions of higher authority are also more likely to induce stress. Perhaps it is because there is less of a support network and more responsibility, but from recruitment onwards, the parity between stress and increasing responsibility is evident. Despite such evidence of a contemporary increase in stress-related illness as induced by work, there is very little being done regarding suitable treatment. There is, perhaps, a stigma attached to mental illness that is not being confronted publically by companies and the media. Still, anxiety and depression are often seen as signs of weakness rather than treatable illnesses. Remarkably, people will only go to their doctor in extreme circumstances, often choosing to suffer in silence. In Britain, only 20% of sufferers receive medication*.

When conducting your job search, whether that be via online job search agents (such as Fish4 Jobs) or through more traditional means, be careful not to punch above your weight when it comes to stress levels. There is a growing urgency around understanding just how much the pressures of our jobs affect our mental health. The whole culture of how and why we prioritise our job – from the competitive job search to retaining high powered and pressured positions – needs reassessing if we are to quell our increasing sufferance at their hands.

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* Professor Terri Moffitt, Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College LondonEnd of story

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