Open-plan office designs have grown in prominence, intended to improve overall employees happiness and productivity.
A recent study conducted in Sweden “The relation between office type and workplace conflict: A gender and noise perspective,” published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology, looked at the data from 5,229 employees.
Analyzing the psychological impact of different office layouts on employees, the researchers found differing dynamics based on gender. For instance, they observed women were more likely to report having conflict with their colleagues while working in a combi-office.
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Analysis of the data found that 16.2% of women who worked in combi-offices reported having ongoing conflicts with colleagues versus 14.7% of women in general, a small but noticeable increase.
Women in combi-offices were also slightly more likely than men to say that the setups were noisy and distracting (56.3% versus 50.5%).
Read the full story, which was published by Benefits Canada‘s companion site, Canadian Business.