One in five US workers regularly attends after-work drinks with co-workers, where the most common mishaps¹ range from bad-mouthing another worker to kissing a colleague and drinking too much, according to a study released on Tuesday.
Most workers attend so-called happy hours to bond with colleagues, although 15 percent go to hear the latest office gossip and 13 percent go because they feel obligated, said the survey conducted for CareerBuilder.com, an online job site.

As to what happens when the after-work drinks flow, 16 percent reported bad-mouthing a colleague, 10 percent shared a secret about a colleague, 8 percent kissed a colleague and 8 percent said they drank too much and acted unprofessionally.

Five percent said they had shared a secret about the company, and 4 percent confessed to singing karaoke.

While 21 percent of those who attend say happy hours are good for networking, 85 percent said attending had not helped them get closer to someone higher up or get a better position.

An equal number of men and women said they attend happy hours with co-workers, with younger workers age 25 to 34 most likely and workers over 55 least likely to attend.

Overall, 21 percent of workers attend happy hours with co-workers and, of those, nearly a quarter go at least once a month.

The survey was conducted online by Harris Interactive² on behalf of CareerBuilder.com among 6,987 full-time³ employees between February 11 and March 13.

Harris Interactive said the results have a sampling error of plus or minus 1.2 percentage points.

据本周二发布的一项调查显示，美国有五分之一的员工会定期在下班后跟同事去喝几杯，每当这个时候，诸如讲同事坏话、亲吻某位同事、以及醉酒等糗事就要上演了。

这项为在线求职网站CareerBuilder.com所做的调查表示，虽然去参加所谓“欢乐时光”的人中有15%是去搜罗最新的办公室流言，13%是迫于无奈才去的，大多数员工去那里都是为了拉近同事关系。

在被问及下班后的欢饮时光都会做些什么的时候，有16%的人表示会讲同事坏话，10%的人会散播某位同事的秘密，8%的人会亲吻某位同事，还有8%的人表示他们会喝醉酒，做出反常的举动。

有5%的人说他们会传播一些跟公司有关的秘密，另有4%的人表示会唱卡拉OK。

参加欢乐时光的人当中有21%表示此类活动有助于人际关系，85%的人则表示参加此类活动并不能让他们跟某些高层人士更加接近，也不会对他们升职有什么帮助。

男性和女性跟同事共赴欢乐时光的人数是一样的，年龄在25到34岁之间的年轻员工是最有可能参加此类活动的人群，而55岁以上的员工参加的可能性是最低的。

总的来说，有21%的员工下班后会与同事共赴欢乐时光，而他们当中有近四分之一的人每月至少去一次。

这项调查是哈里斯互动公司代表CareerBuilder.com在2月11日至3月13日之间进行的，共有6987名全职雇员参加。

哈里斯互动表示该调查结果会有正负1.2个百分点的采样误差。