Emotional Exchange Research Articles

‘Manly tears exploded from my eyes, lets feel together brahs’: Emotion and masculinity within an online body building community

Discussions of crying and love are not what one might expect to find when examining interactions between recreational bodybuilders online. Gendered emotion ideologies, especially related to muscular masculinities, usually forbid men from exhibiting emotional vulnerability in front of other men, as emotional detachment is one of the ways gender hierarchies are maintained. Building on Connell’s concept of ‘hegemonic masculinity’ and Hochschild’s concept of ‘emotion management’, this article analyses emotional exchanges within an international community of male recreational bodybuilders: fans of Aziz Shavershian, known as ‘Zyzz’. We examine the meaning of emotions within the Zyzz fandom’s local hierarchy of masculinities, the expressive freedoms afforded by the context of their emotional interactions, and the strategies employed by Zyzz and fans to traverse masculine emotion ideologies that usually prevent men from expressing love and affection.

Research and Improvement of Social Interaction in MOOC Platform

Taking course discussion of MOOC education platform as example, this paper focuses on the quantity and quality of social interaction in MOOC teaching activities. This study finds that the discussion theme of the MOOC courses is quite rich, mainly based on the subject of curriculum learning, but lack of daily emotional exchange; the high level of interactive content in the course discussion is limited, mostly in the shallow level. In order to improve and promote the quantity and quality of social interaction of MOOC platform, we construct virtual interaction center of MOOC platform, and design three interactive modules: Q&A module, exploration module and sharing module.

Research and Improvement of Social Interaction in MOOC Platform

Taking course discussion of MOOC education platform as example, this paper focuses on the quantity and quality of social interaction in MOOC teaching activities. This study finds that the discussion theme of the MOOC courses is quite rich, mainly based on the subject of curriculum learning, but lack of daily emotional exchange; the high level of interactive content in the course discussion is limited, mostly in the shallow level. In order to improve and promote the quantity and quality of social interaction of MOOC platform, we construct virtual interaction center of MOOC platform, and design three interactive modules: Q&A module, exploration module and sharing module.

Family caregiving for older adults: gendered roles and caregiver burden in emigrant households of Kerala, India

ABSTRACTThe Indian state of Kerala leads the demographic transition and characteristically showcases emigration of predominantly male adult children, leaving behind parents, spouses and children. When men emigrate, gendered contexts burden women, especially spouses and daughters-in-law, with caregiving duties including elder care. Employing the social exchange perspective and drawing on in-depth interviews of left-behind caregivers to older adults in emigrant households, we explore reciprocal motives, expectations and perceptions of burden. Findings resonate gendered expectations of care and social sanction that ensure women do much of the caregiving. Daughters-in-law sacrificed careers and endured separation from husbands to transition into caregiving roles, costs borne to effectuate their husband's filial role. Perceived non-reciprocity, unbalanced exchanges and unmet expectations increased perceptions of burden for caregivers. Temporary financial autonomy could hardly alleviate perceptions of burden among women caregivers who perceived emotional and functional support exchanges from husbands, older adults themselves or other family members as supportive.

Relación entre atención compartida madre-hijo, sensibilidad materna y expresión emocional gestual infantil

Shared attention refers to episodes through which a child and his or her caretaker are intentionally focused on some object or activity while engaging in physical and emotional exchange. This study describes shared attention bearing in mind levels of commitment and emotional tone, and it analyzes associated relationships with maternal sensitivity and the intensity of emotional expression in one-year-old children. The sample includes 12 mother-child dyads with the following inclusion criteria: only children, of ages between 12 and 14 months, living with both parents and attending a nursery. The instruments used were the Shared Attention Assessment, the Children's Emotional Expressions Assessment, and the Adult Sensitivity Scale (ASS). Results show episodes of shared attention between mother-child dyads at one year of age. A significant relationship between shared attention, levels of commitment, and maternal sensitivity was also found.

Triggering and tempering brand advocacy by frontline employees: vendor and customer-related influences

PurposeLawler (2001) posits that social exchanges create a sense of shared responsibility for outcome success. The purpose of this study is to apply this framework to the vendor/frontline employee/customer triad to examine the underlying role of emotions in how frontline employees’ evaluations of vendors and customers trigger and temper brand advocacy efforts, respectively.Design/methodology/approachWith cross-sectional data from 168 frontline employees working at a leading national retailer of electronic goods, path analysis is used to evaluate the hypotheses.FindingsFrontline employees’ relationship quality with the vendor and perceptions of vendors’ product quality positively influence brand advocacy. Also, customers’ brand affinity and recommendation preference both demonstrate a significant, negative curvilinear relationship with brand advocacy.Research limitations/implicationsFrontline employees’ emotion-laden evaluations of vendors and customer influence brand advocacy in different ways. Vendor relationship quality and brand quality perceptions “trigger” brand advocacy. However, customer’s affinity toward a vendor’s brand and willingness to seek recommendations “temper” brand advocacy. Specifically, brand advocacy effort is low when customers possess very low and very high affinity toward a focal brand – moderate affinity spurs high advocacy; likewise, advocacy is low when customers demonstrate very low and very high interest in seeking the frontline employees’ opinion – moderate interest spurs high advocacy. Although ideal to examine vendor and customer emotional exchanges, using only frontline employee data from a technology-selling retailer may constrain generalizability.Practical implicationsFrontline employee training programs should emphasize the customer’s role in the transaction to increase perceptions of shared responsibility, as a means to create a favorable emotional experience, and accentuate timing strategies on when to pursue heightened or diminished emotionally charged brand advocacy efforts.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the frontline employee behavior literature by viewing shared responsibility in transactions as a source of emotional value, explaining variance in frontline employee brand advocacy through relationship and product quality dimensions, and uncovering curvilinear effects for customers’ brand affinity and recommendation preference in elucidating brand advocacy.

Influence of brand relationship on customer attitude toward integrated resort brands: a cognitive, affective, and conative perspective

ABSTRACTDespite the significance of understanding customer behavior in the integrated resort setting, only limited research has been conducted on this topic. Thus, this study aims to identify and assess the antecedents of integrated resort brand loyalty from the perspective of Oliver’s cognitive, affective, and conative theory of attitudinal brand loyalty model. . A total of 443 respondents who had experienced integrated resorts participated and completed a survey questionnaire. A positive relationship was observed between two-way communication and brand attitude, emotional exchange and brand attitude, brand partner quality and brand attitude, and brand attitude and behavioral intention toward integrated resort brand. Results revealed the association between cognitive, affective, and conative dimensions and integrated resort brand value. This notion suggests that integrated resort brands carry a high awareness of relationship, and the brand will invoke an emotional value in customers. Therefore, integrated resorts should consider customer–brand relational aspects to achieve long-term success for the integrated resort brand.

Online self-help forums on cannabis: A content assessment

ObjectiveTo investigate online self-help forums related to cannabis users who were searching for help on the Internet. MethodsWe analyzed the content of 717 postings by 328 users in three online forums in terms of fields of interest and self-help mechanisms. Only English-language forums that were free of charge and without registration were investigated. ResultsThe main self-help mechanisms were disclosure and symptoms, with relatively few posts concerning legal issues and social perceptions. The forums differed significantly in all fields of interest and self-help mechanisms except for social network and financial and vocational issues. Highly involved users more commonly posted on topics related to diagnosis, etiology/research, and provision of information and less commonly on those related to gratitude. Correlation analysis showed a moderate negative correlation between emotional support and illness-related aspects and between emotional support and exchange of information. ConclusionsCannabis forums share similarities with other mental health forums. Posts differ according to user involvement and the specific orientation of the forum. Practice implicationsThe Internet offers a viable source of self-help and social support for cannabis users, which has potential clinical implications in terms of referring clients to specific forums.

Occupy the Emotional Stock Exchange, Resisting the Quantifying of Affection in Social Media

By using a carnivalesque strategy, netprovs discussed in this article introduced a disruption innovation into the social advertising market, a new source of value: creative satire. By playing multiple characters or forcibly separating the real person from the avatar they revealed the myth of the consistent online identity. By encouraging users to look on the other side of the mirror they sought to increase awareness of the real “why” these tools exist. Users were introduced to skepticism of online affection and of projected affection in general. Most importantly they promoted an alternative value network: a culture of contentment and satisfaction — satisfaction in play, in creativity. They created a value network of inner rewards, redeemable in the moment, good forever, producing a real community in which players demonstrate with intentionality genuine attention and approval in the improv manner, by saying “yes, and,” by elaborating others’ fictional themes and moments.

Understanding Promotional Service Interactions through Social Exchange Theory of Affect

ABSTRACTDyadic commercial relations during service interactions are not possible without exchange of emotions between the interactional partners. The study theorizes social exchange theory of affect and explores triggers of emotions from customers and service agents that enable rapport during promotion of products. The study conceptualizes that service agents deliver overall authentic service delivery, which is a composite of authentic emotions and affective service delivery. These delivered emotions are reciprocated by the customers who are high on agreeableness. The study also validates the link between rapport, customer satisfaction, and future buying intentions of the customers. Data were collected through between subjects experimental design on 120 participants. The results were analyzed and structural model was developed using partial least-square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) technique. Results indicate that customer employee rapport is best predicted when overall authentic service delivery and customer agreeableness mutually interacts. The study is limited to outbound promotional services and its validity for other kinds of services and inbound calls awaits exploration.

The concept of communication: plurality of connotations

The existing among scientists convention in terms of rather free use of the term "communication" has a number of warnings. They are connected with a great difficulty and diversity of human interaction processes. This article deals with the consideration of scientific, philosophical and theological connotations of the concept "communication". Some basic attributes of this phenomenon and the assignment of communication to perform mainly its information and representative functions with respect to its participants have been considered. The existing attempts to bring up to date not only informational, but also existential contexts of this phenomenon in the scientific discourse and communicative philosophy determine the necessity of relative concepts consideration: dialogue, interrelations, communication. The starting point of communication is a common interest. Having an information component as basic, communication cannot be reduced to it only. It is supposed to have an emotional exchange between people, to have not only the result, but also a process and contextuality. Any intercourse is exceptionally considered in a unity with activity and relationships. Concerning the correlation of the concepts "communication" and "dialogue", it is worth mentioning that although these words are quite often used as synonyms, it is evident that not every communication is a dialogue, and accordingly, not every dialogue is under the dominant of communication. In a dialogue with another man mostly the subjective being is brought into the foreground. Dialogicity is characterized by a special relation of Other presence, development of interrelations, enriched with a lot of meanings: ontological, existential, and ethical. The denial of monologicality and also so-called manadologicality of a human personality, which constitutes the role of interrelations for the human personality's being, is mostly cleared up through the concept of intersubjectivity. Under such conditions subjectivity in all complexity of relations to its constituting world, also appears as the result of co-being with other people. The theological synonym of the concept "intersubjectivity" is the concept of "perichoresis", which is usually used in the same context, but exclusively in relation to a transcendental being - interpenetration of the hypostases of the Divine Trinity.

Evaluation of stress and support to parents of children with developmental disabilities–Our experience

IntroductionStress is an integral part of parenting. The stress of parenting is especially increased at parents of children with developmental disabilities, which can have negative effects on the health of the parents, the relationship with the child and total parental behavior. The objective of this work is to assess the level of stress of parenting among parents of children with developmental disabilities. Parents were involved in workshops support within a regional project. The workshops were conducted twice a month, in the duration of two hours, during the one-year period. The workshops were led by experts in various fields, and work with parents was psycho-educational and supportive. The assessment was made using the questionnaire Parenting Stress Index-Short Form, within the two time frames, at the beginning of the project and after 12 months. The results showed that nearly two-thirds of parents of children with disabilities were under clinically significant stress at the beginning of the service. By retesting after twelve months, it was found that parental stress decreased, and the decrease is particularly evident in the parental competence experience. Although stress is reduced to some extent by the way the parent is experiencing emotional exchange with the child, its level still remains high.ConclusionOur experience shows that supportive workshops, which we participated in significantly, but insufficiently contributed to the stress reduction among parents. This paper discusses other possible interventions, which would specifically be aimed at developing strategies for reductions of clinically high level of parental stress.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.

The Emotional Economy of Early Modern Pilgrimage Shrines: The Case of Mariazell

This article aligns with recent attempts to challenge the notion that pilgrimage shrines were unified centres of sacred power. It aims to demonstrate that pilgrimages offered varied and changing benefits through their various cultic objects, and that these benefits were transformed as meanings attributed to objects changed over time in response to changing historical pressures and needs. It explores the different emotional benefits cultic objects generated – whether consolation, gratitude, joy, fidelity, self-abasement or resilience – within a broader economy of emotional exchange, promotion and control. The history of three significant objects in the Mariazell basilica – the Statue of Mercy, the Marian Column and the Treasury Image – demonstrates how physical and cultural framing, associated religious rituals, and broader political patronage and association, promoted different emotional responses around these objects. Under pressure of the Hapsburgs’ close association with the shrine from the seventeenth century, changes in the promotion of objects like the Marian Column and the Treasury Image, as well as more structured and choreographed pilgrimage practices, reflected the transformation of Mariazell into a site for the expression of collective and proto-national emotions, in addition to the individual emotional benefits that continued to be critical for the shrine’s ongoing popularity and survival.

Interactive Family Dynamics and Non-suicidal Self-Injury in Psychiatric Adolescent Patients: A Single Case Study.

Non-Suicidal Self-Injury (NSSI) is a common, multifaceted phenomenon among adolescents. Recent researchers have shown that a number of psychological and psychiatric correlates are implicated in the onset/repetition of NSSI, but those previous studies did not directly observe the family interaction patterns of this clinical population. In this paper, the quality of family interactions was observed using the Lausanne Trilogue Play procedure to deepen the specific interactive dimensions associated with NSSI in adolescents. The results of a single case study showed a lack of positive emotional exchanges, a parenting style expressing hostility, a high level of control and difficulties in triangulation. Through this method, the authors show that a better understanding of the role of family interactions is crucial and could improve the assessment and treatment of Non-Suicidal Self-Injurious behaviors. Research and clinical implications are discussed.

Emotional Reflexivity and the Guiding Principle of Objectivity in an Inter-Disciplinary, Multi-Method, Longitudinal Research Project

This paper demonstrates how emotional reflexivity can help researchers aspire to the benchmark of objectivity. It will be argued that emotional exchanges during interviews with research participants can enhance understanding based on the author's research experiences in an inter-disciplinary, multi-method, longitudinal study of low-energy, social housing in Aberdeen, Scotland. It will then be demonstrated that emotional reflexivity allowed the researcher to identify how his feelings of empathy with the household occupants, who had had a negative experience, developed and how he began to share their frustrations and disappointments with the Council. This allowed him to locate himself within the research field, and help him understand how this influenced his representation of this group. This consequently allowed him to moderate his focus on the negative experiences of some occupants and produce a more comprehensive account of the full range of the householders’ perspectives. In conclusion, it will be argued that emotional reflexivity can help researchers maintain the guiding principle of objectivity whilst locating the researcher within the field and therefore can provide an effective means of negotiating the pitfalls of the reflexive turn.

Infant Massage and Quality of Early Mother-Infant Interactions: Are There Associations with Maternal Psychological Wellbeing, Marital Quality, and Social Support?

Infant massage programs have proved to be effective in enhancing post-natal development of highly risk infants, such as preterm newborns and drug or HIV exposed children. Less studies have focused on the role of infant massage in supporting the co-construction of early adult–child relationships. In line with this lack of literature, the present paper reports on a pilot study aimed at investigating longitudinally the quality of mother–child interactions, with specific reference to emotional availability (EA), in a group of mother–child pairs involved in infant massage classes. Moreover, associations between mother–child EA, maternal wellbeing, marital adjustment, and social support were also investigated, with the hypothesis to find a link between low maternal distress, high couple satisfaction and high perceived support and interactions of better quality in the dyads. The study involved 20 mothers and their children, aged between 2 and 7 months, who participated to infant massage classes. The assessment took place at three stages: at the beginning of massage course, at the end of it and at 1-month follow-up. At the first stage of assessment self-report questionnaires were administered to examine the presence of maternal psychiatric symptoms (SCL-90-R), perceived social support (MSPSS), and marital adjustment (Dyadic Adjustment Scale); dyadic interactions were observed and rated with the Emotional Availability Scales (Biringen, 2008) at each stage of data collection. The results showed a significant improvement in the quality of mother–child interactions, between the first and the last evaluation, parallel to the unfolding of the massage program, highlighting a general increase in maternal and child’s EA. The presence of maternal psychological distress resulted associated with less optimal mother–child emotional exchanges, while the hypothesis regarding couple satisfaction and social support influence were not confirmed. These preliminary results, if replicated, seem to sustain the usefulness of infant massage and the importance of focusing on early mother–infant interactions.

The effect of reactive emotions expressed in response to another's anger on inferences of social power.

Social perception of emotions is influenced by the context in which it occurs. One such context is a social interaction involving an exchange of emotions. The way parties to the interaction are perceived is shaped by the combination of emotions exchanged. This idea was examined by assessing the extent to which expressions of anger toward a target-which, in isolation, are perceived as signals of high social power-are influenced by the target's emotional reaction to it (i.e., reactive emotions). Three studies show that the angry person was perceived as having a higher level of social power when this anger was responded by fear or sadness than when it was responded by neutrality or anger. Study 1 indicated that reactive emotions have a stronger effect on perceived social power when emotions were incongruent with gender stereotypes. Study 2 indicated that these effects are a result of these emotions serving as reactive emotions rather than a benchmark against which the angry person's power is assessed. Study 3 showed that reactive emotions affect perceived social power by serving as signals of the level to which the high social power suggested by the first person's expression is confirmed by its target. Comparing effects of reactive emotions to anger with reactive emotions to sadness, showed that perceived social power of the expresser is determined by the nature of the expression, with some adjustment caused by the reactive emotions. This underscores the importance of social interaction as a context for the social perception of emotions. (PsycINFO Database Record

Problems in Visiting Child Life Services for Multicultural Families and Alternatives Research: Centering on Expert Focus Group Interview

Background/Objectives: By means of Focus Group Interview (FGI) the study aims to deduce the practical problems and measures for child life service and to analyze expert content on chapter service effects, problems in current operation methods, and future improvement plans, and make policy suggestions. Methods/Statistical Analysis: The study conducted a Focus Group Interview (FGI) on 4 directors of multicultural family support centers and 3 visiting education supervisors the practice child life service for multicultural families to deduce the practical problems and measures for child life services and create practical measures. For the directors of multicultural family support centers, they were directors with more than one and a half years of experience or had long fueled supervisor experience, and visiting supervisors were supervisors with over four years of experience at A city Gyeonggi center where child life service has been in operation for the longest time. The interview was conducted in two groups on September 18, 2015 and one and a half hours to two hours was required for each of the groups. Findings: The study analyzed child life service effects, operation method problems, and future improvement plan areas through focus group interview comprising of 10 subcategories under 6 categories. First area is ‘Effects of child life service’ and the Category is ‘Encounter’, and subcategories are ‘Opportunity for emotional exchanges and consultation’ and ‘Customized lessons through blind spot visits’. Second area is ‘Operation problems’ and Categories are ‘Service’, ‘Personal perspective’, and ‘Regional association’, and the subcategories are ‘Subject anxiety due to the lack of supply opportunities’, ‘Education supervision centering on desire of mothers’, ‘Low status and improper service request of visiting supervisors’ and ‘Difficulties in association with multicultural family disabled children institutions’. Last area is ‘Future improvement plans’ and the Categories are ‘Service Improvements’, and ‘Increase of efficacy’, and the subcategories are ‘Detailed service broken down by child development status’, ‘Necessary services for various family types’, ‘Family focused service including fathers’ and ‘Service evaluation based on child needs’. Improvements/Applications: As a future improvement plan for child life service considering child development periods, and family characteristics, there needs to be systematic changes in the direction of emotional stability promotion, and there needs to be policy approaches considering the entire members of the family of multicultural families.

Emotional contagion and burnout among nurses and doctors: Do joy and anger from different sources of stakeholders matter?

The present study adds novel knowledge to the literature on emotional contagion (EC), discrete emotions, job burnout, and the management of healthcare professionals by simultaneously considering EC as both a job demand and a job resource with multiple social pathways. Integrating EC into the job demands-resource model, we develop and test a conceptual model wherein multiple stakeholder sources of emotional exchanges (i.e., leaders, colleagues, patients) play a differential role in predicting caregivers' absorption of positive (i.e., joy) and negative (i.e., anger) emotions, and in turn, burnout. We tested this nomological network using structural equation modeling and invariance analyses on a sample of 252 nurses and 102 doctors from diverse healthcare wards in three Italian hospitals. Our findings show that not all emotional exchange sources contribute to the EC experience or likelihood of burnout. Specifically, we found that doctors absorbed joy and anger from their colleagues but not from their leaders or patients. In contrast, nurses absorbed joy and anger from leaders, colleagues, and patients. Surprisingly, we found that joy-absorbed and anger-absorbed were related to doctors' exhaustion and cynicism, but only to nurses' cynicism. We conclude with suggestions for advancing research and practice in the management of emotions for preventing burnout.

S09 - Patient-caregiver relationship in cancer movies of the last ten years: “and the winner is”…the hope!

Background: In recent years among different issues around cancer, also movies have tackled the several aspects of patient-caregiver relationship, having the potential for a fascinating narrative dynamic. The objective of this study is to evaluate the emerging role of caregivers in the last ten years cancer films, analyze the impact of cancer evolution in the relationship caregiver-patient and evaluate the psychological and social implications. Methods: To perform this descriptive study, we searched the last ten years of cancer movies in the main movies database (Allmovie, IMDb, Movieplayer, Mymovies, TMDb) and Google. Each film was viewed by an observer to record patients and tumours characteristics, management, and evolution of the disease and by a psycologist in order to better define the type and the role of caregiver-patient relationship and evaluate the emotional and psycological impact in cancer management. Results: 99 films produced by 16 countries (years 2005-2015) were analyzed. A median number of 9 films for year were released, range: 4 (2014) -16 (2010). In the movies 42 characters with cancer were women, 43 men, and 14 children. The most common cancers were leukemia, breast cancer, CNS tumours and lung cancer (23%; 14%; 13% and 5% respectively). In 26 films the type of cancer was not mentioned. Death occurred 44 times (44% of all movies). Caregiver is the main character in 9 movies. Family members (parents, sisters, brothers and grandparents) represent the caregiver in 44 movies (44%). In 49% of movies the role is covered by a boyfriend or girlfriend, husband or wife, friends, and collegues (16%; 12%, 12% and 6% respectively). Only in 4 movies doctors assume caregiver role. The support of caregiver is not expressed in 9 movies. In 68 movies a significant positive relationship has been recorded and the hope emerges influencing the ability to cope with stressful situations and develop an emotional resilience. Conclusions: The diagnosis of cancer represents a major crisis for patient, involving also caregivers. Therefore, caregiver-patient relationship in these cancers movies reflect some real psychological processes and interpersonal dynamics, as cancer is not only the pathological condition, but also the dinamic transformation of patient in the personal life and interpersonal interactions. Some of the films evaluated could be an useful instrument to support communication and emotional exchange in cancer patient-caregiver relationship.