Is digital stress contagious?

Digital stress in the professional context leads to burnout among employees and causes millions of dollars of damage to companies. As a trigger, previous research has so far exclusively investigated technological characteristics (e.g. complex operation of the technology) and concentrated on individual persons and their respective stress behavior. Typically, however, people act and work in a socially embedded manner, so the question arises as to whether digital stress can also be contagious.

The aim of this project is to understand the nature and pathways of a possible “contagion” of stress-induced emotions between employees in such detail that the additional intersubjective digital stress potential becomes apparent. Empirical work should provide information on how digital stress spreads interpersonally, who is particularly affected by it, and ultimately which countermeasures can be developed.