Process Model Linking Daily Political Behavior and Affective Wellbeing: The Role of Gender

Abstract

Despite significant improvement in women’s career outcomes, the continued gender gap makes it clear that barriers remain. One such barrier explored here is the impact of political behavior in organizations. This research proposes and tests a theoretically derived model of the immediate consequences of daily negative political experiences on employee affective wellbeing, and examines whether men and women experience that process differently. We argue that being exposed to negative political behaviors has the potential to trigger negative affective reactions, depending on one’s past experiences with organizational politics and current sociopolitical resources. We hypothesize that women are at greater risk of experiencing immediate detrimental effects from exposure to negative political behaviors due to more negative past experiences with organizational politics and a lack of sociopolitical resources. We test our model using a daily diary study research design to capture the immediate effects of experiencing negative political behaviors on affective wellbeing. We find that the relationship between negative daily political behavior and daily affective wellbeing is more negative for individuals who report fewer sociopolitical resources, and that women were more likely to report having more negative political experiences in the past and fewer sociopolitical resources than men. As a result of having fewer sociopolitical resources, women suffer the negative effects of political encounters more strongly than men. This finding extends past research examining the gendered experience of occupational stress, by examining the process through which the experience of negative political events differentially impact the health and wellbeing of men and women.