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Experimental evidence for aspects of the broaden-and-build theory actually existed prior to the theory’s introduction to the academic world. Generally speaking, laboratory studies showed a causal effect of positive feelings on thought processes. Across a host of studies, Isen and her colleagues demonstrated a wide range of cognitive outcomes resulting from induced positive emotions, including patterns of unusual thought (Isen, Johnson, Mertz, & Robinson, 1985), flexible thinking (Isen & Daubman, 1984), creativity (Isen, Daubman, & Nowicki, 1987), and receptivity to new information (Estrada, Isen, & Young, 1997).

I argue that while research on collective emotions is gaining in popularity, there has not been sufficient attention paid to understanding the mechanisms that explain how and why group emotions influence group outcomes. The goal of this chapter is to fill this gap by introducing group-member interactions as a group-level mechanism. I explore how positive and negative collective emotions in workgroups link to different types of member interactions, which in turn, influence group outcomes. Finally, I discuss the theoretical contributions of the research and the implications for future research on workgroup emotions and member interactions.

Building upon the psychological literature on responses to potentially traumatic events (e.g., Bonanno, 2004; Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004), this chapter explores the potential impact of managers’ affective expressions during tumultuous times at work. We propose that managerial displays of positive emotions that are also socially appropriate and authentically experienced will enhance employee and team change-related outcomes. We also explain why emotional suppression on the part of managers may be detrimental to healthy employee responses to change. Finally, we discuss theoretical and practical implications of this model.

Creativity is increasingly vital to competitive advantage. Leaders are under growing pressure to generate a creative output from themselves and their teams, and human capital managers and consultants are increasingly called to facilitate and build a climate that promotes innovation. Positive emotions are beneficial for big picture, creative, innovative thinking (Fredrickson, 2001; Fredrickson & Branigan, 2005; Subramaniam et al., 2009). Negative emotions create more accuracy, bottoms up neural processing, and problem finding (Forgas, 2013; Forgas & Wyland, 2006). This research investigated if induced positive emotions lead to a higher creative output than negative emotions. An online experiment aimed to induce either a positive or negative mood through video clips before participants undertook a creative task. Personality dimensions were also measured to assess how preferences in information processing impacted creative output. The study demonstrated the efficacy of induced mood and concluded that positive emotions seem to be beneficial for creative output, both quantity and quality. The findings add to the considerable data on the impact of emotions on workplace performance (Amabile et al., 2005) and can be directly applied to learning, innovation, and creative thinking interventions in the workplace. The chapter concludes with a brief discussion of interventions that facilitate a positive emotional climate and how to increase creative potential and performance.

Organizational behavior scholars have long recognized the importance of a variety of emotion-related phenomena in everyday work life. Indeed, after three decades, the span of research on emotions in the workplace encompasses a wide variety of affective variables such as emotional climate, emotional labor, emotion regulation, positive and negative affect, empathy, and more recently, specific emotions. Emotions operate in complex ways across multiple levels of analysis (i.e., within-person, between-person, interpersonal, group, and organizational) to exert influence on work behavior and outcomes, but their linkages to human resource management (HRM) policies and practices have not always been explicit or well understood. This chapter offers a review and integration of the bourgeoning research on discrete positive and negative emotions, offering insights about why these emotions are relevant to HRM policies and practices. We review some of the dominant theories that have emerged out of functionalist perspectives on emotions, connecting these to a strategic HRM framework. We then define and describe four discrete positive and negative emotions (fear, pride, guilt, and interest) highlighting how they relate to five HRM practices: (1) selection, (2) training/learning, (3) performance management, (4) incentives/rewards, and (5) employee voice. Following this, we discuss the emotion perception and regulation implications of these and other discrete emotions for leaders and HRM managers. We conclude with some challenges associated with understanding discrete emotions in organizations as well as some opportunities and future directions for improving our appreciation and understanding of the role of discrete emotional experiences in HRM.

While researchers have assumed that it is not possible to determine the key reactants that cause positive emotional reactions, we argue that experiences, such as watching an entertaining television show or working in a pleasant climate, produce their positive effects through one or more “root causes” of positive emotion. This study identified a classification of root causes derived from reports of individual positive moments submitted by office workers throughout their workday. Through identifying root causes, such as Fulfilled Expectations, Positive Self-Image, Humor, and Relief, we provide the first data-driven attempt to develop a taxonomy of root causes of positive affect at work.

The chapter should help managers to realize what they could do in order to enhance positive emotions and well being during challenging times of a post-merger integration.

Indeed, negative affects, such as anxieties, aggressions, uncertainties, and stress are a very common phenomenon in mergers and acquisitions. On the other side, positive emotions are proved to be particularly suited for preventing and dealing with negative emotions.

For researchers this chapter serves as an encouragement to shift their attention to positive emotions, and it aims to instill some ideas for further research.

This chapter provides novel theory that explicates how positive emotions of four actors (supervisors, employees, peers, and customers) in the service profit chain can foster the creation of positively deviant service businesses. It is suggested to incorporate studies and theories of positive organizational scholarship and particularly studies on positive emotions to the services marketing literature. This chapter elucidates how positively deviant behaviors, such as expressions of appreciation, helping others, gratitude, trustworthiness, and unselfishness, can foster the creation of such positively deviant performances that may generate supreme customer experience. These four positively deviant performances are trust in self and others, feeling of oneness, creativity, and seeing the bigger picture. The suggestion is that these positively deviant performances create climate for positivity in the supplier–customer interaction and foster the co-creation of mutual value in service businesses.

This chapter aims to explore how emotional language construing experiences of UK COVID-19 lockdown in the present frames expectations for future behaviours and intended memories. We analyse 102 responses collected through an online narrative survey during the first lockdown in the United Kingdom. The survey asked participants to articulate ‘an image to remember lockdown by’. Taking a positive discourse analysis approach, using corpus linguistics and systemic functional linguistics tools, we challenge the primarily negative mainstream discourses of COVID-19 and lockdown experiences and explore how language choices evaluating different aspects of life in lockdown evoke emotion to construe a desired projected future. Findings indicate that respondents actively and selectively articulate primarily positive intended memories based on kinship peace and nature that contrast with normal life experiences. Such choices are framed within emotional states enacted through language choices. We argue that these projected memories act as a ‘time capsule’ whereby decisions to retain positive memories help to promote adaptive well-being in the face of potentially overwhelmingly negative circumstances.

Purpose: This chapter explores how organizations can influence the emotional climate surrounding change, and thereby encourage the emergence of positive rather than negative emotions. Despite growing literature, many companies struggle with postacquisition integration. In the last 3 decades, the discussion has turned toward how employees' emotions complicate the process. This chapter discusses those emotions, paying special attention to the emotional climate surrounding change. The focus is on examining how an organization's emotional climate influences employees' emotions following an acquisition.

Design/methodology/approach: The chapter takes the acquired company point of view, following a German–Finnish deal completed in January 2017 over 1 year. Data were collected through interviews (totaling 26), daily memo-like diaries (65 entries), and an employee satisfaction survey (56 respondents).

Findings: The findings reveal that employees are likely to have emotional reactions even when relatively little integration is intended. In addition, the surrounding emotional climate – whether positive or negative – is likely to trigger similarly valenced emotions. The theoretical contribution of this chapter lies in the introduction of emotional climate rather than organizational culture as a key factor for employees during the early integration period.

Practical implication: Particularly line managers have an important role in maintaining positivity. For positivity to dominate, organizations need to make the benefits of the deal and the future of the company clear to the employees.