英男性工作热情不如女性

 　　Men in Britain are less engaged in their work compared with women until the final years of employment when they get a late surge of enthusiasm, according to a survey.

　　Men start off their careers at a much lower level of job satisfaction than women, only catching¹ up shortly before they give up the commute² and pick up their pension.

　　"One line of theory which I would like to look at more is that men have the Protestant ethic³ of going out to work to make money and not to enjoy it," Simon Easton, co-author of the report, told Reuters.

　　Women's engagement starts high, before dipping mid-career and then bouncing back, again shortly before retirement⁴.

　　The research carried out by Easton and Darren Van Laar, of the University of Portsmouth's psychology⁵ department and spin-out company QoWL, did not look into why there were changes in enthusiasm or explain the differences between the attitudes of men and women.

　　But the pair said the research should encourage employers to hang on to older, more experienced workers who are generally more "engaged."It comes at a time when the British government is looking to speed up plans to raise retirement ages in a bid to rein⁶ in a record peacetime budget deficit⁷.

　　Van Laar also said the findings suggested employers could increase employee retention⁸, get higher productivity and reduce absenteeism if they found ways to increase young men's engagement and satisfaction in the workplace.

Employers could also try to better understand why women lose engagement at work mid-career, he said.

　　The research quizzed 4,000 people at nine large educational organizations including academics, managers and cleaners as part of wider research into the quality of working life.

1 catching   

adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住

参考例句：

• There are those who think eczema is catching.有人就是认为湿疹会传染。
• Enthusiasm is very catching.热情非常富有感染力。

2 commute   

vi.乘车上下班；vt.减(刑)；折合；n.上下班交通

参考例句：

• I spend much less time on my commute to work now.我现在工作的往返时间要节省好多。
• Most office workers commute from the suburbs.很多公司的职员都是从郊外来上班的。

3 ethic   

n.道德标准，行为准则

参考例句：

• They instilled the work ethic into their children.他们在孩子们的心中注入了职业道德的理念。
• The connotation of education ethic is rooted in human nature's mobility.教育伦理的内涵根源于人本性的变动性。

4 retirement   

n.退休，退职

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• I have to put everything away for my retirement.我必须把一切都积蓄起来以便退休后用。

5 psychology   

n.心理，心理学，心理状态

参考例句：

• She has a background in child psychology.她受过儿童心理学的教育。
• He studied philosophy and psychology at Cambridge.他在剑桥大学学习哲学和心理学。

6 rein   

n.疆绳，统治，支配；vt.以僵绳控制，统治

参考例句：

• The horse answered to the slightest pull on the rein.只要缰绳轻轻一拉,马就作出反应。
• He never drew rein for a moment till he reached the river.他一刻不停地一直跑到河边。

7 deficit   

n.亏空，亏损；赤字，逆差

参考例句：

• The directors have reported a deficit of 2.5 million dollars.董事们报告赤字为250万美元。
• We have a great deficit this year.我们今年有很大亏损。

8 retention   

n.保留，保持，保持力，记忆力

参考例句：

• They advocate the retention of our nuclear power plants.他们主张保留我们的核电厂。
• His retention of energy at this hour is really surprising.人们惊叹他在这个时候还能保持如此旺盛的精力。