Workplace social support shapes how people experience pressure, cooperation and psychological safety. In the EU28 in 2015, 71% of workers said colleagues helped and supported them always or most of the time, compared with 58% who said the same about managers. Later EU27 evidence from April–May 2022 shows that 58% of workers would feel comfortable discussing mental health with a manager, while 38% said their workplace offered counselling or psychological support.
Table of contents
- How often colleagues provide support
- How often managers provide support
- Gaps by occupation, sector and hours
- Adverse behaviour and workplace relationships
- Communication and psychological safety
- Access to support by workplace size
- Support, working conditions and wellbeing outcomes
How often colleagues provide support
The Sixth European Working Conditions Survey: Overview report measured workplace support across the EU28 in 2015. It found that 71% of workers said colleagues helped and supported them always or most of the time. About 11% said they never or rarely received support from colleagues.
The longer-term comparison in that Eurofound report places the 2015 result in context. The share reporting always-or-most-of-the-time colleague support was three percentage points above the 2005 level and one percentage point below the 2010 level. The share saying they never or rarely received colleague support was 15% in 2005, compared with about 11% in 2015.
Age and gender differences were also visible among workers under 35. In 2015, 77% of women in this age group reported always-or-most-of-the-time colleague support, compared with 73% of men. These figures describe reported support in the EU28 at that measurement point; they do not establish why the difference occurred.
Colleague support was therefore common, but not universal. The 2015 results include both a large majority receiving regular help and a meaningful minority rarely or never receiving it. That distinction matters for community at work: a workplace can look broadly connected in an average while still leaving particular groups with limited day-to-day support.
How often managers provide support
Manager support was reported less often than colleague support in the same EU28 survey. In 2015, 58% of workers said they received support from managers always or most of the time, while 19% said they never or rarely received it, according to the Eurofound overview report.
The manager-support measure changed only modestly over the periods reported. The always-or-most-of-the-time share was two percentage points higher than in 2005 and two percentage points lower than in 2010. This pattern differs from a simple assumption that support necessarily rises steadily over time: the reported level in 2015 sat between the two earlier comparison points.
Age differences were present as well. Among EU28 workers under 35, 63% reported receiving support from managers in 2015. Among workers aged 50 and over, the figure was 56%. These are survey percentages for the specified age groups and year, rather than forecasts about current workplaces.
| EU28 workplace support measure | 2015 result | Comparison detail |
|---|---|---|
| Colleagues helped always or most of the time | 71% | 3 points above 2005; 1 point below 2010 |
| Managers provided support always or most of the time | 58% | 2 points above 2005; 2 points below 2010 |
| Rarely or never received colleague support | About 11% | 15% in 2005 |
| Rarely or never received manager support | 19% | EU28, 2015 |
The comparison shows a consistent gap between peer and manager support in the 2015 EU28 results. It does not mean that managers are the only source of help, but it does show that formal supervisory relationships were less likely than colleague relationships to be reported as consistently supportive.
Gaps by occupation, sector and hours
Reported colleague support varied by occupation and sector in the EU28 in 2015. The Eurofound survey report found that 21% of workers in elementary occupations rarely or never received colleague support. The corresponding figure for agricultural workers was 20%.
Sector-level results show a broad spread in the share reporting colleague support. The health sector recorded 79%. Education, construction and public administration each recorded 74%. Transport recorded 61%, while agriculture recorded 63%.
These figures use different forms of the same underlying idea: the occupation results identify workers who rarely or never received support, while the sector figures report the share reporting colleague support. They should be read as the source presents them, without converting one measure into the other or assuming that sector averages describe every workplace within a sector.
Working hours were another dividing line. In 2015, 13% of part-time workers in the EU28 reported never or rarely receiving colleague support, compared with 10% of full-time workers. The difference is a reported gap between work arrangements, not evidence that hours alone caused the experience.
Taken together, the 2015 data suggest that workplace connection was unevenly distributed. Health, education, construction and public administration had higher reported colleague-support shares than transport and agriculture, while elementary and agricultural workers had relatively high shares reporting rare or absent support. Part-time workers also reported rare or absent colleague support more often than full-time workers.
Adverse behaviour and workplace relationships
Supportive relationships can be considered alongside harmful social experiences. In the EU28 in 2015, 12% of workers reported verbal abuse at work during the month before the survey, according to the Sixth European Working Conditions Survey. During that same reference period, 6% reported humiliating behaviour, 4% reported threats and 2% reported unwanted sexual attention.
For the longer reference period of the previous 12 months, 2% reported physical violence at work, 1% reported sexual harassment and 5% reported bullying or harassment. The different time windows matter: the month-before-survey figures should not be treated as interchangeable with the previous-12-month figures.
Service and sales workers reported several adverse experiences at higher levels than the EU28 overall figures. During the month before the 2015 survey, 16% reported verbal abuse and 4% reported unwanted sexual attention. During the previous 12 months, 2% reported sexual harassment, 5% reported physical violence and around 6% reported bullying or harassment.
Employment status also mattered in the reported data. One or more adverse social behaviours were reported by 10% of self-employed workers and 17% of employees in the EU28 in 2015. These figures identify reported exposure to at least one listed behaviour; they do not indicate the number of incidents per person.
Communication and psychological safety
The Flash Eurobarometer – OSH Pulse provides a later EU27 snapshot from April–May 2022. It found that 26% of workers reported poor communication or cooperation within their organisation as a psychosocial risk factor.
The same survey asked whether workers would feel comfortable speaking to a manager or supervisor about their mental health. Across the EU27, 58% agreed. Education level was associated with a difference in reported comfort: 53% of workers who completed education by age 15 agreed, compared with 59% of workers who stayed in education longer.
Comfort discussing mental health does not necessarily mean workers would disclose a condition. In Italy, 63% of workers agreed that disclosing a mental-health condition would negatively affect their career. The corresponding figures were 66% in Cyprus, 66% in Greece and 68% in France. These are country-specific EU27 survey results from April–May 2022, not estimates for every country or every subsequent year.
The results point to two separate dimensions of support access: whether communication and cooperation function well, and whether workers believe personal disclosure is safe. A manager may be available to speak with, while workers can still fear career consequences from disclosure. The survey figures measure those perceptions separately.
Access to support by workplace size
Workplace support can also mean structured services and information. In the EU27 in April–May 2022, 38% of workers said their workplace offered access to counselling or psychological support. Forty-two percent said their workplace offered information or training on wellbeing and coping with stress, and 43% said their workplace consulted workers about stressful aspects of work, according to the OSH Pulse report.
Access to counselling varied widely across countries: the reported range ran from 24% in Cyprus and Portugal to 74% in Finland. This range describes the survey results for those countries and period; it is not a European forecast.
Information activities also differed by company size. Across the EU27, 59% of workers said workplace awareness-raising or other activities were available to provide safety and health information. The figure was 76% for workers in companies with more than 250 employees, compared with 39% for workers in micro-companies with fewer than 10 employees.
| EU27 support or information measure | Reported share | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Access to counselling or psychological support | 38% | April–May 2022 |
| Information or training on wellbeing and coping with stress | 42% | April–May 2022 |
| Workers consulted about stressful aspects of work | 43% | April–May 2022 |
| Safety-and-health information activities available | 59% | April–May 2022 |
| Safety-and-health information activities, companies over 250 employees | 76% | April–May 2022 |
| Safety-and-health information activities, micro-companies under 10 employees | 39% | April–May 2022 |
The company-size difference is substantial in the reported availability of safety-and-health information activities. It suggests that access to organised support and communication may depend partly on the scale of the workplace, although these figures alone do not identify the organisational reasons.
Support, working conditions and wellbeing outcomes
U.S. health-worker data show how workplace relationships and conditions were associated with wellbeing outcomes. The CDC Vital Signs report, based on the Quality of Worklife Survey, reported 3.3 days of poor mental health in the previous 30 days in 2018 and 4.5 days in 2022. The share who felt burnout very often rose from 11.6% in 2018 to 19.0% in 2022.
In 2022, health workers who trusted management had 0.40 times the odds of burnout of those who did not. Those whose supervisors provided help had 0.26 times the odds of burnout of those whose supervisors did not. Workers with enough time to complete their work had 0.33 times the odds of burnout of those without enough time, while those who said workplace conditions supported productivity had 0.38 times the odds of burnout of those who did not.
These are associations expressed as odds ratios, not proof that one workplace factor caused or prevented burnout. They are also specific to U.S. health workers and the 2022 survey comparison.
The CDC report also linked harassment with several mental-health outcomes among U.S. health workers in 2022. Harassment was associated with 5.01 times the odds of anxiety symptoms, 3.38 times the odds of depression symptoms and 5.83 times the odds of burnout.
Across the European and U.S. evidence, the measures cover different populations, dates and outcomes. Together, they show that workplace social support includes everyday colleague help, manager support, communication, safe access to conversations, formal services and protection from harmful behaviour. Each statistic remains tied to its own geography, measurement period and survey definition.