They all ghosted a job. Their reasons? More complicated than you think.

One person walked out at lunch, fed up with his job as a debt collector, feeling he could take not one more day. He never said a word to his boss or coworkers.

Another made up a story about getting into a car accident to get out of stocking shelves at a now-shuttered Toys 'R Us near Houston. She wanted to spend more time with her boyfriend, so she told her boss she'd be in touch when she could return to work. She never called. “I was really young and really, really stupid,” she now says of the way she quit.

Then there's the nurse aide who, feeling so demeaned by her superiors, clocked out in the middle of a shift at a nursing home in December and drove away. She says she has no regrets.

All three ghosted at work, disappearing from their jobs without formally quitting or giving notice to an employer. As labor markets tighten and professionals encounter one of the lowest unemployment rates in decades, employers are increasingly reporting stories of people not showing up for job interviews, walking out without giving notice and even accepting a position only to not appear for the first day of work. A recent story I wrote on the topic sparked more than 5,000 comments, many from job seekers describing the times companies had gone dark on them and recruiters sharing their own horror stories.

After the story, I wanted to better understand the mentality of a ghoster. What makes someone disappear into the ether? Recruiters and managers were happy to offer me their pet theories: People dislike conflict, so it’s often easier to say nothing than to deliver unsavory news. This is the online dating age and ghosting is a way of life when you communicate by phone; why shouldn’t this make a jump to the workplace? Multiple commenters also insisted they had picked up the behavior from recruiters who went silent on them during previous job searches.

Yet interviews with those who ghosted suggest the reasons people do it may be more varied than many acknowledge. Some ghost out of moral opposition to a job or frustration with an interview experience. For others, it’s a matter of logistics, such as a lack of transportation to an interview. Many ghosts claim they simply did not know how to properly turn down a job or diffuse a tough situation with a manager.

“There are instances where it's not right, but there's a lot of people out there (where) you might not know this person's situation,” says John Schwab, a St. Louis-based systems administrator who disappeared from his debt collecting job more than a decade ago.

While Schwab says he would never ghost again, at the time, he saw his position as a job, not a career, one that made him feel lousy for calling people who were dealing with tough circumstances. He worked for three months before he decided one afternoon that he had had enough. “I was like, ‘You know what? I’m leaving, it’s lunch time, I don’t think I’m coming back.’”

He could have given notice. But he didn’t have any plans to stay in this industry, so he felt no need for courtesies. “I felt great,” he said. “I just knew I didn’t have to return to that work environment.” The company sent him his last paycheck, and he never spoke to his boss again.

In other positions, Schwab says he's seen people ghost because they feared they would be escorted out immediately after resigning or because their anxiety at work had rendered them unable to cope with the demands of the job.

Shannon N., a 38-year-old nurse aide in Columbus, Ohio, has ghosted more than a half dozen times in her career, often when she felt she could not work out differences with a supervisor. She's walked out on jobs as a hotel housekeeper and as an employee at a Kroger grocery store. In December, she ghosted on a $13 an hour nursing aide position she held at an 86-bed nursing home, saying that the environment was toxic. Nurses routinely talked down to her, she said, and they began to make increasingly pointed demands. So, while her shift was set to end at 11 p.m., “I clocked out around 8 or 9 o'clock and never looked back,” she said, feeling “like a weight’s been lifted off my shoulders.” Supervisors later called looking for her, but she did not pick up.

Shannon says she has no regrets, and she doesn’t feel she put patients in harm's way. “I know it's supposed to be professional to give a two weeks' notice, but the way I look at it, no employer's going to give me a two-week notice if they're going to fire me,” she said. “They're walking me out the door on the spot. They're not too concerned about inconveniencing me.”

Shannon remains licensed as a nurse aide, Ohio records show. She spoke openly with LinkedIn on the condition her full name not be used.

For others, ghosting is simply a reflection of their power in the job market. A 24-year-old software engineer in Mountain View, California disappeared without notice after an employer offered him a job about a month ago. He had a phone interview for this position, talked with the company in-person at its office and even met with the CEO. When the salary offered did not meet his expectations, however, he went cold.

“I didn’t want to cause too much of an incident,” he said, explaining he had friends at the company and saw ghosting as less confrontational than elaborating on why the offer fell flat.

The company followed up twice, asking for his response, but he did not reply. Currently employed by a top technology company, he said he found himself under a “deluge” of job opportunities, so did not see ghosting as detrimental to his career.

Some, though, turn to ghosting as a last resort.

A 53-year-old San Antonio, Tex.,-based administrative assistant said she’s ghosted a job in the past when she felt mistreated. She agonized over writing a resignation letter, so she decided to bail instead. “My work situation was so miserable, it was making me physically ill. I took my mother's advice: Since I couldn't say anything nice, I said nothing at all. Ghosting was a way to get my point across to my employer, without giving them anything to use against me. It was the most dignified way for me to stand up for myself,” she wrote on LinkedIn.

“The reason I don't feel bad about ghosting (and I did it in a very kind and professional way) is, my employer consistently behaved as if they did me a huge favor by allowing me to work there,” she said in a follow-up interview, asking that her name not be used in this story.

Job ghosting even occurs before an offer is extended. Kimberly Robertson, in a comment on LinkedIn, says she has missed job interviews and never contacted employers because she lacked transportation. She said she found ghosting to be preferable than calling and declining an interview, fearing that would make her look worse to a potential employer.

Career experts say that communication — as painful as it can be — is key. If candidates speak up, companies have a chance to make accommodations or changes that can help remedy a problem, said Dawn Fay, district president at Robert Half International in New York. “You’ll never put yourself in a position for any of that to happen unless you communicate,” she said.

Some ghosts say they have learned their lesson. They’re now reformed.

Jessica Deshotel ghosted a seasonal job at Toys ‘R Us in Houston a decade ago, when she was 19, making up the ruse about a car accident. She told her manager at the time that it was nothing serious, but she’d be in touch. Her prepaid cell phone ran out of minutes, so if the manager wanted to get a hold of her, it would have been difficult.

Now, the 29-year-old works in the credit department of a building supply company outside Houston. She is raising a daughter and says she wants to teach her the value of a strong work ethic.

“I don’t think I could ever honestly ghost a job again,” she said, “because I’m scared. I like a paycheck.”

This article is part of Work in Progress, a new series exploring what it means to earn a living today. Subscribe to our podcast on iTunes or Google Play and see more stories at #WorkInProgress.