周五便装日成走秀日 职员表示压力山大

Mini-skirts have become a norm on dress down Friday as many people gear up for the night ahead and hit the town straight after work.

Many companies enforce a 'dress down Friday' policy as an incentive for office workers to let their hair down at the end of the week.

But according to new research, for many the opposite effect is achieved as people get stressed about what to wear on their day 'off' from the office uniform.

Deadlines and budgets aside, one in ten workers cite dress down Friday as the most stressful time of the week and 15 percent become so stressed by what to wear they even call in sick.

Nearly a quarter have even been late due to indecision and one in five have returned home to change after leaving the house.

Careful planning is essential with one third of us beginning to plan our Friday outfit on Thursday lunchtime with one percent beginning the decision-making process as early as Monday evening.

And it seems that 'dressing down' requires a lot more effort than meets the eye with a staggering 43 percent spending more time on hair, makeup and grooming on a Friday compared to any other day of the working week, with 24 percent choosing the day to experiment with their look.

This experimentation, which adds an average of fifteen minutes to an individual’s morning routine, has also had an effect on our pockets as 50 percent claim to spend more on their Friday fashion than they do for the remainder of the week.

And it seems that the office is increasingly becoming a catwalk with high heels over four inches, party dresses and mini skirts all seen as acceptable Friday attire, especially for the 50 percent of those surveyed who claim to go straight out from work every week.

With 15 percent of men claiming to have pulled a colleague aside to tell them about a Friday fashion faux pas, and one in five women admitting to whispering at the water cooler behind a colleague’s back, it’s not surprising that more than one in ten of us have enlisted the advice of a professional stylist over what to wear to work.

The study, carried out by leading online fashion retailer Very.co.uk, found that regionally, those in Birmingham and the West Midlands are the least confident in choosing their outfits alone, with 53 percent of respondents asking partners, 38 percent asking family members and nearly a quarter asking complete strangers for style advice.

(Read by Emily Cheng. Emily Cheng is a journalist at the China Daily Website.)

双语资讯

(Agencies)

许多公司都推行“周五便装日”政策，鼓励员工在周末放松一下。

然而，一项新调查显示，这一措施对许多人而言却起到了反效果，人们因为便装日这天不知道要穿什么衣服好而感到焦虑。

除了截止期限日和财政预算日，十分之一的职员都认为周五是一周中压力最大的一天，15%的职员甚至因为不知道穿什么衣服好而压力倍增，干脆请病假不来上班。

近四分之一的职员由于在挑选衣服时犹豫不决而迟到，五分之一的人在离家后又回家换衣服。

精心的计划至关重要，三分之一的人在周四午饭时就开始考虑周五要穿的衣服，1%的人甚至早在周一晚上就开始做决定了。

而且，“休闲装扮”似乎比你表面上所看到的要花更多的功夫。相比一周中的其他工作日，周五这天多达43%的人会花更多时间用于做发型、化妆和修饰，24%的人选择在这一天尝试新形象。

这种尝试平均要多花一个人15分钟的清晨时间，而且对我们的腰包也会产生影响。50%的人称自己在周五着装上所花的钱比一周中其他所有日子的着装花费还要多。

办公室似乎逐渐变成了四英尺以上高跟鞋、派对礼服和超短裙的走秀T台，这些装扮都被视为可接受的周五着装，特别是对于那些自称每周末一下班就出去玩的50%的被调查者来说。

15%的男性称自己曾经把同事拉到一边，和他们谈论不得体的周五着装行为。五分之一的女性承认曾在水冷却器边背着某个同事议论其着装。因此，有超过十分之一的人曾向专业造型师征求过关于上班着装的意见也就不足为奇了。

这一研究是由领先时装网络零售商Very.co.uk开展的。研究发现，英国人在选择服装上的自信程度还存在地区差异，其中伯明翰和西米德兰兹郡的人们对于着装选择最没自信，53%的被调查者会征求伴侣的意见，38%的人询问家人意见，还有近四分之一的人向陌生人征求着装建议。

Vocabulary:

dress down: 穿着随意，穿便装，穿休闲的衣服

let one's hair down: 放松

meet the eye: 呈现在眼前

faux pas:

enlist: 谋取……的帮助