Many companies enforce a 'dress down Friday' policy as an incentive for office workers to let their hair down at the end of the week.
But according to new research, for many the opposite effect is achieved as people get stressed about what to wear on their day 'off' from the office uniform.
Deadlines and budgets aside, one in ten workers cite dress down Friday as the most stressful time of the week and 15 percent become so stressed by what to wear they even call in sick.
Nearly a quarter have even been late due to indecision and one in five have returned home to change after leaving the house.
Careful planning is essential with one third of us beginning to plan our Friday outfit on Thursday lunchtime with one percent beginning the decision-making process as early as Monday evening.
And it seems that 'dressing down' requires a lot more effort than meets the eye with a staggering 43 percent spending more time on hair, makeup and grooming on a Friday compared to any other day of the working week, with 24 percent choosing the day to experiment with their look.
This experimentation, which adds an average of fifteen minutes to an individual’s morning routine, has also had an effect on our pockets as 50 percent claim to spend more on their Friday fashion than they do for the remainder of the week.
And it seems that the office is increasingly becoming a catwalk with high heels over four inches, party dresses and mini skirts all seen as acceptable Friday attire, especially for the 50 percent of those surveyed who claim to go straight out from work every week.
With 15 percent of men claiming to have pulled a colleague aside to tell them about a Friday fashion faux pas, and one in five women admitting to whispering at the water cooler behind a colleague’s back, it’s not surprising that more than one in ten of us have enlisted the advice of a professional stylist over what to wear to work.
The study, carried out by leading online fashion retailer Very.co.uk, found that regionally, those in Birmingham and the West Midlands are the least confident in choosing their outfits alone, with 53 percent of respondents asking partners, 38 percent asking family members and nearly a quarter asking complete strangers for style advice.
(Read by Emily Cheng. Emily Cheng is a journalist at the China Daily Website.)
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(Agencies)
許多公司都推行「周五便裝日」政策，鼓勵員工在周末放鬆一下。
然而，一項新調查顯示，這一措施對許多人而言卻起到了反效果，人們因為便裝日這天不知道要穿什麼衣服好而感到焦慮。
除了截止期限日和財政預算日，十分之一的職員都認為周五是一周中壓力最大的一天，15%的職員甚至因為不知道穿什麼衣服好而壓力倍增，乾脆請病假不來上班。
近四分之一的職員由於在挑選衣服時猶豫不決而遲到，五分之一的人在離家後又回家換衣服。
精心的計劃至關重要，三分之一的人在周四午飯時就開始考慮周五要穿的衣服，1%的人甚至早在周一晚上就開始做決定了。
而且，「休閒裝扮」似乎比你表面上所看到的要花更多的功夫。相比一周中的其他工作日，周五這天多達43%的人會花更多時間用於做髮型、化妝和修飾，24%的人選擇在這一天嘗試新形象。
這種嘗試平均要多花一個人15分鐘的清晨時間，而且對我們的腰包也會產生影響。50%的人稱自己在周五著裝上所花的錢比一周中其他所有日子的著裝花費還要多。
辦公室似乎逐漸變成了四英尺以上高跟鞋、派對禮服和超短裙的走秀T臺，這些裝扮都被視為可接受的周五著裝，特別是對於那些自稱每周末一下班就出去玩的50%的被調查者來說。
15%的男性稱自己曾經把同事拉到一邊，和他們談論不得體的周五著裝行為。五分之一的女性承認曾在水冷卻器邊背著某個同事議論其著裝。因此，有超過十分之一的人曾向專業造型師徵求過關於上班著裝的意見也就不足為奇了。
這一研究是由領先時裝網絡零售商Very.co.uk開展的。研究發現，英國人在選擇服裝上的自信程度還存在地區差異，其中伯明罕和西米德蘭茲郡的人們對於著裝選擇最沒自信，53%的被調查者會徵求伴侶的意見，38%的人詢問家人意見，還有近四分之一的人向陌生人徵求著裝建議。
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（中國日報網英語點津 陳丹妮 編輯：Julie ）