Emotions and Moods

SUMUDU KARIYAWASAM
 Affect is a generic term that covers a broad range of feelings people
experience, including both emotions and moods.
 Emotions are intense feelings directed at someone or something.
 Moods are less intense feelings than emotions and often (though not
always) arise without a specific event acting as a stimulus
 The Basic Emotions
 How many emotions are there? There are dozens, including

anger happiness
contempt hate
enthusiasm hope
envy jealousy
fear joy
frustration love
disappointment pride
embarrassment surprise
disgust sadness
The Basic Moods: Positive and Negative
Affect
 Positive affect - A mood dimension that consists of specific positive emotions such as
excitement, self-assurance, and cheerfulness at the high end and boredom, sluggishness,
and tiredness at the low end.
 Negative affect - A mood dimension that consists of emotions such as nervousness,
stress, and anxiety at the high end and relaxation, tranquility, and poise at the low end.
 Positivity offset - The tendency of most individuals to experience a mildly positive
mood at zero input (when nothing in particular is going on).
 The Function of Emotions
 Do Emotions Make Us Irrational?
 Do Emotions Make Us Ethical?
 Sources of Emotions and Moods
 Personality
 Moods and emotions have a trait component:
 most people have built-in tendencies to experience certain moods and emotions more frequently than others do
 affect intensity - Individual differences in the strength with which individuals experience their emotions
 Day of the Week and Time of the Day
 Are people in their best moods on the weekends?
 Weather
 When do you think you would be in a better mood—when it’s 70 degrees and sunny, or on a gloomy, cold, rainy
day?
 Stress
 As you might imagine, stressful daily events at work (a nasty e-mail, an impending deadline, the loss of a big sale, a
reprimand from the boss) negatively affect moods
 Social Activities
 Do you tend to be happiest when out with friends?
 For most people, social activities increase positive mood and have little effect on negative mood
 Sleep
 U.S. adults report sleeping less than adults a generation ago.
 Does lack of sleep make people grumpier?
 Sleep quality does affect mood.
 Exercise
 You often hear people should exercise to improve their mood.
 Does “sweat therapy” really work? It appears so.
 Research consistently shows exercise enhances peoples’ positive mood.
 Age
 Do young people experience more extreme positive emotions (so-called youthful exuberance) than older people? If you
answered “yes,” you were wrong.
 One study of people ages 18 to 94 revealed that negative emotions seem to occur less as people get older
 Sex
 Many believe women are more emotional than men.
 Is there any truth to this? Evidence does confirm women are more emotionally expressive than men;
 they experience emotions more intensely,
Affective Events Theory (AET)
 Emotional labor - A situation in which an employee expresses organizationally desired emotions during interpersonal
transactions at work

 Tests of affective events theory suggest the following:

 1. An emotional episode is actually a series of emotional experiences, precipitated by a single event and containing
elements of both emotions and mood cycles.

 2. Current emotions influence job satisfaction at any given time, along with the history of emotions surrounding the event.

 3. Because moods and emotions fluctuate over time, their effect on performance also fluctuates.

 4. Emotion-driven behaviors are typically short in duration and of high variability.

 5. Because emotions, even positive ones, tend to be incompatible with behaviors required to do a job, they typically have
a negative influence on job performance.
 Emotional Intelligence
 The ability to detect and to manage emotional cues and information.
 OB Application of emotions and moods

 Selection - One implication from the evidence on EI to date is that employers should consider it a
factor in hiring employees, especially in jobs that demand a high degree of social interaction
 Decision Making - OB researchers are increasingly finding that moods and emotions have important
effects on decision making.
 Creativity - People in good moods tend to be more creative than people in bad moods. They
produce more ideas and more options, and others think their ideas are original.
 Motivation - Several studies have highlighted the importance of moods and emotions on motivation
 Leadership - Effective leaders rely on emotional appeals to help convey their messages. In fact, the
expression of emotions in speeches is often the critical element that makes us accept or reject a
leader’s message
 Negotiation - Negotiation is an emotional process; however, we often say a skilled negotiator has a “poker
face.”
 Customer Service - A worker’s emotional state influences customer service, which influences levels of
repeat business and of customer satisfaction
 Job Attitudes - Ever hear the advice “Never take your work home with you,” meaning you should forget
about work once you go home? That’s easier said than done. Several studies have shown people who had a
good day at work tend to be in a better mood at home that evening, and vice versa
 Deviant Workplace Behaviors - Anyone who has spent much time in an organization realizes people often
behave in ways that violate established norms and threaten the organization, its members, or both
 Safety and Injury at Work - Research relating negative affectivity to increased injuries at work suggests
employers might improve health and safety (and reduce costs) by ensuring workers aren’t engaged in
potentially dangerous activities when they’re in a bad mood