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This chapter describes the role of service employees’ motives for emotion regulation in interactions with customers. To date, there has been little research and theoretical work on motives for emotion regulation in service work. The reason for this may lie in the fact that there is an implicit general assumption that employees regulate their emotions in customer interactions because of display rules given by the organization. We argue that service employees have more motives for emotion regulation than adhering to display rules. We propose that three fundamental motive categories which are relevant for general emotion regulation are also relevant in the service work context. Moreover, we argue that the different motive categories are important antecedents for the further emotion regulation process. We propose that depending on the motive category different emotion regulation strategies are used as well as moderating effects of the motives with an impact on the consequences of emotion regulation such as well-being. The chapter concludes by pointing to practical implications.

Purpose: The psychological contract involves expectations and responsibilities from both employees and organizations. Recently, arguments have emerged that link employee expectations to increasing individual entitlement beliefs which may not involve reciprocity. Equity theory suggests that employees continually assess their personal outcomes for fairness and that these equity perceptions could be affected by entitlement beliefs. The question that then arises is, how do entitled employees pursue these unmet beliefs and what are the implications if these beliefs are met or unmet? Approach: In this chapter, we present a conceptual model proposing that emotion regulation motives (instrumental or hedonic) influence how employees with unmet entitlement beliefs seek to advance their claims. Using equity theory as an underpinning theory, we conceptualize that instrumental and hedonic emotion regulation motives lead to different job satisfaction levels. We also argue that actual job performance moderates this relationship. Originality/Value: Understanding this process is essential as managers may constantly deal with employee entitlement beliefs, and low job satisfaction has been linked to poor employee and organizational outcomes. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Despite recognition of the importance of emotions and emotion regulation in service encounters, emotion regulation has been generally studied from an employee perspective. This study investigated customer emotion regulation behaviours (CEREBs) in face-to-face service encounters; arguing for a more nuanced approach through an emotion regulation matrix representing the playing up and downplaying of positive or negative emotions. Motivational factors and service-related situational conditions that influence the likelihood of emotion regulation were also examined.

Four focus groups and the critical incident technique method were used to obtain data from people who had interacted with service employees within the previous six months.

There was support for emotion regulation in the four facets of the emotion regulation matrix. Five CEREB dimensions, including verbal behaviours and facial expressions, were evident. Motivational factors and situational conditions that impacted on customer emotion regulation in service encounters were also identified.

The findings were based on two qualitative methods. A quantitative approach should be used to further validate the suggested framework.

Most research on emotion regulation has focused on employees. We examined the phenomenon from a customer viewpoint and in a service encounter context. As customers are not bound by employment rules and conventions, a wider range of emotion regulation behaviours were found. The study used the four-faceted emotion regulation matrix to investigate this, developing a conceptual framework that provides a foundation for future research.

This study aims to contribute novel insights into understanding and mitigating the harmful consequences of abusive supervision (AS) by examining the association between AS experiences, revenge, forgiveness, and the moderating role of emotional intelligence (EI). The key argument is that employees' EI can influence the AS experience through affective processes, countering supervisors' abusive behaviors.

A between-person scenario-based experiment was conducted with 366 participants divided into AS and control groups. The study explored the association between AS experience and revenge/forgiveness, mediated by core affect (valence and activation). EI abilities were measured as a moderator. Data analysis examined the relationships and interactions among AS, revenge/forgiveness, EI, and affective experiences.

The study reveals significant findings indicating that AS experiences were positively associated with revenge and negatively associated with forgiveness. The mediation analysis confirmed the role of core affect in these relationships. EI emerged as a moderator, shaping the association between AS experiences and revenge/forgiveness. Importantly, participants with higher EI exhibited lower revenge intentions, demonstrating the potential of EI to mitigate the adverse effects of AS. Unexpectedly, individuals with high EI also expressed fewer forgiveness intentions.

This study provides a comprehensive understanding of how employees can effectively counterbalance the impact of AS through higher levels of strategic EI. Examining core affect as a mediator offers novel insights into coping mechanisms in response to AS experiences and their consequences.

The study acknowledges several limitations, as the scenarios may only partially capture the complexities of real-life AS situations. The focus on a specific context and the sample characteristics limit the generalizability of the findings. Future research should explore diverse organizational contexts and employ longitudinal designs.

The findings have practical implications for organizations as enhancing employees' EI skills through training programs interventions and integrating EI into organizational culture and leadership conduct.

The purpose of this study is to investigate which emotions and difficulties in the emotional regulation of adolescents with illicit substance consumption.

In total, 41 adolescents undergoing treatment for the use of alcohol and drugs were recruited. The instruments used were the emotional rating scale and the difficulties in the regulation of emotions scale.

Emotional reactivity showed significant differences in the sadness dimension in relation to the number of cannabis cigarettes smoked daily and length of stay, and in the surprise dimension in relation to the number of cannabis cigarettes smoked daily. There was a significant correlation between happiness and age, surprise and number of siblings, sadness and school absenteeism and fear, school absenteeism and number of substances consumed. In regard to difficulties in emotional regulation, there were significant differences between the groups, in strategies regarding the gender of the participants and the number of substances consumed, in non-acceptance and impulses and in the number of substances consumed and in the awareness of the type and number of substances consumed. There was a significant correlation between strategies, non-acceptance, awareness and impulses and the number of substances consumed.

This study demonstrated that the emotional problems of adolescents admitted to a therapeutic community are predictors of illicit substance use.

Purpose: This introduction sets the stage for the book theme, “Emotions and Negativity,” by reviewing the early work on negative emotions and by discussing the impact of the COVID pandemic on people’s moods and emotions. It discusses how most of the chapters in this book were first presented as conference papers at the Twelfth International Conference on Emotions and Worklife (“Emonet XII”). It then highlights the key contributions from each of the chapters. Study Design/Methodology/Approach: This gives an overview of the organizational structure of the book and explains the four major parts of the book. It then relates each chapter to the theme of each part and discusses the key contributions of each chapter. Findings: The introduction concludes by observing that the chapters offer a variety of practical solutions to negative emotions that should be of use to both practitioners and academicians. Originality/Value: The chapters investigate underresearched topics, and thus make original and important new contributions. Although underresearched, the topics they explore have a major impact on people’s lives. Thus, these chapters add considerable value to the field.

The purpose of this study is to examine social conflicts with co-workers (SCCWs) as a predictor of job satisfaction with co-workers (JSCWs) on a daily basis. Moreover, dispositional emotion regulation (ER) was suggested to moderate the within-person relationship between daily conflicts at work and JSCWs.

Ninety-eight employees from German civil service agencies completed surveys across five consecutive work days. Dispositional variables and controls were assessed in a general survey which was completed before the start of the daily surveys.

Hierarchical linear modeling showed that SCCWs at noon were significantly related to employees’ JSCWs in the evening and that dispositional ER moderated this relationship, indicating that people with high abilities of ER reported higher levels of job satisfaction with their co-workers than people with low abilities of ER after experiencing SCCWs.

The present study links conflict research with organizational and personality research. The findings broaden the understanding of social conflicts in an organizational context and further highlight ER as an important factor which can buffer the negative effects of workplace conflicts.

This study aims to test a theoretical research model specifying how two emerging job stressors, i.e. centralized authority and reporting requirements, influence hotel managers’ well-being. A mediated model through reappraisal is hypothesized.

The model was tested on 600 Norwegian and Swedish hotel managers using a questionnaire survey (72 per cent response rate). Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, confirmatory factor analyses, correlation and structural equation modeling, which included bootstrapping.

Job stressors were negatively related to well-being, whereas reappraisal had a positive influence on well-being. A positive relationship was found between reporting requirements and reappraisal, while the opposite appeared for centralized authority. A negative mediating role of reappraisal existed in the relationship between centralized authority and well-being, while there was a positive one in the relationship between reporting requirements and well-being.

The findings will have important implications for management practices, as they illuminate how job stressors reduce well-being on the one hand and how reappraisal positively influences well-being on the other. This knowledge indicates that reappraisal is important for well-being when faced with stressful environments. The findings illustrate the importance of controlling stress in the managerial environment, and for hotel managers to maintain the ability to reappraise.

The study advances the knowledge of the managerial role, as well as the importance of reappraisal and well-being. This is the first empirical study among hotel managers testing a research model that illustrates how job stressors and reappraisal influence well-being.

We test a multilevel exploratory predictive model, examining the relationships between emotional labor (EL) and workers' affectivity traits at a philanthropic hospital, where EL involves a process of emotional regulation at work involving emotional display rules, regulatory strategies, and emotional performance. Specifically, we test a model of the mediation effects of regulatory strategies and the moderation effects of emotional demands.

Participants were 306 workers from 45 different units of a hospital institution, whose performance was evaluated by 30 supervisors. Since workers' emotional display rules could not be represented as shared, unit-level beliefs, we chose two critical demands to test our hypotheses: (1) demand to express compassion and (2) demand to conceal anger or disapproval.

Using multilevel analysis, we found evidence that deep acting mediates between emotional demands to express compassion and emotional performance. We found further that demands to conceal anger toward coworkers increase the strength of the relationship between negative affectivity and surface acting.

Theoretical and practical implications of the study are also discussed.