Anxious hotel employees in China: Engaged or exhausted? Multiple effects of workplace anxiety

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the multiple effects of hotel employees' workplace anxiety under COVID-19. By using time-lag data with 223 matched responses, we showed that workplace anxiety has a positive direct impact on workaholic behavior, emotional exhaustion, and work withdrawal behavior and that effort-reward balance (imbalance) would ameliorate (deteriorate) the negative effect of workaholic behavior on emotional exhaustion, implying that understanding of the adverse but reversible effects of workplace anxiety could help strengthen the hotel industry's development. This study may be the first attempt to examine the moderation of ERI in the link between workaholic behavior and emotional exhaustion, as well as how to mitigate such negative consequences, thereby contributing to the existing hospitality literature. Moreover, we argue that exploring more new ways to deal with workplace anxiety among hotel employees while maintaining employee performance is worthwhile for future research, especially given the industry's current competitive conditions.