Chapter 3: The Case of the Mondays: Examining Workplace Rumors about Stress

From movies like Office Space shown above to songs (i.e., “Manic Monday” by The Bangles) and comic strips (Garfield said “I hate Mondays” as early as 1978), Westernized popular culture is filled with references to the “dreaded Monday.” Monday has earned a notorious reputation for being the most stressful day of the work week and/or a day plagued with generalized feelings of negative mood and poor performance (i.e., the “Monday morning blues”), primarily because it is the first day of the work week. American journalist, H. Allen Smith commented, “On a Monday morning, I am dedicated to the proposition that all men are jerks.” But is there something inherently stressful about Mondays that differentiates it from other days?