CASTELLON DE LA PLANA, Spain, April 5 (UPI) -- About 8 percent of employees devote more than 12 hours per day to their employer to escape from personal problems, researchers in Spain say.
Lead author Mario Del Libano of the Jaume I University in Castellon de la Plana in Spain says spending more than 50 hours per week working could indicate work addiction.
Del Libano and colleagues confirmed the usefulness of Dutch Work Addiction Scale, a new scale for measuring addiction to work.
Work addiction is characterized by extreme work activity with people working outside working hours, at weekends and holidays, inability to delegate, disproportionate involvement with work and focusing on work to the detriment of their lives.
In addition, workaholics can also end up taking illegal substances to help them work harder and longer, the researchers say.
"People are only workaholics if, on top of working excessively, they work compulsively in order to reduce anxiety and the feelings of guilt that they get when they're not working," Del Libano says in a statement.
The findings are published in the journal Psicothema.
