https://fortune.com/2023/02/02/remote-work-why-do-i-miss-commuting-psychological-detach-recovery-liminal-space-management-study/

In our recently published conceptual study, we argue that commutes are a source of “liminal space”—a time free of both home and work roles that provides an opportunity to recover from work and mentally switch gears to home.

During the shift to remote work, many people lost this built-in support for these important daily processes. Without the ability to mentally shift gears, people experience role blurring, which can lead to stress. Without mentally disengaging from work, people can experience burnout.

Remote work actually bad, come back to the office.

  • turgidanklebrace [none/use name]
    ·
    2 years ago

    So I followed up on a couple of the original studies citations for claims about the importance of the 'transition time'.

    One study is literally just about the infringement of work onto home life, and how it makes people unhappy. They have a claim that a 30 minute commute time is a ideal, they do not explain how this value was determined.

    The other citation was around the claim that commuters typically desire at least SOME commute time. Their supporting citation was a study that posed the preference question to people of whether they would prefer to maintain their current commute or teleport home.

    Turns out the only groups that on average enjoy their commutes are the people who walk/cycle, around 65-75%. Car and transit users opt to teleport 75% of the time.

    For 'commuters' in answer to why they prefer their commute, (they failed to properly group the responses by commuting category of course), desire for a liminal/transition space/time has so few responses it's lumped into the 'other' category. So out of an N of like 650 people, there's like 15 tops who support this fucking idea that people find commuting desirable for reasons of avoiding 'role blurring'. Which if you interrogate, is ACTUALLY people complaining about bosses infringing on their time off during the pandemic. Because when you're always reachable, you're always working.

    None of this is supported, all of it is stupid stupid stupid stupid. Fuck the authors of this stupid fucking study, fuck fortune magazine. Fuck you, fuck me.

    tldr: if you enjoy commuting it's actually because you're exercising. The desire for a 'liminal space' is actually people wishing their boss didn't expect them to reply to email off of work hours.