Over half of young men who have just started a job are having difficulty finding a balance between work and private life, a new survey found.

Researchers at study and careers advisors Qompas, who polled some 3,000 students and starters (with a maximum of three year’s work experience) said the finding is surprising because the popular perception is that it is women who have the most trouble striking the right balance.

‘Men are feeling the pressure of having to do more at home but they don’t always know how to organise it,’ researcher Mirjam Bahlmann told RTL. Students also expect their future employers to frown on a four-day week, but, says Bahlmann ‘an employer may accept it readily only that is not what young men believe.’

‘Young women are better at planning,’ sociology professor Beate Volker  told the broadcaster. ‘They enter their private commitments in a diary and keep to it. Young men are not so organised.’

The survey also showed that 52% of young women have trouble making clear when too much is asked of them at work, compared to 34% of men.