Study Says Workplace is the Place for Talk

By Thomas Hargrove and Guido H. Stemple III

Scripps Howard News Service

In the San Francisco Examiner

August 24, 1997


Americans do most of their socializing and communicating at the job rather than with folks at home, with friends or neighbors, according to a study of 1,009 adults conduted by Scripps Howard News Service and Ohio State University.

"Women were the center of the neightbohood structure. Now there are fewer women at home, more at the workplace, where they interact both professionaly and socially with colleages and clients."

The study found that the amount of non-work relater communication in America varies dramatically. South and Midwest significantly hold significantly more such conversations that does the Northwest.

Americans with full time jobs report that more than 2/3rds of their conversations occur at work. They hold an average of 13 significant discussions a day, defined as face to face converstions that are more than just a simple hello. Fewer than half of the significant conversations occurred outside the workplace.