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Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model

This study contributes to the constantly accumulating evidence on the effects of customer incivility (CI) on service employee exhaustion. Previous research has demonstrated that surface acting (SA) acts as a mediating variable in the relationship between CI and exhaustion. This study extended prior...

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Autores principales: Szczygiel, Dorota Daniela, Bazińska, Róz·a
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7859092/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33551888
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.506085
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author Szczygiel, Dorota Daniela
Bazińska, Róz·a
author_facet Szczygiel, Dorota Daniela
Bazińska, Róz·a
author_sort Szczygiel, Dorota Daniela
collection PubMed
description This study contributes to the constantly accumulating evidence on the effects of customer incivility (CI) on service employee exhaustion. Previous research has demonstrated that surface acting (SA) acts as a mediating variable in the relationship between CI and exhaustion. This study extended prior findings in two ways. The results of Study 1 (315 retail sales employees, 62.2% female) demonstrated that SA mediates the positive relationship between CI and exhaustion while controlling for employees’ trait positive and negative affectivity (NA). The results of Study 2 (292 customer service representatives, 51% female) supported a moderated mediation model demonstrating that trait emotional intelligence (EI) buffers the direct and indirect (through SA) effects of CI on exhaustion. Specifically, it was found that employees exposed to many uncivil customer behaviors but high in trait EI reported using less SA and, thus, experienced fewer exhaustion symptoms than their low in trait EI counterparts. These results highlight EI as an important personal resource that mitigates the adverse effects of CI on service employees’ exhaustion, and suggest that organizations should consider implementing EI training programmes for their frontline service employees.
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spelling pubmed-78590922021-02-05 Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model Szczygiel, Dorota Daniela Bazińska, Róz·a Front Psychol Psychology This study contributes to the constantly accumulating evidence on the effects of customer incivility (CI) on service employee exhaustion. Previous research has demonstrated that surface acting (SA) acts as a mediating variable in the relationship between CI and exhaustion. This study extended prior findings in two ways. The results of Study 1 (315 retail sales employees, 62.2% female) demonstrated that SA mediates the positive relationship between CI and exhaustion while controlling for employees’ trait positive and negative affectivity (NA). The results of Study 2 (292 customer service representatives, 51% female) supported a moderated mediation model demonstrating that trait emotional intelligence (EI) buffers the direct and indirect (through SA) effects of CI on exhaustion. Specifically, it was found that employees exposed to many uncivil customer behaviors but high in trait EI reported using less SA and, thus, experienced fewer exhaustion symptoms than their low in trait EI counterparts. These results highlight EI as an important personal resource that mitigates the adverse effects of CI on service employees’ exhaustion, and suggest that organizations should consider implementing EI training programmes for their frontline service employees. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-01-21 /pmc/articles/PMC7859092/ /pubmed/33551888 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.506085 Text en Copyright © 2021 Szczygiel and Bazińska. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Szczygiel, Dorota Daniela
Bazińska, Róz·a
Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model
title Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model
title_full Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model
title_fullStr Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model
title_full_unstemmed Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model
title_short Emotional Intelligence Mitigates the Effects of Customer Incivility on Surface Acting and Exhaustion in Service Occupations: A Moderated Mediation Model
title_sort emotional intelligence mitigates the effects of customer incivility on surface acting and exhaustion in service occupations: a moderated mediation model
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7859092/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33551888
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.506085
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