Recommended ReadsNovember 22nd, 2018
The curious case of the missing workplace teaspoons
Teaspoons disappear faster from communal tearooms than tearooms linked with specific research programs in a research building — Megan Lim and co-authors (BMJ)
The Macfarlane Burnet Institute for Medical Research and Public Health, based in Melbourne, recently had their research project published in the prestigious BMJ (originally titled the British Medical Journal). The longitudinal study set out to answer the question plaguing workplaces worldwide: “Where have all the bloody teaspoons gone?”
Objectives: To determine the overall rate of loss of workplace teaspoons and whether attrition and displacement are correlated with the relative value of the teaspoons or type of tearoom.
Design: Longitudinal cohort study.
Setting: Research institute employing about 140 people.
Subjects: 70 discreetly numbered teaspoons placed in tearooms around the institute and observed weekly over five months.
Conclusions: The loss of workplace teaspoons was rapid, showing that their availability, and hence office culture in general, is constantly threatened.
Despite the whimsy, this is a perfectly carried-out (and peer-reviewed) longitudinal study. The Conversation offers a breakdown of how it constitutes good study design.
