Would you ever crush on your female or male co-worker? And then took steps to ask for a date or an outing with him or her. If so, you are not alone.
According to a search engine by Simply Hired, the work spouse is defined as someone you have a strong relationship with, who is the gender you are charmed, and with who you have a bond that looks like that of a married couple. Often, a colleague you have a strong friendship with, who is not the gender you're attracted to, is still called a friend.
The survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management SHRM revealed that 24 workers have had a work wife. Earlier this year, a Simply Hired survey indicated that about half of women and 41% of men reportedly had a work spouse at some point in their careers.
According to the SHRM survey, a whopping 50% of employees with work spouses admitted romantic attraction to this person.
In the Simply Hired survey, 84% of men and 61% of women reported romantic attraction to their spouses.
In the survey conducted in February 2022, data from the US's Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) suggests workplace romance increased during the times when Covid-19 struck. One in three Americans responded that they have started or maintained a romantic relationship with a colleague during the pandemic - a 6% rise since the pre-pandemic years of 2019 and 2018.
Considering that some data shows people nowadays spend more time at work than with their friends, experts believe there are high risks that work spouse's relationships are likely to be strengthened instead of ending in scandal, as many think conversely.
This is illustrated by the data gathered in the US that showed that people within the age range between 20 to 50 years spend nearly four times as much time as they do with their friends.
It is not a surprise that several people are interested in their colleagues in their work because work has been taking up more and more of our time," says Vanessa Bohns, the organisational behaviour associate professor at Cornell University in the USA, who also studied the dynamics of workplace romance and work spouses.
Hollywood Mogul Harvey Weinstein, whose case is undergoing, was found guilty of two counts of sexual offences on an accusation of forcing his female junior subordinates (Ashley Jud and actresses Rose McGowan ) at multiple moments to massage him and watch him naked alongside advances of pledges of promotions in exchange of sexual favours.
Weinstein issued an apology acknowledging that he has caused a lot of pain but denies the allegations of rape.
Meanwhile, whether the accused acknowledges the pain he caused or not, his scenario is a few among the hundreds of those that were not leaked to the public.
Social psychologists have gone forward to find the labels we assign to things; the words we use shape how we perceive things. And due to these, several spouses who suspect their partners to be involved in similar activities end up doing so.
Office romance for work spouses can still blossom outside the physical place.
According to the article published by BBC Article "The Inevitability of the Office Romance" by Bryan Lufkin, despite the physical interactions that once rekindled office romances became impossible during a lockdown, colleagues still created means to connect.
It was found that during the pandemic, opportunities for people to meet, particularly in public places such as restaurants and bars, were limited, and work spouses used online meetings as an excellent process to find a potential mate.
Tameny Inc., a company that offers bridal services, surveyed the spring of 2021 on 162 young people who are just starting their careers. It found out 45.7 per cent of respondents desired office dating,' up by 7.5 points from a similar survey conducted four years ago.
One of the top reasons for seeking workplace romances was mainly because there were no opportunities to meet people and within the company where they meet regularly was a potential place.