Everyone knows that workers are stressed out. But a new study reveals just how much that tension is seeping into their personal lives, harming everything from their sleep and phone habits to physical health.
Around 47% of employees say that work stress is hurting their mental well being, according to the recent State of Work-Life Wellness 2025 report from Wellhub, a corporate wellness platform. Overall, the vast majority of workers experience pressure during the workday, and many are carrying it home with them. With the exception of baby boomers, work stress is the most common cause of mental health decline for all other generations—around 54% of Gen Z, 49% of millennials, and 48% of Gen X say work is their top stressor.
“It’s very scary,” Lívia de Bastos Martini, CPO of Wellhub, tells Fortune. “The ability for this type of stress to multiply very fast is much higher than any others. Nothing’s more important from an HR executive standpoint.”
Impacted mental wellness among workers goes on to create a domino effect of problems in their personal lives. Around 55% say their degraded mental state is getting in the way of a good night’s sleep, according to the report. Meanwhile, about 27% of staffers say poor mental health affects their relationships, 22% report it plays into excessive or mindless eating, 22% think it’s worsening their digital media addiction, 20% believe it’s led to poorer work performance, and 7% say it’s steered them into substance abuse.
Bastos Martini says that many of these problems are reflective of employees coping with work stress by engaging in small pleasures—like endlessly scrolling through TikTok, or eating sugary and fatty foods to feel better.
“If you are feeling your mental health isn’t so good, it’s ‘Oh, let me get a snack. That makes me feel good,’” she says. “If you’re not feeling very well, sometimes you can’t sleep, or you sleep too much.”
Work stress and its subsequent mental health impact can trap workers in a vicious feedback loop of unhealthy decision making, which only hurts them more. CHROs are well aware by now of the importance of employee wellness, but there is a gap between what company leaders think they’re providing to their employees, and what those workers think about their own benefits. While 94% of CEOs believe they are doing enough to support mental well-being in the workplace, only 67% of workers agree, according to a different study released this year. A lack of awareness among workers about what benefits are actually available is likely contributing to the divide.
Bastos Martini recommends three steps for companies to ensure that their wellness benefits are effective, and actively improving the mental and physical well-being of staffers. Perks need to be comprehensive enough to support a wide range of employees, workers need to be aware of their benefits, and people leaders and colleagues should energize their peers to take advantage of them.
“Companies need to take action on this. Well-being is a virtuous cycle or a vicious cycle,” she says. “Otherwise, change doesn’t happen.”
Emma Burleigh
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Around the Table
A round-up of the most important HR headlines.
Meta fired more than 20 workers last week for misusing the company’s food credit system to buy household items like toothpaste instead of meals. Quartz
Striking Boeing workers held a huge rally at their union’s headquarters in Seattle demanding better wages, marking the second month of their protest against the company. NBC News
U.K. bankers may get some of their total compensation more quickly as regulators plan to end bonus rules that forced workers to wait more than five years for their full payout. Bloomberg
Watercooler
Everything you need to know from Fortune.
Honesty is the best policy. Jeff Bezos credits the success of big ideas like Amazon Prime to maintaining a “culture that supports truth-telling,” including using digital employee suggestion boxes. —Brian Solis
Slimming staffers. Britain is looking to supply weight-loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy to unemployed citizens in hopes that turning the tides on obesity will energize more people back into the workforce. —Orianna Rosa Royle
Staying afloat. Nearly all employees say that taking breaks during work helps boost productivity, but nearly half admit to skipping lunch at least once a week, in order to keep up with their daily tasks. —Brooke Seipel
