Zapf, D. & Holz, M. (2006). On the Positive and Negative Effects of Emotion Work in Organizations. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 15, 1-28

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On the positive and negative
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Dieter Zapf & Melanie Holz
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Department of Psychology, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-
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3. EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF WORK AND
ORGANIZATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY
2006, 15 (1), 1 – 28
On the positive and negative effects of emotion work
in organizations
Dieter Zapf and Melanie Holz
Department of Psychology, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University,
Frankfurt, Germany
Downloaded by [University of Barcelona] at 06:12 19 February 2012
Emotion work (emotional labour) is defined as emotional regulation required
to display organizationally desired emotions by the employees. It has received
increased attention because it is relevant in the service industry where social
interactions with customers, clients, or patients are a significant part of the job.
Empirical studies found equivocal effects on psychological well-being which
indicates that emotion work is a multidimensional construct with dimensions
having positive and negative health effects. In the present studies, the following
aspects of emotion work were differentiated: emotional regulation requirements:
(1) the requirement to display positive emotions; (2) the requirement to display
negative emotions, (3) the requirement to be sensitive to clients’ emotions; (4)
emotional dissonance: the expression of emotions that are not felt. Analyses
were based on a representative sample (N ¼ 184) of service workers and
another sample of service workers (N ¼ 1158) consisting of call centre agents,
hotel and bank employees, and kindergarten teachers. The data showed that
emotional dissonance was the stressful aspect of emotion work, whereas the
display of positive emotions and sensitivity requirements also had positive
effects on personal accomplishment. The requirement to express negative
emotions had little effect on burnout. Neuroticism had little impact on the
relations between emotion work and burnout.
In most economic societies service work plays an important role now. In the
European countries, for example, more than 50% of the workforce comprises
service workers (Paoli, 1997). Consequently, the psychological analysis of
service work has received increased attention in recent years (e.g., Nerdinger,
Correspondence should be addressed to Dieter Zapf, Department of Psychology, Johann
Wolfgang Goethe-University Frankfurt, Mertonstr. 17, D-60054 Frankfurt, Germany.
Email: D.Zapf@psych.uni-frankfurt.de
An earlier version of this article was presented as a poster at the 25th international congress
of Applied Psychology, July 7 – 12, 2002, Singapore. Parts of the present study were supported
by the German Federal Ministry of Work and Social Affairs and the Hessen Ministry of Social
Affairs.
Ó 2006 Psychology Press Ltd
http://www.psypress.com/ejwop DOI: 10.1080/13594320500412199

4. 2 ZAPF AND HOLZ
1994; Zeithaml & Bitner, 2000). One of the core aspects of service work is the
social interaction with customers or clients. Here, as in any social interaction,
the requirement to regulate one’s emotions plays a central role. Hochschild
(1983) coined the term ‘‘emotional labour’’ for this requirement. She
investigated the work of flight attendants and showed that a substantial part
of the job was dealing with the passengers and their emotions.
Based on qualitative findings, Hochschild (1983) argued that high
emotional demands had negative effects on psychological and physical
health. Whereas most but not all empirical studies so far were able to
demonstrate such negative effects of emotional labour, the empirical
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findings with regard to positive effects were much more inconsistent. In
some studies, the frequency of emotion display was positively related to
well-being; in others it was not. In particular, it has been argued that the
display of positive emotions has positive consequences. However, only a few
studies have explicitly measured the requirement to display positive
emotions. But again, empirical results were inconsistent. The present paper
intends to contribute to this still open question. We will present the test of
an overall model using structural equation modelling. In particular, we will
focus on the relationship between emotional job requirements and
psychological strain rather than on behavioural or emotion regulation
strategies and its consequences. We will distinguish between the requirement
to display positive and the requirement to display negative emotions and we
will also investigate the requirement to sense emotions of the interaction
partner. This has only occasionally been done in the literature so far.
Finally, we will systematically consider negative affectivity (NA) in these
analyses, thus responding to an important methodological discussion in
psychological stress research. We are not aware of any study that took all
these aspects into account. In the following we will first describe a
multidimensional framework of emotion work. Based on the existing
literature we will then develop hypotheses regarding the positive and
negative effects of emotion work on burnout.
Emotional labour or emotion work (Zapf, 2002) is an important aspect of
employee – client interactions. ‘‘Client’’ is used here to refer to any person
who interacts with an employee, for example, patients, children, customers,
passengers, or guests. Expressing appropriate emotions during face-to-face
or voice-to-voice interactions is a job demand for many employees in the
service industry. Service workers are required to manage their emotions as a
part of their job. Certainly, service workers cannot be assumed to be always
in a good mood. Rather, they may sometimes be bored and they may all
more or less frequently encounter situations eliciting negative emotions such
as anger, fear, or disappointment. Emotion work as part of the job,
however, implies the display of organizationally desired emotions even in
these unpleasant situations. Accordingly, emotion work has been defined as

5. EMOTION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS 3
the psychological processes necessary to regulate organizationally desired
emotions as part of one’s job (e.g., Grandey, 2000; Hochschild, 1983;
Rafaeli & Sutton, 1987; Zapf, 2002).
Hochschild (1983) argued that carrying out emotion work for long hours
would overtax the service providers’ abilities to show the desired emotions. They
would go on smiling, but they would not feel the expected emotions. This
discrepancy between displayed and felt emotions she called ‘‘emotional
dissonance’’. Hochschild maintained that showing emotions not felt at that
moment would—in the long run—lead to the alienation of one’s feelings, which
would cause psychological ill health. In her qualitative interviews with flight
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attendants, she found a variety of negative health consequences of emotion
work such as psychosomatic symptoms, and alcohol and sex problems.
Other studies, however, did not uniformly find these negative effects, and
some even found positive effects of emotion work. Therefore, researchers
started to develop models differentiating various dimensions of emotion work.
Most of these models comprised dimensions referring to the frequency of
emotion display and/or emotional dissonance (e.g., Brotheridge & Grandey,
2002; Grandey, 2000; Morris & Feldman, 1996, 1997; Schaubroeck & Jones,
2000). This also applies to the concept used in the present study. Moreover,
applying Hackman’s (1969) distinction of job analysis approaches we followed
the behaviour requirement approach, thus focusing on the situational job
requirements (see also Diefendorff & Richard, 2003; Schaubroeck & Jones,
2000) rather than on the individual work behaviours or emotion regulation
ˆ ´
strategies (e.g., Brotheridge & Lee, 2002; Cote & Morgan, 2002; Glomb &
Tews, 2004). We differentiated between various dimensions of emotion work
requirements (Zapf, Vogt, Seifert, Mertini, & Isic, 1999): (1) the requirement
to display positive emotions (abbreviated as ‘‘positive emotions’’), (2) the re-
quirement to display and handle negative emotions (‘‘negative emotions’’),
(3) the requirement to sense the emotion of the interaction partner (‘‘sensitivity
requirements’’), and (4) the dissonance between felt and displayed emotions
(‘‘emotional dissonance’’).
In line with most empirical studies (e.g., Adelmann, 1995; Brotheridge &
Lee, 2003; Morris & Feldman, 1997) the frequency of emotional display was
considered to be an important aspect of emotion work. Factor analyses
(Zapf, Vogt et al., 1999) demonstrated the necessity of distinguishing
between being required to show positive and negative emotions. This is so
because the necessity to display positive and negative emotions is not
uniformly high or low across occupations. Rather, it depends on specific job
requirements. For a call centre agent, the requirement to show negative
emotions will be relatively infrequent (e.g., Zapf, Isic, Bechtoldt, & Blau,
2003). In contrast, a frequently cited example for a job comprising a
frequent requirement to show negative emotions is the case of a bill collector
(Sutton, 1991). Another example may be an undertaker, who has to express

6. 4 ZAPF AND HOLZ
seriousness and grief during a funeral. The requirement to display negative
emotions should not be mistaken for letting out one’s negative emotions in
an uncontrolled manner. Rather, the controlled expression of anger may be
used to make clear that one is seriously affected by something or that one is
taking something very seriously. For example, a nurse may use controlled
anger to make clear that she does not want to be touched by a patient. A
kindergarten teacher may use anger to stop children fighting, etc. Whereas
there are some studies which also included the requirement of positive
emotions display (e.g., Diefendorff & Richard, 2003; Schaubroeck & Jones,
2000), the requirement to express negative emotions has been considered in
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qualitative studies (Stenross & Kleinman, 1989; Sutton, 1991) but only
rarely in quantitative studies.
The expression of organizationally desired emotions is not an end in
itself. Emotions are shown to have an influence on clients (Cote, 2005;ˆ ´
Kruml & Geddes, 2000; Pugliesi, 1999). Expressing emotions is one possible
way to influence the clients’ feelings. To be able to influence the clients’
emotions, their accurate perception is an important prerequisite. In social
interactions, information provided by the emotion display of the interaction
partner is used to guide one’s own response (Elfenbein, Marsh, & Ambady,
2002). Therefore, sensitivity requirements as the necessity to be sensitive and
to consider the emotions of clients is another aspect of the emotion work
concept (Zapf, Vogt et al., 1999). Sensitivity requirements are low if there
are no or only few interactions with clients or if an employee can display
organizationally desired emotions independent from the clients’ feelings, for
example, in the case of highly scripted interactions. Sensitivity requirements
are high, if knowledge of the clients’ emotions is a prerequisite for one’s own
emotional reaction.
Finally, as in some of the other studies on emotion work, we included the
concept of emotional dissonance (e.g., Abraham, 1998; Kruml & Geddes,
2000; Morris & Feldman, 1996, 1997; Nerdinger & Roper, 1999; Zapf, Vogt
¨
et al., 1999; Zerbe, 2000). Emotional dissonance occurs when an employee is
required to express emotions which are not genuinely felt in the particular
situation. A person may feel nothing when a certain emotion display is
required, or the display rule may require the suppression of undesired
emotions and the expression of neutrality or a positive emotion instead of a
negative one. Emotional dissonance was found to be resulting from external
demands rather than being a reaction to emotion display or a behavioural
strategy (Zapf, Vogt et al., 1999). We assume that surface acting which is
a response focused strategy to express an emotion which is not felt
(cf. Grandey, 2000; Hochschild, 1983) is an adequate and probably the
most frequently used emotion regulation strategy to respond to emotional
dissonance as a situational demand, e.g., if the situational demand is to be
friendly to an arrogant customer. However, the service provider may also not

7. EMOTION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS 5
be willing to put on the expected friendly face. Rather he or she may look
neutral or even angry, thus showing emotional deviance (Rafaeli & Sutton,
1987) as another possible response. In cases, the service provider may even
try to overcome his or her negative inner feelings, which corresponds to the
concept of deep acting (Hochschild, 1983). In the work of Hochschild, it was
emotional dissonance that was hypothesized to lead to the alienation of one’s
feelings which in turn caused various psychological strains.
The positive and negative effects of emotion work will be investigated
with regard to burnout (e.g., Schaufeli & Enzmann, 1998). This concept was
introduced as an individual reaction to high emotional demands in human
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service work. It can be understood as an indication that employees are no
longer able to manage their emotions adequately when interacting with
clients. Burnout is a syndrome consisting of three aspects: emotional
exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment
(Maslach & Jackson, 1986). Emotional exhaustion measures one’s feeling
of being burnt out, frustrated, and perceiving working with people to be
demanding. Depersonalization comprises the tendency to treat clients like
objects and to become indifferent and apathetic with regard to clients.
Personal accomplishment includes the feeling of having the competence to
do things and of being able to meet one’s aspirations in one’s job.
Explanations for the positive and negative effects of emotion work on
ˆ ´
burnout can be given at two different levels (cf. Cote, 2005). First, at the
interaction level, the emotion work aspects can be seen as indicators of
positive or negative social interactions with clients. Second, explanations at
the conceptual level of emotion regulation relate to processes and
mechanisms inherent in the emotion work concept (Grandey, 2000; Zapf,
2002; see below). In the following we will discuss the potential positive and
negative effects of the emotion work aspects on burnout both at the level of
social interactions and the level of emotion regulation.
Starting with the negative effects, studies consistently found correlations
between emotional dissonance (or variables which share some features with
emotional dissonance such as suppressing negative emotions or surface
acting) and psychological strain (e.g., Abraham, 1998; Brotheridge &
Grandey, 2002; Grebner et al., 2003; Heuven & Bakker, 2003; Lewig &
Dollard, 2003; Morris & Feldman, 1997; Nerdinger & Roper, 1999; ¨
Schaubroeck & Jones, 2000; Zapf, Vogt et al., 1999; Zerbe, 2000). In
particular, relations between emotional dissonance and emotional exhaus-
tion were found in the studies of Heuven and Bakker (2003), Lewig and
Dollard (2003), Morris and Feldman (1997), Nerdinger and Roper (1999),
¨
Zapf, Vogt et al. (1999), and Zerbe (2000). Similar results were found for
emotional dissonance and depersonalization (Dormann & Zapf, 2004;
Dormann, Zapf, & Isic, 2002; Zapf, Vogt et al., 1999). A variety of
explanations exists for this result. An explanation at the interaction level is

8. 6 ZAPF AND HOLZ
that emotional dissonance is related to emotional exhaustion because it is a
sensitive qualitative indicator of unpleasant and stressful interactions with
clients. Clients may be aggressive, they may confront the service provider
with disproportionate expectations, or they may behave in an uncivil
manner. These behaviours have been related to psychological strain (e.g.,
Ben-Zur & Yagil, 2005; Dormann & Zapf, 2004; Duffy, Ganster, & Pagon,
2002; Spector, 1997) and emotional dissonance may be a good indicator to
cover these different kinds of negative social interactions with clients or
customers.
Moreover, at the level of emotion regulation, Gross and colleagues
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(Gross, 1998; Gross & John, 1997; Gross & Levenson, 1997) argued that
emotion regulation—as any process of self-regulation (see Muraven, Tice, &
Baumeister, 1998)—has its psychological costs. Emotional dissonance often
means the suppression of negative emotion and there is evidence that
emotion suppression is related to the sympathetic activation of the
cardiovascular system (Gross & Levenson, 1997) which has been shown to
be associated with poor health, adjustment, and coping responses
(Pennebaker, 1990). Finally, Brotheridge and Lee (2002) suggested that
surface acting which is one way to react if the required emotions do not
conform to the emotions actually felt, may threaten one’s authenticity (see
also Erickson & Wharton, 1997). This comes close to Hochschild’s (1983)
notion that emotional dissonance generates feelings of estrangement from
the self, which is supposed to be related to psychological strain.
Emotional dissonance may also lead to the (chronic) detachment of other
people’s feelings which may be related to depersonalization. Thus, based on
these explanations both at the interactional and the conceptual level and in
line with previous research, we hypothesized that emotional dissonance is
positively related to emotional exhaustion (Hypothesis 1a) and depersona-
lization (Hypothesis 1b).
With regard to the frequency of being required to display emotions,
contradictory hypotheses exist. Some authors proposed that these require-
ments have negative health effects (Hochschild, 1983; Morris & Feldman,
1996); others (Schaubroeck & Jones, 2000) proposed a positive effect for the
requirement to display positive emotions.
Overall, we assume that emotional job requirements, i.e., the requirement
of the job to display positive or negative emotions and to sense the emo-
tion of the client, depend on the existence of display rules (rules for the
expression of emotions), the frequency and the duration of service interactions
as well as on the quality of these interactions, i.e., whether the clients are
behaving positively or negatively (Grandey, 2000; Morris & Feldman, 1996;
Zapf, 2002). We further assume that there is a positive relation between
emotional requirements and health outcomes as long as these requirements are
matched by the personal prerequisites of the service provider. However, if

9. EMOTION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS 7
emotional requirements exceed certain limits, then the likelihood increases that
the emotions which have to be expressed do not match the emotions felt at that
moment corresponding to the definition of emotional dissonance. It follows
that any negative effect of the requirement to display positive or negative
emotions on burnout should be mediated by emotional dissonance (Hypoth-
esis 2). That is, a full mediation effect is hypothesized, which implies that there
should be no direct negative effects of the requirement to display positive
emotions (Hypothesis 2a) or negative emotions (Hypothesis 2b) on emotional
exhaustion or depersonalization if emotional dissonance is included as a
mediator. This mediator effect of emotional dissonance has not yet been
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systematically investigated in the literature.
There is a variety of reasons why emotion work should also have positive
effects on psychological well-being. At the level of social interactions it can
be argued that if service providers successfully meet the requirement to
display and sense emotions, this will have positive effects. In particular, it
will contribute to the feeling of self-efficacy or personal accomplishment.
Based on the literature on the affiliation motive it can be assumed that
dealing with other people and expressing emotions when interacting with
these people satisfies needs for affiliation, status, and recognition, for
example, by showing altruistic behaviour (e.g., Bierhoff, 1990; Hill, 1987).
Stenross and Kleinman (1989) reported that detectives positively assessed
interrogations with criminal suspects because this played a central role for
goal achievement, namely, solving a case. This also included the display of
negative emotions, e.g., when using the ‘‘good cop – bad cop’’ technique.
Pugh (2001) and Tsai (2001) found that the display of positive emotions was
related to customer satisfaction and customers’ positive affect which may be
indicators of successful service interactions. These processes may contribute
to feelings of personal accomplishment.
At the conceptual level of emotion regulation, the expression of emotion
can either be thought of as a spontaneous or automatic process experienced
not to be effortful at all (cf. Scherer & Wallbott, 1990; Zapf, 2002; emotional
harmony according to Ashforth & Humphrey, 1993; passive deep acting
according to Hochschild, 1983), but contributing to a social situation with
positive consequences for the employee concerned. Moreover, the inten-
tional expression of positive emotions usually increases the probability of
the interaction partner to show reciprocal positive emotions in return (Cote, ˆ ´
2005; Wiemann & Giles, 1997). This can be perceived as positive feedback
contributing to the employee’s satisfaction and self-esteem. Emotional
contagion (Hatfield, Cacioppo, & Rapson, 1994) has also been discussed as
a mechanism how the display of positive interactions in service encounters
can influence the clients’ emotions and thus contribute to a positive
rewarding interaction (Pugh, 2001). Adelmann (1995) referred to the
facial feedback hypothesis to argue for positive effects of emotion work

10. 8 ZAPF AND HOLZ
(cf. Strack, Stepper, & Martin, 1988). On a qualitative level, Tolich (1993)
described supermarket clerks who enjoyed showing prescribed emotions in
the form of jokes or entertainment of customers who chose their checkout
lines.
Empirically, findings with regard to positive effects are inconsistent.
Wharton (1993) found a positive relation between emotional labour and job
ˆ ´
satisfaction. Cote and Morgan (2002) were able to demonstrate a causal
effect of expressing positive emotions on job satisfaction in a longitudinal
study. Morris and Feldman (1997) found positive effects of duration on
emotional exhaustion and job satisfaction, but similar negative effects of the
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frequency of interaction. However, these effects all disappeared in multiple
regressions where emotional dissonance was included. Lewig and Dollard
(2003) did not find any positive effect. Brotheridge and Grandey (2002) and
Diefendorff and Richard (2003) found a positive effect of the requirement to
express positive emotions on job satisfaction. Schaubroeck and Jones (2000)
found a respective negative effect instead of the hypothesized positive effect
on physical symptoms. Based on the theoretical considerations and the
existing empirical findings we hypothesized that the requirement to display
positive (Hypothesis 3a) and negative emotions (Hypothesis 3b) and to sense
the emotions of the interaction partner (Hypothesis 3c) are positively related
to personal accomplishment.
So far we described interactions in which service providers automatically
show the required emotions. If, however, the required emotions are not
automatically shown, then the person may respond with deep acting to bring
the felt emotions in line with the required emotions. When using deep acting
as an emotion regulation strategy, an individual actively tries to experience
the required emotion (Grandey, 2000; Hochschild, 1983). This may have
similar effects as if the emotions were displayed automatically (in line with
Hypotheses 3a – b). Accordingly, Brotheridge and Grandey (2002) reported
positive relations between deep acting and personal accomplishment in their
studies. Alternatively, the required emotion may not be spontaneously felt,
but will be displayed. This corresponds to the definition of emotional
dissonance. Thus, we hypothesize that the emotional job requirements to
display positive (Hypothesis 4a) or negative emotions (Hypothesis 4b) are
related to emotional dissonance. Hypothesis 4 follows from Hypothesis 2,
which assumes that there is no direct effect of the emotion work requirement
variables on emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, but that these
effects are mediated by emotional dissonance.
Moreover, if sensitivity requirements are too high they may overtax the
employees’ abilities to be sensitive because of the continuous necessity to
concentrate and process information while communicating with the client.
Therefore, we hypothesize that there are also direct effects on emotional
exhaustion (Hypothesis 5a) and depersonalization (Hypothesis 5b).

11. EMOTION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS 9
In recent years, stress researchers started to control stressor – strain
relationships for negative affectivity (NA). NA has often been equated with
neuroticism (Burke, Brief, & George, 1993; Watson & Clark, 1984), and it
has been interpreted as a general dimension that lowers the threshold to
experience negative emotions. Some authors have argued that NA
represents a nuisance variable that directly affects stressor – strain relations
(e.g., Burke et al., 1993). According to this view, individuals high in NA tend
to view both their working conditions and their health conditions more
negatively than individuals low in NA, thus producing an artificial
correlation between the variables.
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At the theoretical level, it can be argued that individuals high in NA tend
to experience negative emotions more frequently. They will be more often
exposed to emotional dissonance because the display of positive emotions is
typically required in most service interactions. Moreover, applying the
‘‘stressor creation mechanism’’ (Spector, Zapf, Chen, & Frese, 2000) to the
present context implies that individuals high in NA tend to create or
contribute to social conflicts with clients thus creating or contributing to a
negative quality of this interaction in which negative emotions are
experienced instead of the positive ones frequently required by the
organizational display rules.
Studies show that the burnout dimensions are associated with NA or
neuroticism (Schaufeli & Enzmann, 1998). Moreover, although individuals
with a tendency to experience negative emotions should report more
occasions where positive emotions are required but negative emotions are
felt (emotional dissonance), we hypothesize that these mechanisms do not
substantially decrease the relation between emotional dissonance and
emotional exhaustion and depersonalization. This results from the fact of
the emotional dissonance measure in the present study is intended to describe
aspects of the work situation rather than subjective reactions. Usually, such
measures are only little affected by NA as a nuisance factor (Spector et al.,
2000). We did not expect NA to affect the emotional requirements because
these are mainly determined by the display rules and the frequency and
duration of service interactions. Moreover, the instrument used in this study
aimed at measuring the work environment thereby trying to minimize the
influence of individual cognitive and emotional processing in the measure-
ment process (Frese & Zapf, 1988). There is evidence that under these
circumstances, the effects of NA on stressor – strain relations are only small
in terms of Cohen’s (1992) effect size criteria (Spector et al., 2000). So far,
several studies on emotion work included neuroticism or NA. Brotheridge
and Grandey (2002) and Diefendorff and Richard (2003) found an effect
on demands to suppress negative emotions. In contrast, Schaubroeck and
Jones (2000) found a relatively strong effect of trait negative affect on
demands to suppress negative emotions (r ¼ .48). Thus, we hypothesized that

12. 10 ZAPF AND HOLZ
NA or neuroticism should have a positive effect on emotional dissonance and
burnout (Hypothesis 6). However, NA should not affect the relation between
emotional dissonance and burnout in a significant way. In summary, we will
test the following hypotheses, which are also shown in Figure 1:
Hypothesis 1: Emotional dissonance will be positively related to
emotional exhaustion (H1a) and depersonalization (H1b).
Hypothesis 2: There are no direct effects of the requirement to display
emotions on emotional exhaustion and depersonalization. Rather, the
effects are mediated by emotional dissonance.
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Hypothesis 3: The requirement to display positive (H3a) and negative
emotions (H3b) and the requirements to sense the emotion of the client
(H3c) are positively related to the feeling of personal accomplishment.
Hypothesis 4: The requirements to display positive (H4a) or negative
emotions (H4b) will also be related to emotional dissonance.
Hypothesis 5: There will be a direct effect of sensitivity requirements on
emotional exhaustion (H5a) and depersonalization (H5b).
Hypothesis 6: NA has a small effect (according to Cohen’s, 1992, effect
size criteria) on emotional dissonance, but will not change the relation
between emotional dissonance and burnout (H6).
Figure 1. Hypothesized relations between emotion work and burnout.

13. EMOTION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS 11
METHOD
Samples
In this study we will report analyses based on two samples. The first sample
consisted of employees working in different service sectors (‘‘service
sample’’) and the second was based on a randomly drawn sample
(‘‘representative sample’’).
The service sample consisted of four subsamples. The first subsample was
collected in the hotel business. With the help of the ‘‘Berufsgenossenschaft
Nahrung’’ (professional food association), 20 hotels in an area in South
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West Germany were included in the study. Of the participants, 15% had a
‘‘Hauptschulabschluss’’ (lower stream school leaving certificate), 29% had
‘‘mittlere Reife’’ (middle stream school-leaving certificate), 44% had
‘‘Abitur’’ (high school diploma qualifying for university entrance), and
11% some type of university degree. Only a minority of 18% did not have a
specific vocational education related to the hotel business. The second
subsample consisted of participants who were employed in 14 call centres of
various firms. This subsample consisted of employees who all had voice-to-
voice contacts with clients. Of the participants, 74% had a high school
diploma qualifying for university entrance (Abitur) or some kind of
university degree, 76% received calls but did not call clients themselves
(inbound); the remainder were preoccupied with both calling and receiving
calls (inbound and outbound). The third subsample was collected in seven
banks. Of the participants, 43% had a specific banking vocational education
and another 32% a university degree. The majority of the subsample (97%)
had more than 2 years of job experience. The final subsample consisted of
employees collected in 70 of the 140 public kindergartens in one of
Germany’s large cities. The kindergartens were systematically selected to
obtain the full variety of kindergartens for the subsample. The subsample
consisted of almost 50% of the total workforce of the city’s public
kindergartens. Of the participants, 22% possessed some kind of university
degree, 35% had visited vocational schools for kindergarten teachers, and
74% had received some kind of high school degree. In all, 87% had some
kind of specific education for their job and 94% of the subsample had more
than 2 years of job experience. Due to missing values, the data of N ¼ 1024
participants could be used for structural equation modelling (SEM).
Characteristics of the subsamples are summarized in Table 1.
The second sample (representative sample) consisted of participants from
two large German cities who worked at least 30 hours a week, who were not
self-employed, and whose German was reasonably good so that they were
able to fill in the questionnaire. Participants were randomly chosen from a
citizen database. They received a letter asking for participation. After some
days the potential participants were contacted by telephone. Many people

14. 12 ZAPF AND HOLZ
TABLE 1
Description of the service sample
Response Percentage
Subsample n rate in % Mean age women Occupations
Hotels 175 29 80% between 71 Frontline officers,
18 and 32b waiters or
waitresses,
administrative
staff
Call centre 250 50 31 75 Call centre agents
in banking,
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insurance,
airline industry
Bank 122 –a 37 50 Banking
employees
Kindergartens 611 67 39 94 Kindergarten
teachers, social
workers,
technical staff
Total sample 1158 – 36c 88
a
Distribution of questionnaires was organized by the institutions. They were not able to report
the response rate.
b
To ensure anonymity, we were only able to use age categories (18 – 22, 23 – 28; . . . .63 – 67).
c
Category mean was used for the hotel subsample to compute overall mean age.
were excluded because they did not fulfil the criteria mentioned above. We
contacted 767 persons who fulfilled the criteria for participation; 405
persons sent back the questionnaire anonymously, which corresponded to a
response rate of 52.8%. This estimation was the lower bound of the response
rate, because among the 767 persons contacted some refused to take part in
the study and finished the telephone call before the researchers received all
the information required to decide whether the person fulfilled all criteria for
participation. Two raters rated the jobs of these participants whether they
were service jobs. There were three participants where the raters disagreed;
these were excluded from the sample. They identified 184 service jobs, which
is 45.4% of the total sample. Of these 184 participants full data were
available from 175 participants because of missing data.
Mean age of the representative sample was 40.9, ranging from 19 to 70
years; 37.8% were women. Moreover, 55.9% were in possession of some kind
of high school degree, and 23% attended modern secondary school, 19.8%
had a lower stream school leaving certificate, 1.8% who had no certificate at
all, and 35.6% had some kind of university degree; 79% reported to have
finished a professional training relevant for their current job. On average
(median category), they had worked for 15 – 20 years; they had worked in
their current job for approximately 2 – 5 years of this period of time.

15. EMOTION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS 13
Instruments
Emotion work/emotional labour was measured using the Frankfurt
Emotion Work Scales1 (FEWS 3.0; Zapf, Mertini, Seifert, Vogt, & Isic,
1999; Zapf, Vogt et al., 1999).
. Positive emotions refer to the requirement to show pleasant emotions
(example item: ‘‘In your job how often does it occur that you have to
display pleasant emotions towards your clients?’’).
. Negative emotions ask for the necessity of displaying and dealing with
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unpleasant emotions (example item: ‘‘How often does it occur in your
job that you have to display unpleasant emotions towards your
clients?’’).
. Sensitivity requirements examine whether empathy or knowledge about
clients’ current feelings are required by the job (example item: ‘‘Does
your job require paying attention to the feelings of your clients?’’).
. Emotional dissonance refers to the display of unfelt emotions and to
the suppression of felt but organizationally undesired emotions
(example item: ‘‘How often does it occur in your job that one has
to display positive emotions that do not correspond to what is felt in
this situation?’’).
For most of the FEWS scales there was a five-point response scale for most
items ranging from ‘‘very rarely/never’’ (1), ‘‘rarely (once a week)’’ (2),
‘‘sometimes (once a day)’’ (3), ‘‘often (several times a day)’’ (4), to ‘‘very
often (several times an hour)’’ (5).
Burnout (emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accom-
plishment) was measured using the Maslach Burnout Inventory – German
version of Bussing and Perrar (1992). Emotional exhaustion measures one’s
¨
feeling of being burnt out, frustrated, and perceiving working with people to
be very demanding. Depersonalization comprises the tendency to treat
clients like objects and to become indifferent and apathetic with regard to
clients. Personal accomplishment includes the feeling of having the
competence to do things and of being able to meet one’s personal
aspirations. The burnout items were answered on a seven-point scale.
Neuroticism was taken from a bipolar adjective-rating list to measure the
five-factor model of personality (Costa & McCrae, 1985). The measure was
based on the 45-item bipolar adjective-rating list developed by Ostendorf
and colleagues (Ostendorf & Angleitner, 1992) in the version of Schallberger
and Venetz (1999). The authors demonstrated that this reduced version was
1
A German, English, French, or Spanish version of the instrument can be obtained from the
first author on request.

16. 14 ZAPF AND HOLZ
satisfactory in terms of factorial structure and internal consistencies of
scales. The scale for neuroticism used in this study consisted of six bipolar
items on a 6-point scale, with each pole ranging from 1 and 6 ¼ ‘‘very’’, 2
and 5 ¼ ‘‘quite’’, and 3 and 4 ¼ ‘‘rather’’.
Reliabilities of the scales were sufficient or good in most cases. They were
relatively low for the requirement to display positive and negative emotions.
Note, however, that these scales are both relatively short and that they show
high correlations to some other scales. Depersonalization also showed low
reliabilities in other studies (Bussing & Perrar, 1992). Means and standard
¨
deviations of the above mentioned variables are presented in Table 2, and
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the intercorrelations are presented in Table 3.
Statistical analyses
First we tested the model presented in Figure 1 using structural equation
modelling (SEM). In this model, causal coefficients will be estimated for
parameters referring to hypotheses 1 – 6. We were not interested in causal
models regarding the burnout components (see Golembiewski, Munzenrider,
& Stevenson, 1986; Leiter & Maslach, 1988; van Dierendonck, Schaufeli,
& Buunk, 2001). Therefore, latent correlations among the residuals of these
variables were estimated. We also estimated latent correlations among the
residuals of the emotional requirement variables. The analyses were carried
out with LISREL 8.3 (Joreskog & Sorbom, 1996) using the maximum
¨ ¨
TABLE 2
Psychometric data of study variables
Service sample Representative sample
No. of
items Range Mean SD Coeff.a Mean SD Coeff.a
Requirement to 3 1–5 3.44 0.82 .52 3.09 1.03 .72
display positive
emotions
Requirement to 4 1–5 2.96 0.93 .68 2.65 0.93 .76
display negative
emotions
Sensitivity 3 1–5 3.44 1.03 .85 3.26 1.26 .91
requirements
Emotional 5 1–5 3.12 0.79 .80 3.15 0.79 .75
dissonance
Neuroticism 6 1–6 2.83 0.66 .85 2.83 0.83 .82
Emotional 9 0–6 1.54 1.04 .88 1.32 0.87 .82
exhaustion
Depersonalization 5 0–6 1.02 0.99 .65 1.07 0.98 .81
Personal 8 0–6 3.61 0.89 .79 3.59 1.34 .73
accomplishment

17. Downloaded by [University of Barcelona] at 06:12 19 February 2012
TABLE 3
Intercorrelation of study variables
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
1. Age .09 .13 .06 .06 7.03 .29 .14 .01 7.03
2. Gender 7.08 7.08 .09 7.06 7.04 7.23 7.04 .08 .07
3. Requirement to display 7.20 7.08 .46 .61 .41 .04 .14 .15 .22
positive emotions
4. Requirement to display 7.00 7.13 .37 .48 .21 7.03 .04 .15 .18
negative emotions
5. Sensitivity requirements 7.05 7.09 .51 .48 .30 .04 .14 .13 .25
6. Emotional dissonance 7.30 .02 .41 .15 .29 .06 .22 .36 .09
7. Neuroticism .03 7.09 7.08 7.05 7.02 .09 .38 .15 7.35
8. Emotional exhaustion 7.01 7.10 .11 .20 .19 .27 .31 .54 7.27
9. Depersonalization 7.19 .10 .12 .10 .11 .36 .15 .52 7.21
10. Personal accomplishment .01 .00 .34 .16 .30 .06 7.28 7.16 7.10
Service sample (N ¼ 1152) ¼ lower triangle; r 4 .07 are significant at p 5 .01.
Representative sample (N ¼ 184) ¼ upper triangle; r 4 .14 are significant at p 5 .05; r 4 .18 are significant at p 5 .01.
Gender: female ¼ 1; male ¼ 2 in both samples.
15

18. 16 ZAPF AND HOLZ
likelihood method to examine the covariance matrix of the variables.
Chi square statistics, goodness of fit (GFI), adjusted goodness of fit (AGFI),
root means square error of approximation (RMSEA), the Akaike informa-
tion criterion (AIC), and the normed fit index (NFI) were used to assess the
model fit (Bentler, 1980; Joreskog & Sorbom, 1996; Schermelleh-Engel,
¨ ¨
Moosbrugger, & Muller, 2003). Experts (e.g., Schermelleh-Engel et al., 2003)
¨
suggest the following criteria to indicate a good model fit: w2/df 2; GFI
.95; AGFI .90; RMSEA .05; and NFI .95. AIC should be smaller than
the AIC for the comparison model.
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RESULTS
We started testing models with effects of the requirement to express positive
and negative emotions on exhaustion and depersonalization (direct effects
model), but without effects on emotional dissonance. We then tested the full
mediation model with effects of the requirement to express positive and
negative emotions on emotional dissonance. Third, we tested a model with
both direct and mediator effects. The model with the direct effects showed a
poor fit in both samples, w2 ¼ 172.37, df ¼ 7, p ¼ .0; AIC ¼ 230.37 in the
service sample; w2 ¼ 33.39, df ¼ 7, p ¼ .0 AIC ¼ 91.39 in the representative
sample. In contrast the postulated full mediation model corresponding to the
hypotheses and the theoretical model as presented in Figure 1 showed a
reasonable fit for the service sample, w2 ¼ 47.70, df ¼ 9, p ¼ .0; GFI ¼ .99;
AGFI ¼ .95; RMSEA ¼ .065; AIC ¼ 101.70; NFI ¼ .98, and a very good
fit for the representative sample, w2 ¼ 6.03, df ¼ 9, p ¼ .74; GFI ¼ .99;
AGFI ¼ .97; RMSEA ¼ .0; AIC ¼ 59.98; NFI ¼ .98. The direct effects model
and the full mediation model are not nested. Therefore, only the AIC could
be used to compare the models. The AIC was clearly lower for the full
mediation model thus rejecting the direct effects model. In a next step we
compared the full mediation model with a model with both direct and
mediator effects. This model is nested with the full mediation model. Not
surprisingly, these models showed a very good fit (for the service sample,
w2 ¼ 24.55, df ¼ 5, p 5 .01; GFI ¼ .99; AGFI ¼ .96; RMSEA ¼ .062; AIC ¼
86.55; NFI ¼ .99; for the representative sample, w2 ¼ 2.36, df ¼ 5, p ¼ .80;
GFI ¼ 1.00; AGFI ¼ .98; RMSEA ¼ .0; AIC ¼ 64.36; NFI ¼ .99. The model
comparison was not significant for the representative sample, Dw2 ¼ 3.62,
df ¼ 4; p 4 .05, and it was just significant for the service sample, Dw2 ¼ 23.15,
df ¼ 4; p 5 .05. For the service sample more detailed analyses revealed a
significant effect of the requirement to express negative emotions on
emotional exhaustion, but no effects of this variable on emotional
dissonance. We then computed an optimized model where all parameters
not significant in both samples, were fixed to zero. The effects concerned
comprised the effect of negative emotions on personal accomplishment and

19. EMOTION WORK IN ORGANIZATIONS 17
emotional dissonance as well as the effect of sensitivity requirements on
depersonalization. Moreover, we used the maximum modification index of
the LISREL program to improve the model for the service sample. For this
sample, the modification index suggested a relation between positive
emotions and neuroticism. Because cause – effect structures were unclear,
we modelled a correlation between the residuals of these variables. Moreover,
we added a causal effect of sensitivity requirements on emotional dissonance
and a causal effect of emotional dissonance on personal accomplishment.
Both optimized models were very good and met all criteria for a good model
fit: for the service sample, w2 ¼ 12.19, df ¼ 8, p ¼ .14; GFI ¼ 1.00; AGFI ¼ .99;
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RMSEA ¼ .023; AIC ¼ 68.19; NFI ¼ .99; for the representative sample,
w2 ¼ 5.12, df ¼ 11, p ¼ .93; GFI ¼ .99; AGFI ¼ .98; RMSEA ¼ .0;
AIC ¼ 55.12; NFI ¼ .99. The results are shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 shows the expected correlations among the emotional
requirement variables and among the burnout variables, which were similar
in both samples. Moreover, it shows that most, though not all hypotheses
were supported by the empirical data.
Figure 2. Relations between emotion work and burnout: Empirical results (optimized model).
Results for the representative sample in parentheses.