Rising to the Challenge: Deep Acting is More Beneficial When Tasks are Appraised as Challenging

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Huang, Jason L.; Chiaburu, Dan S.; Zhang, Xin-an; Li, Ning; Grandey, Alicia A.
• 署名单位: Wayne State University; Texas A&M University System; Texas A&M University College Station; Shanghai Jiao Tong University; University of Iowa; Pennsylvania Commonwealth System of Higher Education (PCSHE); Pennsylvania State University; Pennsylvania State University - University Park
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0021-9010
• DOI: 10.1037/a0038976
• 发表日期: 2015
• 页码: 1398-1408
• 关键词: customer service; EMOTIONAL EXHAUSTION; EMOTIONAL LABOR; felt challenge; deep and surface acting

摘要

Cumulative research indicates that deep acting has a nonsignificant relationship with employee exhaustion, despite arguments that deep acting can be beneficial. To illuminate when deep acting leads to more positive employee outcomes, we draw on the resource conservation perspective to propose a within-individual model of deep acting that focuses on service employees' daily fluctuation of emotional labor and emotional exhaustion. Specifically, we propose that the ongoing experience of felt challenge is a within-person boundary condition that moderates deep acting's relationship with emotional exhaustion, and model emotional exhaustion as a mediating mechanism that subsequently predicts momentary job satisfaction and daily customer conflict handling. Using an experience sampling design, we collected data from 84 service employees over a 3-week period. Deep acting was less emotionally exhausting for service providers when they saw their tasks as more challenging. Furthermore, emotional exhaustion mediated the deep acting by felt challenge interaction effect on momentary job satisfaction and daily customer conflict handling. The findings contribute to a better understanding of the deep acting experience at work, while highlighting customer conflict handling as a key behavioral outcome of emotional labor.