Workplace mistreatment and emotional labor: A latent profile analysis

Abstract

By adopting a person-centered approach, this research explored emotional labor latent profiles based on employees’ levels of surface acting and deep acting. Further, this study examined the role of workplace mistreatment from different sources (customer incivility, coworker incivility, abusive supervision, and organizational dehumanization) in the prediction of profile membership and the associations between these profiles and several outcomes (job satisfaction, turnover intentions, emotional exhaustion, and affective commitment). Five profiles of emotional laborers were identified (surface actors, regulators, low actors, non-actors, and deep actors). Customer incivility, coworker incivility, and organizational dehumanization but not abusive supervision were found to be associated with profile membership. Particularly, employees who perceived high levels of organizational dehumanization had a higher likelihood to be identified as surface actors. Overall, positive outcomes were associated with deep actors, while surface actors were more likely to be related to negative outcomes. Our findings provide further support for the advantages of adopting a person-centered perspective to the study of emotional labor.