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Unfinished tasks cause the Sunday scaries
What the survey found
An October survey of 2,100 people by the job platform FlexJobs found the pattern. As workloads mount and job security ebbs, the scaries are getting worse.
Fixes workers try
The fixes that workers try all aim at shrinking that list before Sunday night. Some get their thoughts out on paper or into phone notes early on Sunday. Others set guardrails on work time: one woman bought an hourglass and uses it to stop herself from working longer than an hour on Sundays, and so far it is working for her.
Moving work earlier
A psychologist's suggestion moves the work earlier in the week instead: spend a little more time at work on Friday so the week is done and doesn't carry into the weekend. Getting to work a little earlier on Monday does the same job for people who want to catch up, rather than using Sunday for it.
Why do unfinished tasks nag at us?
In the 1920s, the psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik reported that people remembered interrupted tasks better than completed ones. The pattern became known as the Zeigarnik effect and suggested that an open task stays active in memory. Later attempts to reproduce the original finding have had mixed results. Still, researchers continue to study unfinished goals as a source of intrusive thoughts.
Why does writing tasks down help?
A 2011 study by Masicampo and Baumeister in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology tested what happens when people make a specific plan for an unfinished goal. Those who made a plan had fewer intrusive thoughts about the goal and did better on a later task than those who did not. The researchers' explanation was that a concrete plan tells the mind the goal is being handled, which frees attention. The effect appeared even though participants had not yet completed the goal.
Why is dread worse on Sunday night?
The body begins preparing for an expected demand before it arrives. A 2004 study led by Wolff Schlotz in Psychosomatic Medicine found that the cortisol rise after waking is larger on workdays than on weekends. The rise was also larger in people who reported heavier work overload. Cortisol is a hormone that helps mobilize energy for the day ahead.
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