Too much stress: The average American has 60 bad days a year, study finds

NEW YORK — Bad days are as much an American pastime as baseball and apple pie, a new study finds.

Researchers at Freeletics, a personal fitness and nutrition app, commissioned a poll of nearly 2,000 working Americans about how they dealt with stress, hoping to learn more about what constituted a “bad day.”

Angry woman with smoke coming from ears
A new survey finds that Americans have about 60 bad days each year. Work and lack of sleep were found to be the two most frequent contributors to putting a damper on one’s day.

Respondents, on average, indicated that they had 60 bad days a year, with 80% of these 24-hour periods being made at least partially unpleasant by work-related stress.

However, sleep — or a lack thereof — was found to be the largest source of misery, accounting for 67 percent of an individual’s dissatisfaction on any given day.

Illness, financial worries, cancelled plans, and feeling unclean or disheveled also had the ability to ruin someone’s day, the researchers found. In fact, bad hair days were fairly prominent responses. One in four respondents indicated that frustration over uncooperative hair puts a damper on their day. Similarly, another quarter of respondents admitted that having no hot water for their morning shower left them in a day-long bad mood.

Meanwhile, a comparatively small percentage of respondents (8%) said that their day could feel wrecked by their favorite sports team losing a game.

Negative feelings, no matter how long they persist, can result in unhealthy behaviors, the researchers noted.

Half of respondents said that they were more likely to eat unhealthy foods after a tough day, and 34 percent said that they were more likely to drink alcohol.

According to the researchers, exercise may be the best way to deal with stress, as it provides both mental and physical benefits.

Workout frequency was positively correlated with one’s ability to cope with stress, the researchers added.

“These findings make a lot of sense, as working out after a tough day can be a very effective stress reliever, especially because it boosts those all-important endorphin levels,” explains John-Francis Kennedy, a personal trainer at Freeletics.

The numbers don’t lie: 95 percent of those surveyed said that a stressful day could be made less difficult by spending some time at the gym. Half of the respondents indicated that working out gives them more energy at the office, and 44% say exercise simply makes them feel more motivated.

Nevertheless, only a fifth of respondents said they had a gym membership, largely due to cost.

Life is complicated, and bad days are inevitable, but as this study shows, many Americans may be having the blues too often.

Comments

  1. “The numbers don’t lie: 95 percent of those surveyed said that a stressful day could be made less difficult by spending some time at the gym.”
    Nothing in this report about the percentage of those surveyed who said that a stressful day could be made less difficult by spending more time having secks. Seems like it might help.
    Just wonderin’.

  2. Notice that “leftists” never demand open borders, ‘diversity or mass immigration into any non white population anywhere.

    Why is that? What is their real goal?

    Thats why we talk about Anti White.
    Thats why we talk about White Geno cide

  3. “Researchers at Freeletics, a personal fitness and nutrition app……………….”

    “According to the researchers, exercise may be the best way to deal with stress, as it provides both mental and physical benefits.”

    I am shocked that a study by a personal fitness app found that exercise is the best way to deal with stress. A similar study by Ben n Jerry’s found that eating ice cream was the best way to deal with stress.

  4. Well… It is down from 365 days a year just a hundred years ago. Just ask yer Dust Bowl relatives: Wimpy is as wimpy does (I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today). “Stress” is so absolutely relative SMH. So is the idea that we should have a stress-free life? Well, just take out 50 years worth of college loans and camp out in the safe spaces. I hear they have playdough there. As a child I learned that if you eat a gram of playdough everyday, and bite yer fingernails to the bone, pretty soon comes graduation day… Whoa Mama! REALLY REAL LIFE! Dang. In the end, it is all just sideways lessons to teach us how to take our last breath. You learn it or you don’t.

  5. Where the hell are they getting this? I have about 3 or 4 bad days a year. The rest are glorious!

    1. For one, millions of snowflakes during the November 2017 election night!

      Oh, and probably for every day the following month!

  6. 60 days a year is about 5 days per month. They should do another study and find out if the males “bad days” coincide with the females, uhh … bad 5 days.

    1. FIRST question off my lips when I get to heaven: ” LORD, when you made woman, WHAT were you THINKING?”

      1. God, MY God, the God of Abraham, Issac and Jacob is NOT a woman, not sure what god YOU worship

      2. Oh, you worship the same god the muslims worship. They don’t respect their women much either. Interesting.

  7. LOL, then I must be ABOVE average, as almost EVERY day is a bad day, having to deal with the public.

  8. Wow! I can honestly say that I have had only 1 or 2 bad days my entire life. That was when my mother passed. I guess it is all ones perspective.


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