2019 Workforce Attitudes Toward Behavioral Health – Ginger

behavioral health

Ginger’s 2019 Workforce Attitudes Toward Behavioral Health Report studies the experiences of more than 1,200 US employees with behavioral health. The term “behavioral health” will be used in this report to refer to both emotional and mental health.

Some main findings from this report include:

  • 83% of US employees regularly experience stress and 45% of employees under 40 experience stress daily. 48% of people admitted that they have cried at work due to stress. Almost 50% of surveyed employees claimed that they missed at least one workday per year because of behavioral health challenges.
  • Half of the surveyed employees report being more likely to seek help now than they were five years ago. This is one of the strongest patterns in the research and is consistent through industries, genders, age groups and locations.
  • 85% of employees agreed that behavioral health benefits are important to them when considering a new job.
  • Most people applied self-help or didn’t do anything to deal with stress, even though 81% of them claimed that stress affects their work.
  • A majority of surveyed employees think that their employer should care about their emotional and mental health.
  • The demand for virtual/online behavioral health services is nearly as high as the demand for in-person care. People who regularly use behavioural health benefits prefer to access these benefits via online, phone or chat formats that conveniently fit their schedules. If people can use their smartphones to access these benefits, they are more likely to utilize the benefits.
  • More than 30% of employees had to pay for behavioral health services as their employers didn’t cover it. Only 30% of people who don’t regularly use these benefits claimed that they didn’t utilise these because it was not necessary for them. The ease of access and affordable costs were ranked as the most important factor to motivate US employees to use behavioural health benefits.
  • 30% of people admitted that they had started a behavioural health program but didn’t finish it, especially younger employers when almost half of them report doing so.
  • 81% of surveyed workers said that they had difficulties accessing behavioral health services.

Ginger provides on-demand behavioral health assistance for organisations.

Full report here.