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This paper aims to examine organisational behaviour as a result of emotional contagion experienced by selected members in direct selling companies. Specifically, it seeks to investigate how members in a group are affected by the happiness of their high achievers, what factors influence the emotional contagion to occur, and what are the effects of emotional contagion on individual, group and organisation work outcomes.

The variables studied were emotional contagion, personal characteristics, group outcomes and organisational outcomes. Emotional contagion was measured by self‐report of impulsive acts; while personal characteristics were measured in terms of social desirability, extraversion, locus of control, live accomplishment, materialistic world, susceptibility to interpersonal influence, and self‐esteem. Organisational outcome variables were measured in terms of organisational commitment and organisational culture. Other variables studied were group behaviour, team player, demographic characteristics, and business organisational characteristics. A total of 276 respondents participated in this study.

It is found that emotional contagion is positively related with personal outcomes. Further findings reveal that emotional contagion has an impact on both the group and the team. The team, as a whole, is influenced not only by the emotional contagion but also by the personal characteristics of the respondents. Emotional contagion is also related to organisational outcomes. Both the group characteristics are positively related with organisational commitment. Emotional contagion is also positively related to organisational culture. Group characteristics are also positively related with organisational culture. It can be postulated that the following relationships exist between emotional contagion, personal outcomes, group outcomes, and organisational outcomes. It is also found that emotional contagion is a very important variable in the light of personal characteristics, group characteristics and organisational characteristics.

The paper focuses on a specific industry in Malaysia – direct selling – where no such study has been conducted in the past.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the two effects (flow effect and resonance effect) during a group complaint based on the emotional contagion theory.

This study uses an experimental research design in which participants’ negative emotions dynamically change driven by group emotional interactions when they are experiencing a group complaint.

Flow effect and resonance effect can occur during the process of group emotional contagion. Specifically, when group customers’ negative emotional similarity is low in a group complaint, group emotional contagion leads to flow effect (i.e. negative emotions flow from customers with higher levels of negative emotions to those with lower levels of negative emotions). By contrast, when group customers’ negative emotional similarity is high in a group complaint, group emotional contagion leads to resonance effect (i.e. group customers’ negative emotions increase significantly).

Most of the previous research studies the process of emotional contagion from one with higher levels of emotional displays to the other with lower levels of emotional displays, which is named as the “flow effect” of emotional contagion. However, when two individuals with the same levels of negative emotional displays interact with each other, the flow effect of emotional contagion is very likely not to occur. It is interesting to find that both individuals’ negative emotions increase significantly during the process of emotional contagion. The authors propose the “resonance effect” of emotional contagion to explain this phenomenon.

Nowadays, computer-mediated communication (CMC) is an inherent part of consumers’ daily interactions. That kind of communication, however, is associated with limited options to express emotions and, thus, impairs smooth interactions. Considering these shortcomings, existing research has paid attention to the use of smileys and examines their impacts on communication. Nevertheless, little is known about the effects of smileys on the receivers’ emotions as well as on the interaction between the communication partners. Against this background, the study aims to investigate the appropriateness of smileys in causing emotional contagion in CMC. That interpersonal mechanism fosters harmonic interactions and strengthens the relationship between interaction partners by sharing emotions.

Field data of 1,745 females were obtained through an online experiment applying two scenarios that only differ by the use of either a positive or a negative smiley. The appropriateness of both smileys to express positive or negative emotions was pretested in a study with 18 respondents.

The findings support the assumption that emotions expressed by smileys affect receivers’ emotions through the process of emotional contagion. Furthermore, the effects of the negative smiley on the emotions of the receivers are moderated by the receivers’ susceptibility to emotional contagion.

Findings contribute to current research on CMC by offering a deeper understanding of the impacts of smileys on interactions. In that way, the present study underlines the suitability of smileys to stimulate emotional contagion in a “cueless” environment.

Despite the growing consensus that consumers extensively use online reviews and that negative reviews can significantly damage brand equity, it remains uncertain whether negative online reviews that focus on different aspects of a service have a similar or differential effect on brand equity. This study aims to fill this gap and explores the mediating role of emotional contagion and what kind of response helps better deter their negative effect.

This research is conducted through a one-panel study and three experimental studies. SAS enterprise miner is used for text mining analysis and Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Process macro models are used to analyze the experimental data.

Negative reviews related to the tangibility, responsiveness and empathy dimensions have a more detrimental effect on brand equity than negative reviews related to the assurance and reliability dimensions. The results also provide evidence that emotional contagion is more prevalent when consumers read reviews that are specific to the empathy and responsiveness dimensions. Finally, accommodative responses from the service provider are more effective in deterring the effect of a negative online review on brand equity.

The generalizability of this study is limited to the restaurant and hotel industry.

The findings will also help the brand manager in understanding the comparative effect of service quality-specific negative reviews on brand equity and also the type of responses that brand managers should give to negative reviews.

Despite online reviews receiving increased attention in academic research, Service quality (SERVQUAL) dimension-specific reviews have not been studied until now. This study contributes to the service quality-related literature by providing evidence that not all negative online reviews related to different Service quality (SERVQUAL) dimensions equally affect brand equity.

This research examines the extent to which emotional contagions are shaped by human resource practices (HRPs) and work harassment and the influence of this on employee well-being and innovative behaviour.

The authors examined a structural equation model, including two waves of survey data from 240 healthcare professionals to explore the statistical associations between the tested variables.

The results do not show support for a significant relationship linking HRPs with work harassment. However, a significant positive effect linking HRPs, positive contagion, well-being and innovative behaviour was noted, in addition to a significant negative link from harassment on positive contagion, well-being and innovation behaviour.

The research highlights the limited role that HRPs (alone) play in mitigating harassment and their deleterious effects. Notwithstanding, HRPs can have a positive role in shaping the positive contagions and subsequent positive effects on employee and work outcomes.

The purpose of this paper is to build theory and present a model of the development of conflicts in teams.

The paper develops a conceptual model based on past theory and research.

The model brings a multi-level perspective to the process of intragroup conflict by showing the mechanisms by which an interpersonal, dyadic conflict can spread to other team members over time through a process of conflict contagion.

This study provides a new model for conflict escalation and it sheds light on factors which can either ameliorate or exacerbate the speed and extent of conflict contagion. The repercussions of different degrees of conflict involvement within a team are discussed.

This paper aims to draw attention to the need for a nuanced view of the emotional contagion framework. It proposes and empirically tests a refined model of emotional contagion and its effects in the hotel sector by focusing on the front-desk service encounter interactions.

Data were collected from three separate groups of paired informants: receptionists, hotel customers and interaction observers. The sample included 573 full customer service interactions in 47 hotels in Catalonia. The model was tested with structural equation modelling.

Emotional contagion has specific mechanisms at the hotel front-desk. No relationship was found between receptionists’ inner mood and their outwardly displayed emotions. Yet, receptionists’ displayed emotions enhance customer mood, and, largely, customer satisfaction. Ultimately, this affects customer behavioural intentions. It was also discovered that guests are able to clearly distinguish between their satisfaction with the specific service encounter at the front desk and the overall satisfaction with the hotel stay. The positive effects of employees’ displayed emotions are of particular importance in lower-star hotels and are less important at the high end. Perceived training opportunities have a positive effect on customer satisfaction and improve the employee-displayed emotion.

Researchers should examine employee outcomes that are more stable than mood, but may enhance or be related to the effective display of emotions at the front desk, such as employee satisfaction and commitment. In general, emotions and behaviours of employees and consumers should be further examined in other services across the hospitality industry, in different cultural contexts and in terms of their impact on company performance. Researchers should heed the precise type of mechanism that takes place in each service context.

The hotel management should focus their efforts on ensuring positive emotional performance, regardless of employees’ inner mood. Managers should carefully interpret differentiated results according to whether they have been drawn from overall satisfaction or customer service interaction surveys. The training provision is of particular importance in lower-star hotels, where customer outcomes depend more on employee-displayed emotion.

This study empirically corroborates that customer outcomes of front-desk services are linked to receptionists’ displayed emotions, and not to employees’ feelings. Onsite data collection, multiple-informant approach, paired dyads and structural equation modelling hold a great potential for study designs that seek insights into interpersonal phenomena in hospitality services research.

The purpose of this paper is to study the applicability of a crossover model of work–family conflict (WFC) in the work setting among supervisor–subordinate dyads. It examines the positive association between supervisor’s WFC and subordinate’s WFC and analyses the moderating effect of subordinate’s susceptibility to emotional contagion (SEC).

Data were gathered using a questionnaire survey method and tested in 193 matched supervisor–subordinate dyads from select organisations representing the services sector in India.

The authors found a significant direct crossover path from the supervisor to his/her subordinate’s WFC. The effect of supervisor reported WFC on subordinate reported WFC was found to be strong when the subordinate displayed higher SEC with his/her supervisor.

Examining the crossover of WFC contributes to theory by broadening crossover research to include transmission of negative experiences in the work context. This study significantly adds to emotional contagion theory by substantiating the existence of WFC contagion in supervisor–subordinate dyads. Given the constraints of cross-sectional research design, future research should replicate these findings using a larger sample in other cultural contexts as well to generalise the results. Future research should consider using longitudinal data and including information from both the supervisor and the subordinates collected at different points in time. Crossover of positive work–family experiences (e.g. work–family enrichment) and the role of other individual difference variables such as the personality of the subordinates, empathy, etc., could also be considered.

Supervisors should be advised of the potential adverse effects of their WFC and organisations should be made cognizance of the impact that the WFC of employees can have on their job outcomes. Organisations should provide the required formal and informal support to their employees to deal with their WFC efficiently.

This study has attempted to examine the crossover of WFC in supervisor–subordinate dyads and the potential effect of one of the individual difference variables namely SEC. To the best of the authors knowledge, it has rarely been examined earlier.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the emotional contagion theory in print ads, and expand the literature of smiling to different type of smiles and gender congruency. Emotional contagion happens when an emotion is transferred from a sender to a receiver by the synchronization of emotions from the emitter. Drawing on emotional contagion theory, the authors expand this concept and propose that smiles in static facial expressions influence product evaluation. They suggest that false smiles do not have the same impact as genuine smiles on product evaluation, and the congruence between the model gender–product in a static ad and the gender of the viewer moderates the effects.

In Experiment 1, subjects were randomly assigned to view one of the two ad treatments to guard against systematic error (e.g. bias). In Experiment 2, it was investigated whether viewing a static ad featuring a model with a false smile can result in a positive product evaluation as was the case with genuine smiles (H3). In Experiment 3, it was assumed that when consumers evaluate an ad featuring a smiling face, the facial expression influences product evaluation, and this influence is moderated by the congruence between the gender of the ad viewer and the product H gender of the model in the ad.

Across three experiments, the authors found that the model’s facial expression influenced the product evaluation. Second, they supported the association between a model’s facial expression and mimicry synchronization. Third, they showed that genuine smiles have a higher impact on product evaluation than false smiles. This novel result enlarges the research on genuine smiles to include false smiles. Fourth, the authors supported the gender–product congruence effect in that the gender of the ad’s reader and the model have a moderating effect on the relationship between the model’s facial expression and the reader’s product evaluation.

Marketing managers would benefit from understanding that genuine smiles can encourage positive emotions on the part of consumers via emotional contagion, which would be very useful to create a positive effect on products. The authors improved upon previous psychological theory (Gunnery et al., 2013; Hennig-Thurau et al., 2006) showing that a genuine smile results in higher evaluation scores of products presented in static ads. The theoretical explanation for this effect is the genuine smile, which involves contraction of both zygomatic major and orbicularis oculi muscles. These facial muscles can be better perceived and transmit positive emotions (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2006).

The purpose of this paper is to study dynamic evolution of passenger emotional contagion among different flights emerging in mass flight delays, so as to quantitatively analyze emotional variation tendencies and influences of concerned factors and intervention measures.

An intervening variable of group emotion was introduced into emotional contagion model to simulate passenger emotional evolution among multi-flight groups. Besides, personalities, characters and social relationships were considered to represent individual differences in emotional changes. Based on personal contact relationships, emotional contagion model was proposed to evaluate cross-emotion transition processes among different groups under scenarios of information shortage. Eventually, evolutionary processes of passenger emotions were fused in an agent-based simulation based on social force correction model.

Simulation experiment results revealed that passenger emotions suffer from combined impacts of individual emotional changes and emotional interactions among adjacent flights through a comparison with actual survey. Besides, emotional interactions accelerate processes of emotion transitions, and have significant impacts on adjacent flights when different measures are taken. Moreover, taking intervention measures simultaneously seems more effective than implementing intervention successively.

The proposed method makes up for deficiency of ignoring effects of emotional interactions among adjacent flights. It contributes to providing control methods and strategies for relevant departments and improving the efficiency and ability of handling passenger collective events in mass flight delays.