What is Emotion | Dimensions of Emotion in Organizational Behavior

Emotions are defined as feelings experienced towards a person, object or event that make a condition of readiness.

Emotions interrupt our train of thought and demand attention.
Emotions are directed toward particular thing.
In employee behavior, emotions are critical element. Within the discipline of OB, the topic of emotions had been given no or little importance until very recently.
With the purpose of trying to control emotions, organizations have been specifically designed. An effective organization was one that properly eliminated fear, frustration, love, anger, joy, hate, grief and other similar feelings.

Table of Contents

What are Emotions?

Affect is a general term that encompasses both moods & emotions and covers a wide range of feelings that people experience.

Emotions are strong feelings that are directed at something or someone. They are not a trait but reactions.
On the other hand, feelings that tend to be less strong than emotions are said to be moods and they miss contextual stimulus. They are not directed toward anything.

When one person loses concentration on contextual thing, his emotions turned into moods. Emotional labor is a related affect-term that is obtaining enhancing significance in organizational behavior.

Felt vs. Displayed Emotions

Emotional labor makes dilemmas for workers when their job needs them to show emotions are not accordance with their real feelings. The person’s actual emotions are felt emotions.

Displayed emotions are those that are considered appropriate in a provided job and are organizationally required and are learned. Displayed and felt emotions are mostly different.

This is specifically correct in organizations, where situation mostly need and role requires people to show emotional behaviors that mask their true feelings.

Different Dimensions of Emotion in OB

Variety

There are various emotions. Six universal emotions have been recognized, which are fear, anger, sadness, disgust, happiness and surprise.

From positive to negative, emotions are identified along a continuum. The more people are likely to confuse those emotions that are more closely to each other on the continuum.

Intensity

Individuals provide various reactions to identical emotion-provoking stimuli. In some cases, this can be imputed to personality.

In order to express intensity, people vary in their inherent ability to express intensity from displaying extreme sadness or happiness to never showing feelings.

In terms of emotional labor, jobs make different intensity requirements. For example, even in stressful situations, air traffic controller must remain calm.

Frequency and Duration

Emotional labor that needs long duration or high frequency is more demanding and needs more exertion by workers.

Whether or not the workers can effectively fulfill the emotional requirements of a job depends upon both for how long the effort has to be made and the intensity of the emotions displayed.

Can People Be Emotionless?

Some people have trouble in understanding the emotions of others and showing their emotions. This difficulty is said to be alexithymia by the psychologists.
People who suffer from alexithymia are mostly seen by others as cold & bland and they cry seldom. They are not able to discriminate among their various emotions and their own feelings make them uncomfortable.
In a job requiring little or no emotional labor, they might very well be effective performers. Customer service or sales jobs would not be better career selection.

Gender & Emotions

It is widely supposed that as compared to men, women are more ‘in touch” with their feeling s. The differences between men & women are confirm by the evidence when it comes to ability to read others and emotional reactions.

Women:

Experience emotions more strongly
Can exhibit greater emotional expression
Show emotions more frequently
Are good at reading others emotions
Are more comfortable in showing emotions

Men:

Are naturally less able to recognize with others emotions and to read them
Believe that with the male image, displaying image is inconsistent
By showing positive emotions, have less requirement to seek social approval

External Constraints on Emotions

Boundaries are defined by every organization that recognize what emotions are acceptable and the extent to which they can be shown. In different cultures, the same applies.

Organizational Influences

Sought by all organizations, there is no single emotional “set”.
Against negative & intense emotions, there is bias in the United States. Except under fairly specific conditions, showing of negative emotions such as anxiety, fear and anger tend to be unacceptable.
Well-managed organizations are expected to be necessarily emotion-free, consistent with the myth of rationally.

Cultural Influences

When interacting with customers, cultural norms in United States dictate that workers in service organizations should act friendly and smile. But this norm is not applicable throughout the world.
Cultures vary in terms of the interpretations they provide to emotions.
Research highlights that some cultures miss words for such standard emotions as depression, anxiety or guilt.