Job

Study: 4-day week improves employee health and satisfaction

The study involved 2,896 employees from 141 organisations in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Ireland and the United States

23 July 2025

2' min read

Employees work better and get less tired when they work four days a week, according to a six-month study involving thousands of people.

The research, led by Boston College associate professor of sociology Wen Fan and economics professor Juliet Schor, also found that changes in work patterns led to greater job satisfaction and a reduction in sleep problems.

The study, published in Nature Human Behaviour, was designed to test the effects of a four-day working week for equal pay. It was based on a six-month study involving 2,896 employees from 141 organisations in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Ireland and the United States. The researchers compared work and health indicators - including burnout, job satisfaction and mental and physical health - before and after the intervention using survey data. An additional 285 employees from 12 companies did not participate in the study and served as controls.

The research found that switching to a four-day working week resulted in an effective reduction in average working time of about five hours per week. However, those who reduced their working week by eight hours or more achieved greater benefits, attributed by the authors to fewer sleep problems and less fatigue.

"The results indicate that the four-day, income-preserving working week is an effective organisational intervention to improve the well-being of workers," said the researchers.

Lavoro: Pd presenta ddl su part-time. Schlein: "Non sia trappola sfruttamento"

The limits of research

The researchers noted, however, that the study was limited in that companies volunteered to participate and the sample consisted of companies relatively from English-speaking countries. Larger government-sponsored studies could help provide a clearer picture, they said.

Although several factors may explain the effect, one possibility is "an increased intrinsic motivation to work", says the study. "Unfortunately, we cannot assess this aspect due to limited data."

However, the researchers found that the study showed that reduced working hours were associated with improvements in employee well-being, a trend not observed in control companies. "Among the results, the magnitude is greatest for the two work-related measures - burnout and job satisfaction - followed by mental health, with the smallest changes reported in physical health. This trend is to be expected, as changes in physical health may take time to manifest themselves," said the authors.

"Despite its limitations, this study has important implications for understanding the future of work, with the four-day working week likely to be a key component. Scientific advances from this work will influence the development of interventions that promote better organisation of paid work and the well-being of workers. This task has become increasingly important with the rapid expansion of new digital, automation and general artificial intelligence technologies,' the researchers say.