However, rather than risk a caution/being fired, many of us slyly tap away at our keyboard pretending to check emails and catch up on our to-do list when, in fact, we're scrolling through Arket and Net-A-Porter's latest collections and popping on Instagram to check what Blake Lively has recently been up to.
However, the habit of surfing the web and opening up numerous clothing, social media, and news tabs on your laptop is a practice that experts are now calling 'cyberloafing' and sadly, it's not as fun as it sounds. In essence, 'cyberloafing' is a term used to describe the way an employee uses the internet at work for personal use while they should be working, and research suggests it's seriously bad for your career.
A new study published in The Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace explains that 'cyberloafing' is associated with range of 'dark' personality traits. In the study, participants shared their cyber use to assess how internet consumption affected their behaviour and the results found that checking the news and browsing online retailers were the greatest hindrances to employee's productivity and career trajectory. The report also suggests that those who 'cyberloaf' are more likely to be manipulative, socially exploitative, and narcissistic.
Career coach Evelyn Cotter explains to Stylist magazine that 'cyberloafing' is 'an attempt to replace something that we're lacking, but we never get that 'filled-up' feeling'.
Read the full article on Elle here.
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