Emotional Demands at Work: A Job Content Analysis

In: The annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Band 561, S. 177-191

Abstract

Qualitative & quantitative evidence from a study of several occupations in the public sector in the regional municipality of Haldimand-Norfolk, Ontario, is used to evaluate dimensions of emotional labor in the content of work performed by registered nurses, police officers, & managers. As part of a gender-neutral comparison system, two indexes are constructed to measure a range of emotional skills & demands found in these historically female & male jobs. It is found that the emotional labor required of police officers & registered nurses is comparable, despite the cultural ideology that portrays these jobs as requiring gender-specific skills. The utility & increased accuracy of using an augmented conceptualization of emotional labor to measure what employees actually do in performing their jobs are demonstrated. It is proposed that those studying emotional labor abandon their reliance on preconceived stereotypes of femininity when studying emotional labor, especially in service sector jobs. 6 Tables, 1 Appendix, 21 References. Adapted from the source document.