Concept Of Emotion Work Research Articles

Socjologia tęsknoty w badaniach migracyjnych: społeczne uwarunkowania emocji z perspektywy studium białoruskich emigrantów

The aim of this article is to analyse feelings of longing and nostalgia of Belarusian migrants in Poland and return migrants in 2020–2022 on the basis of the multiple case study. Three categories of migrants were included: post-August 2020 emigrants, dual emigrants and returned migrants. The theoretical basis of the study was the concept of emotion work and concepts focusing on the emotions of longing and nostalgia. The empirical material was selected in a purposive manner. The empirical data included statements made by migrants on social media and in journalistic interviews (Polish and Belarusian). Answers were sought to the following research questions: What do migrants miss? How do they cope with these emotions? What are the socio-cultural determinants of longing and nostalgia of Belarusian migrants? The results of the qualitative study show that longing is complex in nature and that in every situation migrants undertake emotion work, using cognitive and behavioural strategies. Key themes of longing relate to loved ones and places. Feelings of nostalgia include the time before 2020, perceived by migrants as more secure. Cultural determinants include the special attachment of Belarusians to their country, family, community.

Mother blame and emotion work: a sociological study on Swedish mothers of children with long-term school absenteeism

Building on interviews with 31 Swedish mothers and drawing on the concepts of emotion work, feeling rules, and cultural, economic and social capital, the article examines the emotion management mothers of neurodivergent and school-absent children carry out as they navigate school and care systems to improve their children’s situation. Three main findings are presented: (1) the mothers were left with a burdensome individual responsibility to obtain support for their children in the education and care sectors, and while doing so, they were expected to follow feeling rules emphasising reason, calmness and a constructive attitude; (2) the emotion work the mothers carried out in relation to the feeling rules was underscored by mother blame; and (3) the mothers’ emotion work was marked by their cultural, economic and social capital, though not always in a straightforward way. The article contributes to research on mother blame by illuminating the underexplored issue of emotion work among mothers experiencing mother blame. The results also add to previous research on mother blame and social class by demonstrating when and how mothers’ cultural, economic and social capital helps them fend off mother blame and when such resources play a more ambiguous role.

The third shift: Addressing emotion work in couple therapy.

Research on the gendered division of household work in western political economies often neglects its emotional dimensions. This conceptual paper draws on concepts of emotion work and feminist care ethics to explore gendered and intersecting divisions of emotions and emotional work in couple relationships and their implications for couple therapy. Although emotion work has been studied in workplace settings, less attention has been paid to inequalities in the privatized realm of interpersonal relationships, including romantic and filial ones. Women and feminine partners' culturally presumed expertise in emotions typically positions them as carrying primary responsibility for managing emotions in intimate relationships. Couple therapy is an important site of interaction that can both support and, potentially, disrupt the invisibility and gendering of emotion work in intimate relationships, thus shedding light on recurring patterns of women's subordination and exploitation. We conclude by advancing suggestions for addressing gendered and intersectional dimensions of emotion work in therapy practice.

Virginia Woolf and the emotion work of reading George Eliot: A case study in reader–author relationships

AbstractVirginia Woolf has written extensively about her own strategies of reading. In her essays and her letters, she often describes the methods she employs to reconstruct the real author’s personality and retrace authorial voices in the books she was experiencing as a reader. This article will compare Woolf’s methods to contemporary discussions about immersion in fictional texts and emotional engagement with characters, eventually arguing that the concept of emotion work, developed by sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild, is a fruitful one for understanding the process Woolf engages in. Thanks to this theoretical approach, it will also offer an original analysis of the relationship between Woolf and Eliot, arguing that the study of Woolf’s engagement with this writer can offer a point of access for the study of Woolf’s relationship with the legacy of Victorian women writers, an emotionally charged one.

The joy of foodwork: allergies, gendered foodwork and emotion work in parenting advice, 1991–2020

ABSTRACT At a time when child health is receiving considerable attention, child feeding practices are under intense scrutiny as the site for developing healthy habits and preventing childhood illness. Previous scholars of foodwork detail the various types of labor involved in feeding children, purchasing foods, researching foods, preparing appealing meals, and managing emotions around these activities. Less scholarly attention has been given to the advice directed at parents - mothers in particular - about feeding children. Our study examines parenting advice on general feeding and feeding children with food allergies published between 1991 and 2020 in a Canadian mainstream parenting magazine. We build on Arlie Hochschild's concepts of emotion work and feeling rules, demonstrating that magazines instruct parents to manage emotions to create pleasurable eating experiences for children. We conclude with implications for studies of foodwork, emotion work and childrearing.

Mothering at a distance and disclosure of maternal HIV to children in Kingston, Jamaica

AbstractExisting guidelines (WHO, 2011) advise caretakers and professionals to disclose children’s and their caretakers’ HIV status to children, despite a lack of evidence concerning the potential implications in resource-constrained settings. Our research uses feminist Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) to explore the experiences of HIV positive mothers in Kingston, Jamaica, focusing on their lived experiences of talking to their children about maternal HIV. This paper will focus on the concept of mothering at a distance and how this presents additional challenges for HIV positive mothers who are trying to establish emotional closeness in relation to talking to their children about their HIV. Using Hochschild’s concept of emotion work and examples from the interviews, we highlight the difficult contexts informing women’s decisions when negotiating discussions about their HIV. Women may choose full, partial or differential disclosure or children may be told their mother’s HIV status by others. Disclosure policy, we argue, reflects Anglo-Northern constructions of the family and parenting which may not adequately reflect the experiences of poor urban mothers in low and middle income countries. We argue that policy needs to recognise culturally-specific family formations, which, in Jamaica includes absent fathers, mothering at a distance and mothering non-biological children. This article reflects on the experiences of an under-researched group, poor urban Jamaican women practising mothering at a distance, using a novel methodological approach (IPA) to bring into relief unique insights into their lived experiences and will contribute to the global policy and research literature on HIV disclosure.

Learning cultures in retail: apprenticeship, identity and emotional work in England and Germany

The paper is based on a study of apprentices in retail and motor vehicle maintenance in England and Germany, exploring their perceptions of themselves as learners over time and in particular learning environments. The study combines biographical interviews with participant observation in colleges and workplaces. The paper examines the concept of emotion work in the context of retail apprenticeships. It explores the extent to which the skill of emotion management is developed through apprenticeship programmes and the meaning young people attach to it in the context of their individual biographies. Comparing the German dual system with the minimalist approach of an English supermarket, it concludes that emotion work may be part of an occupational competence offering positive means for identification as a critical resource for young people’s negotiation of identity. The findings challenge existing conceptualisations of emotional labour and have important implications for the provision of apprenticeships in the service sector.

‘It's People's Whole Lives’: Gender, Class and the Emotion Work of User Involvement in Mental Health Services

The concept of emotion work has been widely applied to the study of service work. Yet its use in understanding the social dynamics of user involvement in public services remains under explored. Drawing on a study of user involvement in mental health service development, I show its utility for understanding this social and political realm. The article discusses findings from a critical discursive and contextual emotional labour perspective, taking into account organizational and institutional factors as well as social structural dimensions of gender and social class. It shows how discourses on emotion, constructed through articulation of personal experiences of service usage both reflected and constructed the ideological and structural positionings of women service users, while emotional discourse — displays of anger in user involvement forums — worked to constitute traditionally male and ideologically masculine elements of the field, as well as the working‐class identities of some participants. These forms of emotion work, and the ways in which they elicited further emotion management from service users and workers alike, are located in relation to the rules of engagement of user involvement and the bureaucratic institutional forms within which this took place. The article concludes that the emotion work of user involvement ultimately helped to reproduce the dominant institutional and social order, including its gender and class dimensions. Implications for policies and practices of user involvement in mental health services are provided.

Flood of emotions: emotional work and long-term disaster recovery

This paper uses concepts of emotion work and emotional labour to explore people’s experiences of the long-term disaster recovery process. It draws on data taken from two qualitative research projects which looked at adults’ and children’s recovery from the floods of June 2007 in Hull, UK. The paper argues that the emotional work of recovery cannot be separated from the physical and practical work of recovering the built environment. It shows that a focus on emotion work can lead to a more nuanced understanding of what recovery actually means and who is involved, leading to the identification of hidden vulnerabilities and a better understanding of the longer timescales involved in the process.

Nursing emotion work and interprofessional collaboration in general internal medicine wards: a qualitative study

This paper is a report of a study to examine nursing emotion work and interprofessional collaboration in order to understand and improve collaborative nursing practice. Nursing standards identify collaborative practice as necessary for quality patient care yet many nurses are often reluctant to participate in interprofessional teams. Strategies intended to improve participation often fail which suggests that the factors underpinning nurses' disinclination towards interprofessional collaboration have yet to be understood. The concept of emotion work has not been applied to nursing interprofessionalism, and holds the potential to improve collaborative practice. Nursing emotion work is defined as the management of the emotions of self and others in order to improve patient care. Qualitative data were collected in 2006 using non-participant observation, shadowing and semi-structured interviews with nursing, medical and allied professionals in the general internal medicine wards of three hospitals in urban Canada. Nurses' collaborations with other professionals are influenced by emotion work considerations. The establishment and maintenance of a nursing esprit de corps, corridor conflicts with physicians, and the failure of the interdisciplinary team to acknowledge the importance of nursing's core caring values are important factors underpinning nurses' interprofessional disengagement. Longstanding emotion work issues must be addressed before nurses will engage collaboratively. We suggest improving nursing collaboration through the refining of holistic nursing information, and reflections on practice by all interprofessional team members.

対人援助職における感情労働がバーンアウトおよびストレスに与える影響

This study examined the relationship between emotion work (Zapf, 2002) and burnout. One hundred and eighty-two human service professionals (nurses and caregivers) completed questionnaires. A factor analysis revealed that the concept of emotion work had four main factors: "Negative emotions display", "Positive emotions display", "Emotional dissonance", and "Sensitivity requirements". In addition, the hierarchical regression analyses revealed only the main effect of "Emotional dissonance" on psychological stress reaction, whereas the main effects of all emotion work variables and two interaction effects of those on burnout. These results suggested that burnout was distinguished from psychological stress reaction by the differences in its relationship to emotion work.