Abstract
Controlled Interpersonal Affect Regulation –the process of deliberately influencing the internal feeling states of others– occurs in a variety of interpersonal relationships and contexts. An incipient corpus of research shows that interpersonal affect regulation can be characterized as a goal-directed behavior that uses self-control processes which, according to the strength model of self-regulation, consumes a limited resource that is also used by other self-control processes. Using interpersonal affect-improving and affect-worsening regulation strategies can increase agent’s resource depletion but there is reason to think that effects will partially rely on target’s feedback in response to the regulation. Using a healthcare paradigm, an experiment was conducted to test the combined effects of interpersonal affect regulation use and patient feedback on healthcare workers’ resource depletion, measured as self-reported experienced and expected emotional exhaustion, and persistence on a self-regulation task. Medical students (N = 78) were randomly assigned to a 2(interpersonal affect regulation: affect-worsening vs. affect-improving) × 2(patients’ feedback: positive vs. negative) factorial between-subjects design and given instructions to play the role of doctors in interactions with two professional actors trained to act as patients. Analysis of covariance showed that affect-worsening was more depleting than affect-improving for all measures, whereas the recovery effects of positive feedback varied depending on strategy type and measure. The findings confirm the characterization of interpersonal affect regulation as potentially depleting, but suggest that the correspondence between the agent’s strategy and the target’s response needs to be taken into consideration. Use of affect-improving and positive feedback showed positive effects on self-rated performance, indicating that interpersonal affect regulation is relevant for organizational as well as personal outcomes.
Highlights
When doctors try to make patients feel less distressed about their health diagnosis, or call center operators attempt to make customers feel regret for not accepting an “incredible” offer, or flight attendants act to calm down anxious passengers, they are engaging in a process of controlled interpersonal affect regulation because they are deliberately trying to influence the internal feeling states of another person, including their moods and emotions
Post hoc multiple comparisons showed that affect-improving participants who received positive feedback reported significantly, F(1,73) = 12.36, p = 0.001, η2p = 0.14, Cohen’s d = −1.31, lower emotional exhaustion, M = 0.50 (SD = 0.76), than affect-improving participants who received negative feedback, M = 1.66 (SD = 1.01), whereas for affect-worsening the difference between positive feedback, M = 1.59 (SD = 1.27) and negative feedback, M = 1.54 (SD = 1.35) was not significant, F(1,73) = 0.01, p = 0.91, η2p = 0.00, Cohen’s d = 0.04
The results suggest that the recovery effect of targets’ feedback on resource depletion are not straightforward because: for affectworsening, positive feedback had no effects for experienced emotional exhaustion or anagram persistence but a positive effect for expected emotional exhaustion; while for affect-improving, negative feedback had a negative effect for experienced and expected emotional exhaustion, but a positive effect for anagram persistence
Summary
When doctors try to make patients feel less distressed about their health diagnosis, or call center operators attempt to make customers feel regret for not accepting an “incredible” offer, or flight attendants act to calm down anxious passengers, they are engaging in a process of controlled interpersonal affect regulation because they are deliberately trying to influence the internal feeling states of another person, including their moods and emotions. Niven et al (2009) have empirically established two major categories of interpersonal affect regulation They define interpersonal affect regulation that is aimed at improving how others feel (affect-improving). This can involve someone (the agent) trying to induce a positive feeling in a target person but it can involve reducing a negative feeling. A second category describes interpersonal affect regulation that is aimed at worsening how others feel (affect-worsening). This can involve trying to induce a negative feeling in a target person but it can involve dampening a positive feeling. Examples of affect-worsening strategies are making defaulting clients aware of the negative consequences that their behavior may have upon the financial situation of their family or withdrawing attention from clients to extinguish their unwarranted demands
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