Long commutes linked to mental health stress, Quebec study finds
Posted October 15, 2025 7:13 am.
Last Updated October 15, 2025 8:01 am.
Getting to work may be doing more damage to your mental health than you think — and in some cases, taking public transit could be making it worse.
A new study led by Annie Barreck, a Montreal researcher and research assistant for the Observatory on Health and Well-Being at Work, has found that longer commutes and certain modes of transportation are strongly linked to increased stress, work-family conflict, and symptoms of psychological distress.
“We analyzed the effect or the association between the time it takes for people to commute to work and also their different modes of transportation,” said Barreck, who completed her PhD at the Université de Montréal. “And if those were associated with either less or more work-family conflicts, which in turn can be associated with more mental health problems.”
The study used a national database of more than 1,800 workers across 65 different workplaces, collected between 2019 and 2020.
Even short commutes take a toll
Barreck said even relatively short daily trips — as little as 20 minutes — can begin to have an impact.
“Twenty minutes to go to work is an extra 20 minutes to come back,” she explained. “That’s 40 minutes per day. Multiply this by the time that you do it in the week, and that’s the amount of time that you don’t have for the other activities of your life.”
She added that the more time spent commuting, the less time workers have for family, social, and leisure activities — and the more likely they are to experience symptoms like anxiety, frustration, or headaches.
Driving may be better than transit — mentally, at least
One of the more unexpected findings was that, from a mental health perspective, driving to work may actually be less harmful than commuting by public transit or even walking or biking.
“In my study, we found out that it’s the opposite actually when we look into work and family conflicts,” said Barreck. “It seems that public transportation brings actually more stress to the individuals than the car.”
That goes against many earlier studies and public health advice that promote active or green commuting as healthier and less stressful, but Barreck argues that it depends on how we look at the issue.
“When we look at the commuting with that lens — how people are able to manage their work and family responsibilities — public transportation seems to add stress,” she said.
Why public transit can be harder on parents
Barreck said that for many workers, especially parents or caregivers, public transit doesn’t make it easier to transition between work and home life.
“Public transport does not facilitate the transition between home and work and from work to home for workers,” she said.
For example, she noted that a single worker living and working in Montreal likely experiences a very different commute from a parent with young children who has to drop them off at daycare or school before heading to work.
“How do they integrate their transport using public transportation while doing all this?” she said. “That’s why I’m saying the transition can be more complicated, more difficult.”
And because work-family conflict is a known driver of psychological distress, Barreck said the link is clear.
What needs to change?
Barreck said that while improvements to public transportation would help — such as making it more reliable, flexible, and predictable — the real change needs to come from workplaces.
“I believe that there are changes or policies that we can implement in workplaces,” she said. “If employees have flexible work arrangements, this might be helpful. If they have the possibility to work remotely, even if it’s not five days a week, if it’s just once or twice a week, it gives them more time for themselves and less time during the commute.”
She also encouraged employers to offer more work-family policies, and to train managers to be more aware of mobility and family-related stress among employees.
But she said this isn’t just a workplace issue — it’s a broader societal problem.
“I believe we’re facing a bigger problem — a society problem — with mental health issues, issues with commuting,” she said. “We know that in the last years, the commuting patterns have changed. The length of the commuting is getting bigger and bigger.”
Finding a sustainable solution
Barreck said the findings point to a difficult balance. While governments and environmental advocates encourage people to switch to greener transportation, they also need to consider the human cost.
“If we want individuals to switch to greener modes of transportation, I think that we need to find solutions for them,” she said. “So that they choose those public transportation [options], and that at the same time, they don’t have mental health issues related to their commute.”
She hopes to see better coordination between public transit authorities and employers to create solutions that work for both people and the planet.
