We are happy to announce the significant success achieved by the scientific article published in the journal PlosOne by the team formed by the researchers of the Faculty of Science and Psychology from UVT: Patricia Albulescu, Irina Macsinga, Andrei Rusu, Coralia Sulea, Alexandra Bodnaru and Bogdan Tulbure, an article published under the title : "Give me a break!" A systematic review and meta-analysis on the efficacy of micro-breaks for increasing well-being and performance".
The article signed by Albulescu, Macsinga, Rusu, Sulea, Bodnaru and Tulbure was published on Wednesday, August 31, 2022, in scientific journal PlosOne, and until now it has been taken up by over 20 publications - including CNN, Medical News Today, Science Daily, Menshealth, India Today, etc., but also by the prestigious publication The Guardian.
The article explores how breaks limited to less than 10 minutes in the work schedule promote well-being. The automation and digitization of work that we all experience these days, the permanent connection to information and data, anytime and anywhere, have changed the way we relate to work and put a lot of pressure on employees. One aspect, however, remains constant: we all seek to feel energized, energized at work, and perform. The study signed by Albulescu and his colleagues from UVT, Department of Psychology, started from this very question: What can people do, in individual actions, that are not stipulated in explicit rules of the organization, so that they are more energetic and productive at work?
The meta-analytic study thus investigated the specialized literature (22 experimental studies from 19 analyzed articles), showing that micro-breaks / mini-breaks (en: micro-breaks), i.e. those breaks lasting between 8 seconds and 10 minutes, which the employee voluntarily takes during work, when he feels the need, is beneficial for increasing the level of energy, vitality and, consequently, for persistence in the face of obstacles and investment of effort in subsequent tasks. Moreover, for certain types of tasks/activities, taking a mini-break is effective in terms of increasing performance (for routine and creative activities), while for others, such as cognitively demanding ones, taking a break of up to 10 minutes is not associated with better performance.
The Rector of the Western University of Timișoara, Marilen Gabriel Pirtea: "The European Education and Research Area is today a competitive one, in which research teams assert more and more positive ambitions to generate outstanding research results. When an article that publishes the research results of a Romanian team ends up being picked up immediately in dozens of publications, it is clear that the value and competitiveness of the research is superlative. I congratulate the UVT colleagues who make up the team that published the excellent article in the scientific journal PlosOne, a new significant testimony to the way UVT prioritizes the internationalization of research and competitiveness!"
