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Emotion work in service occupations

Employees in the service industry are confronted with particular job requirements, as they have to deal with customers, clients or patients when performing their tasks. Companies want this interaction to meet certain requirements, making it a "purchased" part of the service. Usually, employees need to express positive emotions to their customers, regardless of how they really feel.

TThe requirement to regulate one's emotions in order to express certain, organizationally desired emotions in gestures, facial expressions, and voice, regardless of one's true inner feelings, is referred to in the literature as emotion work, or emotional labour. In our works, we strive to find out in which circumstances emotion work is detrimental, causing employee ill-health. But at the same time, we want to find out in which cases emotion work corresponds to optimal service quality, so that emotion regulation is well worth the effort.

Current Research Project: STRIKE: Self-Guided Training Approaches to Enhance Emotional Resilience in Challenging Customer Interactions

The “STRIKE” project aims to foster emotional resilience among retail employees, improve their emotional regulation skills during challenging customer interactions, and help them maintain emotional stability in stressful situations. At the same time, the project seeks to optimize workplace conditions to actively support employees in their emotional labor.

Given that customers cannot be "changed", behavioral measures such as targeted training is of central importance. To date, the retail sector lacks well-established “on-the-job” training programs specifically designed to enhance emotional labor skills. Emotional labor not only affects employees' well-being, but also plays a significant role in determining customer satisfaction and loyalty. This project will develop a training program and evaluate it according to scientific criteria.

Check the project homepage for more information (only available in German): https://respectwork.de/

Related publications:

  • Kern, M., Trumpold, K., & Zapf, D. (2021). Emotion work as a source of employee well- and ill-being: The moderating role of service interaction type. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 30(6), 850-871. https://doi.org/10.1080/1359432X.2021.1873771
  • Johnson, S. J., Machowski, S., Holdsworth, L., Kern, M., & Zapf, D. (2017). Age, emotion regulation strategies, burnout, and engagement in the service sector: Advantages of older workers. Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 33(3), 205–216. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rpto.2017.09.001
  • Trumpold, K., Kern, M., & Zapf, D. (2021). Emotion regulation and service-related attitudes: Connecting customer orientation and service organization identification with customer interactions. Journal of Service Management Research, 5(4), 270–284. https://doi.org/10.15358/2511-8676-2021-4-270
  • Trumpold, K., Zapf, D., & Kern, M. (2024). A reverse perspective on emotion work and well-being: Connecting chronic burnout to emotion regulation from an antecedent perspective. International Journal of Stress Management. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1037/str0000336
  • Winkler, A. D., Pihan, N., Zapf, D., & Kern, M. (2025). Serving with masks: A comparative analysis of flight attendants’ emotional labor between normal and COVID-19 times. Service Business. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11628-025-00585-3
  • Winkler, A. D., Zapf, D., & Kern, M. (2024). Effects of emotion-rule dissonance on emotional exhaustion and physiological health: A two-wave study. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 73(2), 540–564. https://doi.org/10.1111/apps.12489
  • Zapf, D., Kern, M., Tschan, F., Holman, D., & Semmer, N. K. (2021). Emotion work: A work psychology perspective. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 8, 139–172. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-012420-062451
  • Zapf, D., Kern, M., Tschan, F., Holman, D., & Semmer, N. K. (2024). Emotion work in organizations. In M. C. W. Peeters, J. De Jonge, T. W. Taris (Eds.). An introduction to contemporary work psychology (2nd ed., S. 170–189). Wiley.