The Ripple Effect: Emotional Contagion and Its Influence on Group Behavior

Group emotional contagion, the transfer of moods among people in a group, and its influence on work group dynamics was examined in a laboratory study of managerial decision making using multiple, convergent measures of mood, individual attitudes, behavior, and group-level dynamics. Using a 2 times 2 experimental design, with a trained confederate enacting mood conditions, the predicted effect of emotional contagion was found among group members, using both outside coders\u27 ratings of participants\u27 mood and participants\u27 self-reported mood. No hypothesized differences in contagion effects due to the degree of pleasantness of the mood expressed and the energy level with which it was conveyed were found. There was a significant influence of emotional contagion on individual-level attitudes and group processes. As predicted, the positive emotional contagion group members experienced improved cooperation, decreased conflict, and increased perceived task performance. Theoretical implications and practical ramifications of emotional contagion in groups and organizations are discussed

What’s Love Got to Do With It? A Longitudinal Study of the Culture of Companionate Love and Employee and Client Outcomes in a Long-Term Care Setting

In this longitudinal study, we build a theory of a culture of companionate love—feelings of affection, compassion, caring, and tenderness for others—at work, examining the culture’s influence on outcomes for employees and the clients they serve in a long-term care setting. Using measures derived from outside observers, employees, family members, and cultural artifacts, we find that an emotional culture of companionate love at work positively relates to employees’ satisfaction and teamwork and negatively relates to their absenteeism and emotional exhaustion. Employees’ trait positive affectivity (trait PA)—one’s tendency to have a pleasant emotional engagement with one’s environment—moderates the influence of the culture of companionate love, amplifying its positive influence for employees higher in trait PA. We also find a positive association between a culture of companionate love and clients’ outcomes, specifically, better patient mood, quality of life, satisfaction, and fewer trips to the emergency room. The study finds some association between a culture of love and families’ satisfaction with the long-term care facility. We discuss the implications of a culture of companionate love for both cognitive and emotional theories of organizational culture. We also consider the relevance of a culture of companionate love in other industries and explore its managerial implications for the healthcare industry and beyond

The Social Perception of Emotional Abilities: Expanding What We Know About Observer Ratings of Emotional Intelligence

We examine the social perception of emotional intelligence (EI) through the use of observer ratings. Individuals frequently judge others’ emotional abilities in real-world settings, yet we know little about the properties of such ratings. This article examines the social perception of EI and expands the evidence to evaluate its reliability and cross-judge agreement, as well as its convergent, divergent, and predictive validity. Three studies use real-world colleagues as observers and data from 2,521 participants. Results indicate significant consensus across observers about targets’ EI, moderate but significant self–observer agreement, and modest but relatively consistent discriminant validity across the components of EI. Observer ratings significantly predicted interdependent task performance, even after controlling for numerous factors. Notably, predictive validity was greater for observer-rated than for self-rated or ability-tested EI. We discuss the minimal associations of observer ratings with ability-tested EI, study limitations, future directions, and practical implications

Career guidance and the changing world of work: Contesting responsibilising notions of the future.

Career guidance is an educational activity which helps individuals to manage their participation in learning and work and plan for their futures. Unsurprisingly career guidance practitioners are interested in how the world of work is changing and concerned about threats of technological unemployment. This chapter argues that the career guidance field is strongly influenced by a “changing world of work” narrative which is drawn from a wide body of grey literature produced by think tanks, supra-national bodies and other policy influencers. This body of literature is political in nature and describes the future of work narrowly and within the frame of neoliberalism. The ‘changing world of work’ narrative is explored through a thematic analysis of grey literature and promotional materials for career guidance conferences. The chapter concludes by arguing that career guidance needs to adopt a more critical stance on the ‘changing world of work’ and to offer more emancipatory alternatives.N/

To Your Heart's Content: An Affective Diversity Model In Top Management Teams

This study examines positive affective diversity, differences in positive affective personality among group members, to understand how this diversity influences individual attitudes, group processes, and group performance. We develop a Positive Affective Diversity Model, and test it on a sample of 62 U.S. CEOs and their top management teams (TMTs). Greater affective fit between a TMT member and their group is related to more positive attitudes about group relations, and self-perceptions of greater influence within the group. There is a marginally significant negative relationship between team trait positive affective diversity and the CEOs' use of participator decision making, as well as between TMT trait positive affective diversity and financial performance. Exploratory analyses of the interaction of trait positive affective diversity and mean level trait positive affect revealed that affectively diverse, low mean trait PA groups, suffered from the greater task and emotional conflict and least cooperation. There were no effects found for trait negative affective diversity or mean level of group trait negative affect on any of the dependent variables. We discuss the overall implications of our study, and the specific implications for the group emotion, team composition, group performance, and top management team literatures.

The Ripple Effect: Emotional Contagion In Groups

Emotional contagion, the transfer of emotion between individuals, and its influence on work group dynamics was examined in two managerial simulations using multiple, convergent measures of emotions and group dynamics. The studies tested hypotheses on differential contagion effects due to the degree of pleasantness of the emotion, and the energy with which this pleasantness was conveyed. After determining that emotional contagion existed in groups, I then examined the influence of emotional contagion on individual-level attitudes and group processes. As predicted, experiencing positive emotional contagion led to improved cooperation, decreased conflict, and increased perceptions of task performance - all as rated by self, other group members, and outside video-coders. The opposite was the case when experiencing negative emotional contagion. Theoretical implications and practical ramifications of emotional contagion in groups and organizations are discussed.

A new look at employee happiness: how employees’ perceptions of a job as offering experiences versus objects to customers influence job-related happiness

info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Group affect: Its influence on individual and group outcomes

We review and synthesize the research literature examining group affect and its consequences, focusing on groups who interact together to accomplish a task. We use a definition of group affect that incorporates the mutual influence of a group’s affective context and affective composition (the amalgamation of group members’ state and trait affect). Our focus is on the influence of group affect on individual members’ behaviors and attitudes and on group-level outcomes. We call for more research in this area, including the study of more specific discrete group emotions and a broadening of the types of groups studied in this research area

Managing Organizational Culture Change: The Case of Long-Term Care

Recent research has focused on organizations as continuously confronted by forces for change. These forces may cause organizations to rethink their deeply held cultural values and beliefs in order to survive in the changing landscape. Using the long-term care industry as an exemplar, we argue that effective change requires understanding what organizational culture means, and understanding how organizational change typically occurs. Though some scholars emphasize that change is largely out of the control of organization leaders and primarily the result of evolutionary and revolutionary forces, we argue that culture change can be effectively managed. We conclude with implementation strategies for effective culture change management

Why Does Affect Matter in Organizations?

Interest in and research about affect in organizations have expanded dramatically in recent years. This article reviews what we know about affect in organizations, focusing on how employees\u27 moods, emotions, and dispositional affect influence critical organizational outcomes such as job performance, decision making, creativity, turnover, prosocial behavior, teamwork, negotiation, and leadership. This review highlights pervasive and consistent effects, showing the importance of affect in shaping a wide variety of organizational behaviors, the knowledge of which is critical for researchers, managers, and employees