Your work stress may be increasing, as you attempt to "keep up with the Joneses' work" hours, a recent study reveals.

Various studies have tracked the increase in hours Americans are working; however, the study by Wayne Eastman, a professor at Rutgers — the State University of New Jersey — Graduate School of Management, reveals that the number of hours that people work is definitely influenced by how long their co-workers work.

Eastman's study took a look at whether work hours were "contagious" — that is, whether one worker puts in longer hours if other workers do. For example, is it an awareness that the person in the next office is putting in extra time making an employee do the same? And, are workers putting in longer hours because they're afraid of falling behind in the scramble for prominence in the company?

Eastman also analyzed whether there was a limit to this tendency, and whether the same trends hold true for men and women.

"Positional effect," or the tendency for people to adjust their work habits based on others' habits, plays a major role in the number of hours people work, Eastman found.

A large majority of respondents indicated they would indeed adjust their work hours according to how long others were working, compared with only about 25 percent who indicated they would work the same regardless of what others did, according to the study.

Of the majority, most indicated they would match or exceed other people's hours at lower levels. However, these competitive instincts were curtailed for many respondents when the number of hours other people worked began passing 50.

Specifically, if other people worked 30 hours, the average respondent would work 41. If other people worked 40 hours, the average respondent would work 56. But, when the others' number rose to 50, the respondents said they would put in only 50.5, and when the others worked 60, the respondents went only as high as 54.7, the study found.

Moreover, the positional effect is contributing to workplaces in which standard managerial hours are further away from women's preferences than from men's, according to Eastman, noting that women put up more resistance to the peer pressure than men did. The difference wasn't great, but in general the women fairly consistently said they would work two or three hours less per week than the men said, in response to each number that other people worked, said Eastman.

The reasons given were quite sensible, he indicated. Most respondents said they would feel funny working less than other people did, but beyond 50 hours a week they cited family time and "other things in life."

Address: Wayne Eastman, Rutgers' Graduate School of Management, 81 New Street, Newark, NJ 07102; (973) 353-1001, e-mail weastman@gsmack.rutgers.edu.