Emotion in Organizations: Theory and Research

Abstract

The workplace elicits a wide range of emotions, and likewise, emotions change our experience of the workplace. This article reviews the scientific field of emotion in organizations, drawing from classic theories and cutting-edge advances to integrate a disparate body of research. The review is organized around the definition of emotion as an unfolding sequence of processes: We interpret the world around us for its subjective meaning, which results in emotional experience. Emotional experience, in turn, has consequences for behaviors, attitudes, and cognition. Emotional experience also elicits expressive cues that can be recognized by others. Each process in the emotion sequence can be regulated. Processes can also iterate until emotion is shared throughout workgroups and even entire organizations. A distinct body of organizationally relevant research exists for each process, and emotional intelligence refers to effectiveness across all. Differences across culture and gender, future research directions, and practical implications are discussed. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Psychology, Volume 74 is January 2023. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Leaders laughing in the line of fire: An emotional aperture perspective on leader laughter in response to critical questions.

“…However, when witnessed in an unshared pattern, the same laughter reduced leaders' warmth and diminished their effectiveness. Therefore, while leaders' other-directed emotion also influences third-party followers, this influence is achieved via third parties' emotional aperture, which situates the leader's emotion in interactive processes involving not only the leader but also the critical questioner (Elfenbein, 2007(Elfenbein, , 2023.…”

“…Second, we expand leadership and emotion research beyond interpersonal approaches (van Kleef & Côté, 2022) to incorporate a much-needed third-party perspective. Although third parties often witness their leaders expressing emotions toward others, we lack insight into the unique psychological processes underlying how third parties perceive, interpret, and respond to leaders’ emotion displays within a dyad (Elfenbein, 2023; Hareli et al, 2008). Third parties play an important role in the impact of leader emotions because leader emotion expression directed at one person can spark cycles of social influence that extend well beyond the dyadic interaction (Hareli et al, 2008).…”

Burnout Syndrome and Emotional Labor in Leaders and Subordinates: A Dyad Analysis

“…Emotional contagion is characterized by a non-conscious tendency to synchronize personal affective and emotional states with those of other people (Chullen 2014;Doherty et al 1995;Hatfield et al 1994). In this way, key social interactions, such as those that occur between leaders and subordinates, can trigger emotional contagion between individuals, resulting in behavioral synchrony (Elfenbein 2023;Herrando and Constantinides 2021).…”

The Heuristics and Biases of Top Managers: Past, Present, and Future

“…We believe that more research is also warranted to understand the interactions between heuristics and emotionality. In recent years behavioural decision researchers have devoted increasing attention to the analysis of the nature and significance of affect and discrete emotions in judgement and decision making (see, e.g., Lerner et al, 2015; Loewenstein, 1996; Loewenstein et al, 2001), building on the increased understanding of the inseparability of emotion and cognition in all but the least consequential of tasks and situations (Ashton‐James and Ashkanasy, 2008; Damasio, 1994; Elfenbein, 2023; Forgas, 1995; Grichnik et al, 2010; Lazarus, 1991; LeDoux, 2000; Smith and Ellsworth, 1985; Welpe et al, 2012). Viewed from the perspective of parallel‐competitive dual‐process theories, these advances suggest that, rather than acting simply as a disturbance to effortful, Type 2 processes, which should be suppressed at every available opportunity, affect and emotion are integral to the very nature of cognition, infusing reasoning, learning, decision making, and action (Hodgkinson and Healey, 2011).…”