ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Public Health
Sec. Occupational Health and Safety
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1593957
This article is part of the Research TopicWorld Mental Health Day: Mental Health in the WorkplaceView all 20 articles
Exploring the Association Between Loneliness, Work Environment, and Depressive Symptoms: Evidence from Young Korean Workers in the Seoul Metropolitan Area
Provisionally accepted
- 1Hanyang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea
- 2Gachon University, Seongnam, Republic of Korea
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Background: Mental health in the workplace is an emerging public health concern, particularly for young workers who may experience challenges that contribute to psychological distress. This study examined the associations between loneliness, work environment, and depressive symptoms among young workers in Seoul, South Korea.A cross-sectional survey was conducted among young workers in Seoul to assess workplace conditions, job satisfaction, workplace bullying, and depressive symptoms. Negative binomial regression analysis was used to evaluate the associations between selected workplace factors, including job-major alignment, commute time, workplace bullying, job satisfaction, and mental health outcomes.Results: A negative association was found between job satisfaction and depressive symptoms, and a positive association was found between workplace bullying and depressive symptoms. Job-major alignment and commute time were not significantly related to depressive symptoms. The findings also highlighted a meaningful relationship between workplace social connections and loneliness among young workers.These results suggest that workplace conditions, such as job satisfaction and social climate, may be important factors in understanding depressive symptoms among younger working populations. Given that the data were limited to young workers in Seoul, future research should adopt a longitudinal design and conduct comparative studies across different regions and countries to gain a more comprehensive understanding of workplace mental health.
Keywords: Workplace mental health, Job Satisfaction, workplace bullying, depressive symptoms, Loneliness, Young workers
Received: 14 Mar 2025; Accepted: 13 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Lee and Kim. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Chulwoo Kim, Gachon University, Seongnam, Republic of Korea
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