The Impact of Daily Emotional Labor on Health and Well-Being

Emotional labor research largely focuses on client-facing occupations. However, employees across occupations engage in emotional labor when they perceive that specific types of emotional communication are required to align with organizational expectations. The current two-week daily survey study of 42 employees was conducted at a small website development company to examine relationships between employees’ emotional labor, physical health, and psychological well-being. Results indicated that daily emotional labor surface acting was significantly negatively related to daily psychological well-being and daily physical health. However, daily emotional labor deep acting was not significantly related to daily psychological well-being or daily physical health. After aggregating emotional labor across days, results revealed a significant positive relationship between emotional labor and burnout. This study enhances organizational awareness of the relationship between emotional communication expectations and employees’ psychological and physical health. Research-driven practices are detailed to ameliorate the negative side effects of emotional labor communication demands.