The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA

Abstract #49538

A. Butch de Castro, RN, MSN/MPH¹, Sheila T. Fitzgerald, PhD¹, and Barbara A. Curbow, PhD². (1) Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Bloomberg School of Public Health, 615 N. Wolfe Street, Baltimore, MD 21205, 410-366-6061, adecastr@jhsph.edu, (2) Department of Health Policy and Management, Johns Hopkins University, School of Hygiene and Public Health, 624 N Broadway 7th Floor, Baltimore, MD 21205

Emotional labor (Hochschild, 1983) is gaining recognition as a job stressor for workers employed in sales and service jobs. Emotional labor describes the management of feelings and expressions to create facial, bodily, and verbal displays that are expected or required for certain jobs. This performance requires effort imposing an occupational demand on workers. Additionally, emotional labor possesses an aspect of control over workers that can further result in adverse psychosocial outcomes. This current research is a cross-sectional study examining emotional labor among a multi-racial sample (n=127) of young female and male workers (ages 17-28) predominantly employed in the sales and service sector. The measurement of emotional labor involves the recently developed Curbow-Spratt Emotions at Work Scale that captures two principal components of emotional labor (surface and deep acting) with good internal consistency and reliability. Specifically, relationships between surface acting/deep acting and the psychosocial outcomes of depression and job dissatisfaction will be described. Also, the hypothesis that surface acting mediates the relationship between the independent variables of positive/negative affect, anxiety, and factors of job strain and the dependent variables of depression and job dissatisfaction will be tested. Results of this investigation will be presented and contribute to the relevance of emotional labor as a job stressor, particularly for youth who are typically employed in sales and service jobs.

Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the session, the participant will be able to

• Describe the concept of emotional labor and its significance to occupational health.
• Apply a survey instrument designed to measure emotional labor.
• Identify psychosocial consequences for workers performing emotional labor.

Keywords: Occupational Health, Youth at Work

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.