Current Emotion Research in Sociology: Advances in the Discipline

Background

The sociological study of emotions, which is now over 40 years old, is relatively new compared to other sociological areas of investigation. A sociological analysis of emotions involves theorizing and then testing the relationship among key macroelements (social structure and culture), microelements (interaction and self-processes), and individuals’ emotional experiences (Stets & Turner, 2008). Some theorists focus on particular macro- or microelements to the exclusion of others, thus any sociological theory on emotions is partial. For example, the microtheory of exchange examines how productive exchanges in which individuals jointly contribute to a collective good generate strong positive emotions, a cohesive unit, commitment, and the development of a strong, micro social order (Lawler, Thye, & Yoon, 2008). However, there is little in the way of explicating the self-processes that contribute to positive emotions. For example, positive emotions may be the result of individuals verifying each others’ identities in the exchange. Thus, emotions are not only an emergent property of exchanges, but also may be the result of verifying self and identity goals.

Theorists may employ a macroframework to study emotions, but the focus is sometimes ill-defined or limited to a particular range of issues. For example, some use cultural theory to highlight how social norms guide the expression of emotions in an interaction, but what is left unspecified are the particular social rules or cultural ideologies that are operating to influence specific emotional expressions (Stets & Turner, 2008). Alternatively, others may examine the role of social structure on emotions, but it is often restricted to an analysis of structural properties such as power and status in interaction (Kemper, 2007), and what is left unexamined are categories of individuals based on gender or race who stand in a similar place in the stratification system and who may have different emotional responses to events. However, the variability in emotional experiences by gender and race are now beginning to be addressed (Simon, 2004; Wingfield, 2010).

Overview

Current theoretical advances in the sociology of emotions continue to be plagued with some of the problems identified above. The theories are partial, given that they focus on some sociological aspects over others. Mindful of this, I review three theories that have been making inroads into the sociology of emotions: identity theory, exchange theory, and justice theory. Each theory focuses on different sources of one’s feelings, such as identity verification in identity theory, exchanges in exchange theory, and the allocation of rewards in justice theory. The empirical findings that stem from each of these theories are important, indicating that the dynamics they identify need to be taken into account when developing a more general, integrative sociological theory of emotions.

While sociologists have been making theoretical advances on emotions, they have also been moving beyond an analysis of positive and negative emotions to examine specific emotions. I discuss several specific emotions that have been studied including happiness, anger, and the moral emotions of guilt and shame. It is not surprising that moral emotions have been investigated, given the economic downturn and the attacks that were leveled against investment advisors and mortgage lenders who were seen as greedy and responsible for the economic damage. Clearly their actions brought issues of what is right and wrong to public awareness. Thus, I follow a discussion on moral emotions with some discussion on emotions as they relate to economic activity. I then review emotions in the workplace with an emphasis on the management of one’s emotions, which has been the focus of much sociological research. Finally, I discuss some novel ideas emerging in the sociology of emotions.

Identity Theory

Historically, identity theorists have concentrated on the cognitive aspects of self and identity, but as I discuss below, that has been changing as researchers increasingly have incorporated the affective component into identity theory development and testing. Identity theory focuses on the self as composed of multiple parts (or identities). An identity is a set of meanings that individuals apply to themselves as members of different groups (social identities), as occupants of different roles (role identities), or as unique persons who are different from others in society (person identities) (Burke & Stets, 2009). This set of identity-defining meanings constitutes the identity standard. Individuals seek to have their identity meanings or identity standard verified within and across situations. Identity verification occurs when people perceive that others see them in a situation in the same way they see themselves. Emotion emerges from the verification process with the expectation that identity verification will lead to positive emotions and identity nonverification will result in negative emotions. ¹

Researchers have examined the emotional outcomes following the verification process (Burke & Harrod, 2005; Stets, 2005; Stets & Asencio, 2008; Stets & Osborn, 2008). In general, the findings revealed that while identity verification was associated with positive emotions, identity nonverification did not always lead to negative emotions. Negative emotion did occur when people fell short of their identity standard; however, sometimes positive emotion emerged when people surpassed their identity standard. This latter, unexpected finding indicates that more empirical tests are needed. Contextual factors may condition the results. For example, if individuals are not invested in an identity that is subject to the verification process, when they exceed their identity standard in a situation, they may respond to its enhancing effects rather than its nonverifying effects.

Identity researchers have been refining their research on emotions by moving beyond a focus of positive and negative emotions to an analysis of specific emotions. For example, Stets and Burke (2005) generated a series of testable hypotheses regarding how specific emotions might emerge from the identity verification process. In doing this, they examined several relevant dimensions that can be examined, such as the source of one’s identity standard meanings (self or other), the source of one’s identity nonverifying state (self or other), and the relative power and status of the self and others in the interaction. For instance, if the source of people’s identity meanings is primarily themselves (individuals build up a set of expectations as to who they are), and if they feel responsible for not being able to verify their identities (an internal attribution), they may feel sad when identity nonverification occurs. Alternatively, if others are primarily the source of people’s identity meanings (others influence and shape the nature of people’s identity meanings), and if individuals see others as responsible for not being able to verify their identities (an external attribution), anger may be felt following identity nonverification. Adding the dimension of power, if another who is responsible for not verifying one’s identity is of higher power than the individual, the individual may feel fear when identity nonverification emerges. If another is of lower power than the individual, the individual may feel rage. In general, since people make distinctions in terms of how they are feeling in situations, identity theorists need to identify the conditions under which these emotional distinctions emerge.

Exchange Theory

Exchange theorists have been making advances in conceptualizing the role of emotions in exchange relations. The theory of social commitments (Lawler, Thye, & Yoon, 2009) extends ideas from two earlier theories: relational cohesion theory (Lawler & Yoon, 1996) and the affect theory of social exchange (Lawler, 2001). In relational cohesion theory, power relations (specifically relations of mutual dependence in an exchange) generate more frequent agreements in an exchange, and in turn, positive emotions, a cohesive relation, and commitment to the exchange relation. The affect theory of social exchange adds the structure of the social exchange. Specifically, productive exchanges, that is, joint tasks that require the cooperation of all members, influence the endogenous process of relational cohesion, particularly when each person’s contribution to the joint task is inseparable from others’ contributions. In this situation, productive exchanges increase the frequency of agreements, and this leads to positive emotions, relational cohesion, and commitment to the exchange relation. The theory of social commitments extends the first and second theory beyond exchange relations (dyads) to social units (triads and larger groups) and identifies additional factors that increase commitment such as the sharing of emotions and a sense of control.

The theory of social commitments is premised on the idea that a collective task, specifically productive exchanges, produces the strongest social commitments to social units. In productive exchanges, each person’s contributions are indistinguishable from others, but collectively the contributions benefit the group, which everyone enjoys. This form of exchange is in contrast to other exchanges including negotiated, reciprocal, and generalized exchanges. In negotiated exchanges, individuals are involved in offers, counteroffers, and concessions until an agreement is reached. In reciprocal exchanges, offers are separated in time, and there is no explicit expectation for reciprocating. Generalized exchanges involve three or more individuals who give and receive resources from one another, but the givers and receivers are different people. Research has revealed that compared to generalized exchanges, productive exchanges produced the strongest positive feelings, the greatest cohesion, and the strongest attachment to the social unit; negotiated and reciprocal exchanges fell between productive and generalized exchanges in these outcomes (Lawler et al., 2008).

According to the theory of social commitments, when people are involved in productive tasks, the positive or negative feelings that they experience from success or failure will be attributed to the social unit, given the sense of shared responsibility. When there is success with a task, the positive emotions that are felt and shared with others will produce feedback that enhances the sense of shared responsibility in the group. Thus, the sharing of emotions is important. The positive emotions and the enhanced sense of shared responsibility will increase further when the group does not constrain actors, but rather facilitates autonomy and personal control with respect to task activity. Thus, a sense of control is also relevant. The result of control is that people will be more likely to commit to their group, remain in it, invest in it, and make sacrifices for it. Alternatively, when there is failure with a task, negative emotions are attributed to the social unit, and ultimately social commitments to the group will weaken with individuals less likely to stay in the group. Overall, exchange theory shows how affect is critical to social commitments.

Justice Theory

In understanding the relationship between justice and emotions, two processes are generally considered: procedural justice and distributive justice. Procedural justice focuses on whether the means by which outcomes are decided are good and fair; distributive justice addresses whether the allocation of outcomes is fair. In distributive justice, allocation rules of equality, equity, and need typically are considered. In general, people feel good when there is procedurally just treatment and they receive outcomes that they expect; they feel bad when unfair procedures are used and they obtain outcomes that are less than what they expect.

People assume that fair procedures will lead to the allocation of fair outcomes. However, sometimes individuals may feel that they are treated in a procedurally fair manner, but they receive less than what they expect. In this situation, procedural justice tempers the negative feelings that are experienced, given the inequitable outcome (Hegtvedt & Killian, 1999). Clay-Warner (2006) theorized that an important factor influencing reactions to procedural justice is the legitimacy of the decision-maker. Legitimacy can be understood in terms of authorization (support for the decision-maker by those higher in an organization) and endorsement (support for the decision-maker by those either at the same level or lower in the organization). Clay-Warner maintained that authorization and endorsement will moderate the effects of procedural justice on the expressions of negative emotions such as anger and resentment. Specifically, when the decision-maker uses unfair procedures but is authorized and endorsed, the expression of anger and resentment will be weaker than if the decision-maker was not authorized or endorsed. This suggests that a decision-maker needs to be perceived as legitimate in order for people to tolerate injustice.

In contrast to Clay-Warner’s expectation, Hegtvedt and colleagues (Hegtvedt, Johnson, & Morgan, 2008) argued and found support for the opposite when considering how observers emotionally respond to the injustice suffered by others. To date, researchers have not studied how third parties respond to another’s injustice. Hegtvedt and colleagues maintained that when an endorsed decision-maker acts unfairly, it is unexpected, and it may be perceived as an affront that needs to be addressed. Consistent with this reasoning, they found that when the decision-maker was endorsed and used unfair procedures on others, observers were more likely to express resentment and frustration toward the decision-maker.

Stets and Osborn (2008) found results similar to Hegtvedt and her associates. However, their findings apply to the distributive justice process rather than the procedural justice process. They examined workers’ responses to receiving outcomes that were less than what they expected for their work. Workers reacted more negatively to an under-reward when the under-reward came from a male (high-status) manager than a female (low-status) manager. Stets and Osborn argued that the workers may have perceived that the behavior of the male manager was inappropriate, given his position of authority and the expectation that high-status actors are knowledgeable and experienced in allocating outcomes in a fair manner. When they did not behave according to these expectations, the workers got upset. Thus, receiving an under-reward and experiencing a violation of expectations by high-status managers may have been doubly distressing for the workers.

While status is important in understanding people’s emotional reactions, the resources that individuals possess are also important. Stets and Osborn argued that positive emotions from prior situations can be conceptualized as a resource that individuals bring into current situations, making current situations more tolerable, particularly when receiving unjust outcomes. Negative emotions from prior situations do the opposite, leaving individuals less likely to accept current injustices. Distributive justice researchers generally have assumed that emotions are the consequence of an evaluation of justice. However, emotions also can be antecedent to a justice evaluation. Individuals bring feelings from prior situations into a current situation, and these feelings can influence the evaluation of the outcomes they receive. Indeed, Stets and Osborn found that emotions from a previous interaction positively influenced reactions in a current interaction. Perhaps more importantly, they found that if individuals felt good in a previous encounter, and then obtained less than expected outcomes in a current encounter, the prior good feelings helped offset or buffer the negative impact that the less-than-expected outcomes ordinarily produced. Thus, baseline emotions going into a justice evaluation may be just as important as the emotions following the justice evaluation.

Other recent research that has examined the relationship between distributive justice and emotions has focused on equity within the family, and this work attempts to move beyond the finding that perceived inequity in the family is related to depression by studying other emotions and examining whether there are gender differences in emotional reactions to inequitable family arrangements. ² Using two national datasets, Lively and colleagues (Lively, Powell, Geist, & Steelman, 2008; Lively, Steelman, & Powell, 2010) found that a variety of emotions were associated with inequitable family arrangements. Those who felt that they overbenefitted or underbenefitted from the division of labor reported less feelings of tranquility and more feelings of distress, anger, and rage. Additionally, those who reported overbenefitting also reported feelings of fear and self-reproach. There were also gender differences in emotional reactions to inequity in the division of labor. Men were more emotionally sensitive than women to underbenefitting; women were more emotionally sensitive than men to overbenefitting. Men may have a greater sense of entitlement than women. By and large, justice theorists remind us that emotions are notably linked to perceptions of equity and fairness.

If sociologists are to reach an integrative theory on emotions, they will need to identify the critical ideas that are common across different theories. One idea that identity theory, exchange theory, and justice theory share is the notion that cognitive consistency is associated with positive emotions and cognitive inconsistency is related to negative emotions (Stets & Asencio, 2008). Specifically, in all three theories there is the assumption that individuals’ feelings result from comparing what they expect in a situation with what they actually experience. If expectations and experiences match, they feel good; if there is a mismatch, they feel bad. In identity theory, people anticipate identity verification. If verification occurs, they feel positive emotions and nonverification leads to negative emotions. In exchange theory, people expect to satisfy their value preferences. The frequent exchange of value preferences influences positive emotions, and the infrequent exchange of value preferences produces negative emotions. In justice theory, individuals expect just outcomes. Just rewards influence positive emotions and unjust rewards increase negative emotions. Future research is needed to examine these and other important ideas and processes that will help develop an integrative theory of the sociology of emotions.

Happiness

Sociologists are beginning to examine specific emotions. I review recent work on two primary emotions: happiness and anger, and two secondary (moral) emotions: guilt and shame. Two studies draw on national data to examine trends in happiness over a 30-year period beginning in 1972 (Schnittker, 2008; Yang, 2008). Schnittker’s analysis revealed that happiness has increased in the USA over a 30-year period (1973–2004). He found that this increase was associated with a rise in income and growing participation in the labor force. Thus, material pursuits were associated with feeling good.

In a slightly different analysis using the same national data, Yang provided additional insights over the 30-year period by studying age, period, and cohort effects. The age effects revealed that as one gets older, happiness increases. Maturity, such as an increased understanding of oneself over time, is partially responsible. Yang also found that disparities in happiness based on one’s position in the social structure diminished with age. For example, research reveals that women are happier than men, Whites are happier than Blacks, and those with a higher education are happier than those with a lower education. ³ Yang argued that the reduction in differences in happiness across sex, race, and education with age may be due to individuals experiencing common life events that help equalize differences such as, on the one hand, the death of a spouse/partner, relatives, and friends, declining health, and on the other, social welfare benefits such as Medicare and Medicaid that help equalize health care. Herein lies a paradox. As people age, they report increased happiness even though the conditions of their life are more challenging. Further research is needed to understand this paradox.

Period effects showed Americans to be happier in some years than others, though it was unclear why. The trend was nonlinear over the 30-year period. Happiness levels were low in the early 1970s and rose and fell until the early 1990s. From the mid-1990s until 2004, happiness rose. Cohort effects showed baby boomers to be less happy than earlier or more recent cohorts. Given the larger cohort size of baby boomers, they may have experienced greater competition in the educational system and in the labor force earlier in their lives, and this may have had a lasting effect on reducing their happiness later in their lives.

Anger

Turning from positive to negative emotions, sociologists have been studying anger, including where anger likely emerges and who expresses it. Schieman (2006) discussed three different contexts in which anger emerges: work, family, and one’s neighborhood. At work, a central issue that influences anger is perceived inequity. In the family, money issues easily provoke anger. In one’s neighborhood, crime and poverty raise anger levels. Lively and Powell (2006) compared the expression of anger at home and at work and found that while individuals who were angry at family members were more likely to speak directly to the target of their anger, those who were angered at work were more likely to use the indirect approach of talking to others about their anger. However, they found that compared to those angered at work, those angered at home were more likely to say nothing about their anger, and they were less likely to discuss their anger with others. This latter finding is surprising, given that research on emotion management has focused on the control of expression in the workplace, neglecting the ways in which it occurs in the home.

Sociologists have been studying whether some social groups are more likely to express anger than others. Anger appears to be lower among older individuals than younger individuals, thus indicating that anger declines over the life course (Schieman, 2006). This decline may be due to retirement, fewer parental responsibilities, and more leisure time. There are some gender differences in anger. While men and women do not differ in the frequency with which they experience anger, women experience more intense anger than men, and once angered, women are more likely to talk about their anger whereas men are more likely to use substances (Schieman, 2006; Simon & Lively, 2010). Simon and Lively (2010) argued that the more intense and persistent anger of women compared to men may contribute to women’s high rate of depression. Examining a national sample of respondents, they found an association between intense and persistent anger and greater depression for women.

One’s status in society may make one more or less prone to anger. Collett and Lizardo (2010) studied two competing lines of research on status and anger. In one research line, those with low status are more likely to experience anger, given their greater exposure to disadvantages such as under-rewards and discrimination. In a second research line, high-status people are more likely to experience anger, particularly in interactions with low-status others, in which low-status others fail to defer to or confirm the position of high-status persons. Collett and Lizardo found support for both views. They found that those at the extreme low and high ends of the status hierarchy were more likely to report anger. Low-status individuals’ anger was associated with having a lack of control over life events and endorsing the idea that when individuals are angry, they should show it rather than suppress it. High-status individuals’ anger emerged in encounters with unfamiliar others and when the target of the encounter was a low-status other. More generally, these results reveal how individuals’ status, together with what they frequently encounter in situations, produces their anger.

Moral Emotions

Moral emotions such as shame and guilt are being examined more closely by sociologists. This has been facilitated by the economic downturn and the unregulated practices of Wall Street executives that pushed issues of good and bad to the forefront of Americans’ minds. Conceptually, moral emotions are feelings that stem from violating evaluative cultural codes, that is, codes that indicate what is good or bad or right or wrong in a society (Turner & Stets, 2006). The intensity of the evaluative content varies across cultural codes in society. For example, context-free societal values carry more intense conceptions of good/bad, right/wrong than situational norms, that is, expectations about how individuals should behave in specific situations. While moral emotions may involve many feelings, recent research has focused on the moral emotions of shame and guilt.

In a survey of undergraduate students, Stets, Carter, Harrod, Cerven, and Abrutyn (2008) examined how individuals’ moral identities, their status (high, equal, or low) relative to others in a situation, and their behavior (normative or nonnormative) influenced reports of moral emotions. Perhaps not surprisingly, they found that when individuals enacted normative behavior, they were less likely to report feelings of guilt and shame. Having a high moral identity decreased reports of shame but not guilt. Surprisingly, individuals were less likely to report feelings of guilt and shame in the presence of status equals. Since guilt and shame are self-critical emotions in which one feels responsible for a “bad” outcome (Tangney & Dearing, 2002), status equals compared to status unequals might be weakening the self-evaluative process that is important in determining one’s responsibility for an outcome. When this self-evaluation process is reduced in the presence of status equals, it might diminish the monitoring of one’s own behavior when others are not able to monitor it for the person. Ironically, this self-monitoring is important in making the social order, the moral order, possible.

More recently, Stets and Carter (2012) examined the relationships among the moral identity, moral behavior, and moral emotions more closely. Additionally, they examined whether the framing of situations in moral terms also influenced moral feelings of guilt and shame. In a sample of university students, they found that while those with a higher moral identity were more likely to behave morally than those with a lower moral identity, those who received feedback from others that did not verify their moral identity were more likely to report guilt and shame than those whose moral identity was verified. Additionally, when individuals both defined a situation as morally potent (e.g., attending a church service would be more morally potent than attending a party) and also indicated that people should feel bad when they violated the moral codes in the situation, they behaved morally. And, when they behaved immorally in these situations, they were more likely to report feelings of guilt and shame. Thus, internal identity meanings of morality and external cultural meanings of morality coalesced to influence reports of moral emotions.

Economic Transactions

Studying the role of emotions in economic activity is currently opportune, given the USA’s economic problems that have been fueled by investment brokers’ risky and sometimes careless decision-making practices. According to Bandelj (2009), sociologists can no longer ignore the role of emotions in interactions between economic actors; it is an integral and unavoidable aspect of economic transactions. She introduced the idea of emotional embeddedness and argued that because economic action is always interdependent and relational, emotions will be present in economic transactions and influence the outcomes that ensue.

Bandelj (2009) argued that when individuals enter an economic transaction, feelings immediately form as each actor interprets the other’s social characteristics (e.g., the person’s network position and reputation). These and other impressions in the interaction become part of the economic transaction and can influence the outcomes. As the transaction proceeds, individuals pick up clues that either produce new emotions or support existing ones. Additionally, one perceives the emotional states of the other, and this too can influence one’s own emotions. Such interaction-generated emotions can change a person’s preference orderings, which may result in setting new goals during the economic interaction that are consistent with the new emotional states. In this way, while economic behavior may be characterized by rational action in which a means–ends relationship is initially identified, emotional embeddedness may cause a transaction to take a very different turn. Thus, Bandelj proposed two economic action principles that are different from utility maximization: situational adaptation and improvisation.

Situational adaptation, she argued, involves economic actors changing their desired ends or means as the interaction proceeds. This change is due to the emotion-induced interaction which may prompt new means or ends. In improvisation, a means–ends relationship does not exist at the outset, and it is established as the interaction proceeds, guided by how the actors are feeling in the situation. Economic actors follow their intuitions or gut feelings, and they may engage in innovative thinking to identify the goals to pursue and the means to achieve them. As Bandelj (2009) made clear, the emotions that are felt cannot be completely anticipated or controlled, thus individuals engage in creative solutions to adjust. On the whole, the rational, means–ends decision-making model of economic behavior that has been accepted for many years requires modification to include emotions.

Emotional Labor

One’s feelings will necessarily be manifest in interactions in the workplace, and at issue is how individuals manage these feelings. The groundbreaking work of Hochschild (1983) was the catalyst for a host of research on emotion management at one’s job, known as emotional labor. Currently, this research can be divided into two areas (Wharton, 2009). In the first area, emotional labor is studied as one among many aspects of interactive work in which a worker has frequent interaction with the public, for example frontline service jobs or professional occupations such as law or medicine. What is examined is how emotional work relates to getting one’s job done. For example, if workers are expected, to have smooth, nondisruptive interactions with their clients, they may manage their emotions to keep the situation in control, particularly when clients are expressing hostility, anger, or rage. In the second area, emotional labor is directly examined, such as whether individuals express emotions that oppose their inner feelings, and whether this influences their physical and mental health. The consequences of emotional labor for the self have garnered the largest body of research (Wharton, 2009). The most consistent finding is that surface acting (changing one’s outward appearance) is associated with emotional exhaustion. Beyond this finding, emotional labor does not always have deleterious effects for workers. For example, deep acting (changing one’s inner feelings) does not always generate emotional exhaustion (Grandey, 2003). This is surprising, given Hochschild’s assumption that emotional labor leads to harmful outcomes because individuals are behaving inauthentically. For Hochschild, the true self resides in being able to impulsively express what one is feeling. When people inhibit the impulse to express their true feelings in the workplace, they experience alienation and other negative feelings.

Recently, Sloan (2007) studied individuals who defined themselves as having an impulsive self-orientation compared to an institutional self-orientation. While an impulsive orientation involves individuals seeing their true self as revealed in more spontaneous actions that may disregard the norms in a situation, an institutional orientation occurs when individuals see their true self as revealed in conforming to the norms in a situation. Thus, “institutionals” should feel authentic when they manage their emotions at work, while “impulsives” should feel authentic when they freely express their feelings.

Drawing on a random sample of state employees, Sloan’s (2007) results revealed that when workers managed their emotions, “institutionals” were more likely to report feelings of inauthenticity than “impulsives.” Sloan also found that “institutionals” reported greater inauthenticity than “impulsives” when they experienced negative emotions such as irritation and anxiety at work, but they reported greater authenticity than “impulsives” when they experienced positive emotions such as happiness. Sloan reasoned that “institutionals” may place greater importance on their emotions at work compared to “impulsives.” Since “institutionals” feel most like themselves when meeting normative expectations, when they experience positive emotions at work, this may be evidence that they are living up to their values. The experience of negative emotions and having to manage their emotions at work feels phony. For “impulsives,” emotions at work are of little consequence to how they see themselves. They are less affected by positive and negative feelings as well as emotional labor because their real feelings are experienced outside of the work setting. More generally, these findings suggest that researchers need to consider a theory of the self in understanding the processes and outcomes of emotional labor.

Wharton (2009) maintained that future research on emotional labor needs to focus on the development of theory. It would facilitate integrating the various empirical results. The cultural framework has been the primary way to understand emotional labor. Essentially, individuals learn the emotion culture of a society including the expectations about what people are supposed to feel and express in situations. Recently, Erickson (2008) argued for a contextual approach to emotional labor that incorporated both one’s position in the social structure and cultural expectations. She applied this approach to an analysis of registered nurses and found that emotional labor varied by one’s position in the stratification system. For example, there was a tendency for male nurses to be less likely to engage in deep acting than female nurses, and White nurses were more likely than nurses of color to pretend to feel emotions that they were not experiencing.

Wingfield’s (2010) research also investigated one’s position in the social structure and emotional labor. In her study of Black professionals, she argued that the workplace feeling rules were racialized, thereby constraining Black professionals to express themselves on the job. Racialized feeling rules revealed themselves in two ways. First, because many professions promote the feeling rule of displaying a pleasant demeanor, such as being agreeable, congenial, and friendly, Black professionals reported that it was particularly difficult to be pleasant because of the racism they experienced at work and outside of work, in the wider society. Second, while the emotion norms sometimes allowed the expression of frustration and annoyance, Black professionals perceived that the expression of such negative emotions was not available to them. This was particularly acute among Black professional men who feared being labeled “angry black men” (Wingfield, 2010, p. 259). Thus, compared to White professionals, Black professionals reported greater difficulty with expressing positive emotions, and they felt barred from the genuine expression of negative emotions. Overall, this research suggests that emotional work may be racially segregated, thereby reinforcing the racial imbalances that exist in society. Perhaps more importantly, we need to more closely examine how one’s structural position interacts with cultural meanings to produce emotional labor, and we need to identify the general principles that produce these outcomes that would help formulate a theory about emotional labor.

We need to keep in mind that emotional labor is not always an individual undertaking, but also a joint venture, enlisting the help of others such as coworkers. Only recently have sociologists begun to examine how coworkers help in emotion management. For example, when people get angry at work, they are less likely to confront the target of their emotions, and they are more likely to turn to coworkers to help them manage their emotions (Lively & Powell, 2006; Sloan, 2004). In an analysis of the role of coworkers in emotional labor, Lively (2008b) revealed how, in a reciprocal fashion, coworkers help each other manage workplace emotions. Further research is needed to better understand the type of coworkers who are most likely to help, the type of assistance they provide, and the type of situations that are most likely to enlist their support (Lively, 2008b). More importantly, we need theory to guide our understanding of the significance of coworkers in managing workplace emotions. Identity theory may be useful. Supportive coworkers may be verifying one’s identity in a setting where one’s identity is threatened.

Emotional Segueing

Innovative developments in the study of emotions are emerging more out of the emotion management area than from other areas in the sociology of emotions. When individuals engage in emotional labor, they may be forced to change their inner feelings to show an outward feeling that is consistent with the feeling norms in the situation. This change in inner feelings may involve transitioning through a few or many emotions. Drawing on a national sample, Lively (2008a) studied emotional segueing, that is, the shortest intervening emotional paths that individuals transition through to get to a specific emotional outcome. She examined emotional segueing by gender and found several differences. First, the relative distance between two emotions that were either opposite in valence (e.g., fear and hope) or similar in valence (e.g., self-reproach and anger) was further for women than men. Thus, women’s emotions are more remote and relatively inaccessible from each other compared to men’s emotions, suggesting that moving from one emotional state to another takes more work for women than men. Second, compared to men, women’s shortest paths between the more distant positive and negative emotions (e.g., getting from tranquility to distress) involved traveling through many more intervening emotions to accomplish the emotional transition. Third, men’s and women’s paths were marked with qualitatively different emotions. For example, women were more likely than men to rely on more positive emotions such as joy to make emotional transitions. In general, compared to men’s emotional pathways, women’s emotional pathways were longer, more complex, and they were more likely to rely on positive emotions to make emotional transitions. Since men were more likely to move between negative and positive states and with greater ease, it suggests that they may be more effective at emotion management than women. Emotion management may be more of an effort for women, and they may be less successful at it.

Pathways to Meaning

The idea of understanding emotion management through an analysis of pathways has also been examined by Grant, Morales, and Sallaz (2009), though their approach is slightly different. To set the stage for their approach, the researchers pointed out that increasingly, rather than organizations dictating particular “feeling rules,” they are encouraging workers to express their deepest values at their job in the hope that this might lead to more satisfied workers. One consequence of this, the researchers argued, is the reinsertion of “spirituality” into the workplace. Some managers now encourage workers to see the spiritual significance of their work. In the health care profession, for example, this might be revealed in portraying the profession as taking a more holistic approach in which caring professionals would care for the bodily as well as spiritual needs of patients. Critics of this approach maintain that this is another strategy to commodify workers’ innermost values. By advertising a holistic approach to care, for example, it primes patients that their spiritual needs will be met when health professionals may not be able to meet those expectations.

Grant et al. (2009) studied nurses and investigated whether nurses believed the care they provide had spiritual significance, and whether those beliefs were associated with feelings of authenticity on the job. They examined various factors which they thought might influence these outcomes, such as good vertical (employer–employee) relations, supportive horizontal (coworker– and worker–patient) relations, a cognitive framework that was sympathetic to spiritual beliefs, and involvement in religious institutions that sensitized individuals to spiritual matters. Each of these factors was individually coded from low to high. Then, instead of examining each factor separately, they combined them to see how different configurations (labeled “pathways”) affected spiritual care beliefs and feelings of authenticity.

They found that five different configurations (thus five different types of nurses) were associated with the nurses’ belief that their care was spiritually significant. For example, one configuration was made up of nurses who had good relations with their patients, a cognitive framework that was sympathetic to spiritual beliefs, and the nurses regularly attended religious services. An alternative configuration was comprised of nurses who had supportive coworkers, good relations with patients, a cognitive framework that was sympathetic to spiritual beliefs, but who did not regularly attend religious services. Further, the researchers found that some configurations (nurses) were more likely to experience feelings of authenticity when they engaged in spiritual care than others. For instance, while nurses from the first configuration were more likely to report authenticity on the job, nurses from the second configuration were more likely to report alienation. Thus, different pathways of meanings produced different emotional outcomes. Expressing deeper meanings at one’s job, such as spirituality, may be actualizing for some and alienating for others. What the above two studies on innovative directions reveal is a more dynamic and complex way of understanding how people manage their emotions.