Mondays are often unpopular among employees due to the challenge of re-engaging with work after time spent relaxing and attending to personal matters. While this aversion to Mondays has been widely studied and discussed, there has been little research conducted on the topic. This article (Völker et al., 2024) examines whether the struggle to re-engage on Mondays affects the entire workweek and to what extent this can be attributed to weekend sleep quality.
WEEKEND SLEEP
The researchers conducted a weekly diary study spanning nine weeks. Participants completed surveys on their sleep quality, catch-up sleep (i.e. sleeping more on the weekends), exhaustion, and reattachment to work. The results revealed that better sleep quality over the weekend enhanced employees’ reattachment to work on Monday, which subsequently reduced exhaustion throughout the workweek. In contrast, relying on catch-up sleep over the weekend hindered reattachment to work on Monday, leading to greater exhaustion during the week.
PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS
This study found that mentally reconnecting to work on Monday can significantly impact employees throughout the rest of the work week. As such, the authors suggest that organizations use the following strategies to help employees re-engage with their jobs:
- Shift employees to remote work, where feasible. This allows employees to align their schedules with their circadian rhythms, reducing sleep deficits, minimizing reliance on weekend catch-up sleep, and enhancing overall well-being.
- Provide education on the importance of weekend sleep and the role of circadian rhythms. Addressing misconceptions about sleep can prevent ineffective strategies, such as over-reliance on catch-up sleep. Ultimately, this may promote healthier habits.
Jette Völker, Wiegelmann, M., Theresa, & Sonnentag, S. (2024). It is Monday again: Weekend sleep differentially relates to the workweek via reattachment on Monday. Journal of Organizational Behavior.
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