Is working from home good for mental health and well-being? Associations between work location, self-rated mental health, life satisfaction, and life and work stress among Canadian adults

Congraulations to HALOites JP Chaput, Mark Tremblay, Rachel Colley and Justin Lang on their recent publication “Is working from home good for mental health and well-being? Associations between work location, self-rated mental health, life satisfaction, and life and work stress among Canadian adults” published in Mental Health & Prevention! The abstract and citation are below.

Abstract

Methods

This cross-sectional and nationally-representative study used self-reported data from the 2022 Canadian Community Health Survey (n = 24,614 individuals aged 18 years and older). Work location was categorized into three groups: working outside the home at a fixed location; working outside the home without a fixed location; and working from home. Logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine the associations between work location and the outcome measures, with adjustments for relevant covariates.

Results

Overall, 62.9 %, 12.2 % and 24.9 % of Canadian adults reported working at a fixed location outside the home, outside the home with no fixed location, and at home, respectively. Individuals working from home reported a higher level of education and many were in the business/finance/administration field (30.4 %) or in natural and applied sciences (22.4 %). After adjustment for covariates, work location was not significantly associated with self-rated mental health, life satisfaction, life stress or work stress.

Conclusions

Findings from this study suggest that the best work location for mental health and well-being is not necessarily linked to the specific physical place where it is conducted. Future research will need to better characterize the specific working conditions and identify possible causal mechanisms.