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Supervisor-Directed Emotional Labor as Upward Influence: An Emotions-as-Social-Information Perspective

Deng, H.; Walter, F.; Guan, Y.

Supervisor-Directed Emotional Labor as Upward Influence: An Emotions-as-Social-Information Perspective Thumbnail


Authors

F. Walter



Abstract

To access organizational resources, subordinates often strive to influence supervisors' impressions. Moreover, subordinates' interactions with supervisors are known to be ripe with emotions. Nevertheless, research on upward impression management has rarely examined how subordinates' emotion regulation in supervisor interactions may shape their tangible outcomes. The present study introduces subordinates' emotional labor toward supervisors as a novel means of upward influence. Building on the emotions‐as‐social‐information model, we propose that supervisor‐directed emotional labor indirectly relates with supervisory reward recommendations by shaping supervisors' liking and perceived competence of subordinates. Moreover, we cast supervisors' epistemic motivation as a boundary condition for these indirect relations. We tested these notions using time‐lagged data from 377 subordinates and 91 supervisors. When supervisors' epistemic motivation was higher (but not lower), (1) supervisor‐directed surface acting related negatively with supervisors' liking and perceived competence of subordinates and (2) supervisor‐directed deep acting related positively with supervisors' liking of subordinates. Liking and perceived competence, in turn, related positively with supervisors' willingness to recommend subordinates for organizational rewards. These findings highlight supervisor‐directed emotional labor as an upward impression management strategy with both beneficial (deep acting) and detrimental (surface acting) implications, and they illustrate important mechanisms and a key contingency factor for these consequences.

Citation

Deng, H., Walter, F., & Guan, Y. (2020). Supervisor-Directed Emotional Labor as Upward Influence: An Emotions-as-Social-Information Perspective. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 41(4), 384-402. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.2424

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Dec 18, 2019
Online Publication Date Jan 18, 2020
Publication Date May 31, 2020
Deposit Date Jan 26, 2020
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Journal of Organizational Behavior
Print ISSN 0894-3796
Publisher Wiley
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 41
Issue 4
Pages 384-402
DOI https://doi.org/10.1002/job.2424
Public URL https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1278148

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Copyright Statement
This is the accepted version of the following article: Deng, H. , Walter, F. & Guan, Y. (2020). Supervisor-Directed Emotional Labor as Upward Influence: An Emotions-as-Social-Information Perspective. Journal of Organizational Behavior 41(4): 384-402 which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1002/job.2424. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for self-archiving.





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