British women take four times as long to get ready for work on Mondays than on Fridays, while men also put less effort into their appearance as the week goes on, according to research by retail chain Debenhams.

On average, women spend 76 minutes getting ready on Mondays -- with almost a third of that spent on their hair -- 18 minutes on make-up, 16 minutes trying on different combinations of clothes and the rest taken up by showering and washing.

This is reduced to 40 minutes on Tuesdays and continues to decline as the week goes on, falling to 19 minutes on Fridays.

"Make the most of looking at your work colleagues on a Monday morning, because that's as good as they're going to get," said Debenhams spokesman Ed Watson.

But it is not just women who put more effort into making a good impression on work colleagues at the start of the week.

Men too let their standards suffer with each passing day, the survey of 1,000 customers by Debenhams' personal shopper network found. They take 28 minutes on Monday, half that on Tuesday and 11 for the rest of the week.

"It's clear that most men can only pay attention to their appearance for a maximum of two days before opting for an acceptable level of dishevelment," said Watson.

"Women try to keep their dress standards higher for longer, but by the time Friday comes, they too have gone down a line of least resistance."

(Read by Renee Haines. Renee Haines is a journalist at the China Daily Web site.)

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(Agencies)