Emotions and Attitude

Class: Ex-PGDM Date: June 28, 2011 Presented by: Kanhaiya Manda (04) Shanta Kakodkar (14) Arun Kumar Nigam (24)

What is Attitude?
An evaluative statement which can be favorable or unfavorable about objects, people or events. It reflect how we feel about something.

I Like smoking

I like playing football

I hate my boss

How does one form Attitude?

My supervisor gave a promotion to a coworker who deserved it less than me. My supervisor is unfair.

I dislike my supervisor!

Negative attitude towards supervisor

I m looking for other work; I ve complained about my supervisor to anyone who would listen.

Components of Attitude
Includes the beliefs, opinions, and information a person has about the object Is the person s intention to behave in a certain way toward someone or something

The person s emotions or feelings about the object

Cognitive Component
(Cognitive = Evaluation)

Affective Component
(Affective = Feeling)

Behavioral Component
(Behavioral = Action)

Sets the stage for the more critical parts of an attitude

Leads to behavioral outcomes

Understanding the components of attitude is particularly important when attempting to change attitudes

Does behavior always follows attitude?

We love Cricket, but does everybody becomes a cricketer? We like n number of girls, but do we marry everyone? We may not like a certain brand, but will we say no if someone gifts us the same brand product?

These are some cases of differences between a person s attitude and his behavior. What is this called then?

Cognitive Dissonance
Condition or situation in which two attitudes or a behavior and an attitude conflicts. According to Leon Festinger (A Researcher in 1960)
Any form of inconsistency is uncomfortable. People seek consistency among their attitudes and between their attitudes and their behavior. They do this by altering their attitudes or the behavior or by developing a rationalisation for the discrepancy.

Ex: How we try to rationalise - why we joined SIMS Ex-PGDM

Desire to Reduce Dissonance

Difficult to avoid dissonance completely
Ex: Eating junk food is not good for health, but we still eat by thinking that we won t do this next time or we won t do this offten.

Desire to reduce dissonance depends on

Importance of elements creating dissonance Ex: Telling Lie; Working at wrong place Degree of individual influence over elements (Control over the elements) Ex: Corruption Rewards involved in dissonance

Measuring Attitude Behavior Relationship

Important attitudes tend to show a strong relationship to behavior Important Attitudes fundamental values, self interest, or identification with individuals or groups that a person values Specific attitudes tend to predict specific behaviors, whereas general attitudes tend to best predict general behavior.
Ex: Asking about intention to staying with an organisation and asking about his job satisfaction

More we talk about or express our attitude towards a subject, the more we are likely to remember it, and the more likely it is to shape our behavior. Discrepancies between attitudes and behavior are more likely to occur when social pressure to behave in a certain ways hold exceptional power.
Ex: Employee from Cigarette; Arranged Marriages

Stronger attitude behavior relationship, if an attitude refers to something with which the individual has direct personal experience. (EX: Experience of Accident)

Attitudes in Organisation Job Satisfaction

A person's evaluation of his or her job and work context A collection of attitudes about specific facets of the job
Job Content Supervisor

Career Progress

Job Satisfaction

CoCo-workers

Pay and Benefits

Working Conditions

EVLN: Responses to Dissatisfaction

Active

Exit Destructive

Voice Constructive

Neglect

Loyalty

Passive

Job Satisfaction and Work Outcomes

Happy workers are somewhat more productive, but:
General attitude is a poor predictor of specific behaviors Job performance affects satisfaction only when rewarded Job satisfaction and motivation have little effect in jobs with little employee control

Job satisfaction increases customer satisfaction and organizational profitability

Because it affects mood positive behaviors to customers Decreases turnover more consistent, familiar service

Attitudes in Organisation Job Involvement

Job Involvement
The degree to which people identify psychologically with their job and consider their perceived performance level important to self-worth. Employee with strong level of job involvement strongly identify with and really care about the kind of work they do.

Psychological Empowerment
Employees beliefs in the degree to which they influence their work environment, their competence the meaningfulness of their job, and the perceived autonomy in their work.

Attitudes in Organization Organizational Commitment

Affective commitment
Emotional attachment to, identification with, and involvement in an organization

Continuance commitment
Belief that staying with the organization serves your personal interests

Normative commitment
Obligation to remain with the organisation for moral or ethical reasons.

Emotions
Emotions are intense feelings that arise spontaneously rather than through conscious effort

Attitudes vs. Emotions

Attitudes
Judgments about an object

Emotions
Feelings toward an object

Based mainly on rational logic

Based on awareness of our senses

Usually stable for days or longer

Occur briefly, usually lasting minutes

Types of Emotions
Anger Cheerfulness

Nervousness Happiness Stress

Negative Positive Emotions Emotions

Frustration Excitement Fear Self Confidence

Anxiety

Functions of Emotions
It is not just enough to be rational. Emotions help interpret the world. In social interaction it is very important to know ones emotions and the emotions of the person you are interacting with. Differentiate managers from computers. If only logic was enough to make to a decision we wont need managers robots would have been enough. Emotions like motivation, instinct, aggression all affect thinking and decision making. Helps in decision making in critical situations. Ex: fear prevents us from taking dangerous or risky decisions. Helps in analysing the need, and in deciding to implement or avoid.

Social Function

Decision Making Function

Role of Emotion in Memory

Studies have shown that emotionally charged events are remembered better

Sources of Emotions and Moods

Personality: the personality of the individual decides to what extent and intensity a person experiences a particular emotion or mood Stress: stress can worsen our mood. The more the stress the more negative the emotion Social Activities: social activities usually increase positive mood and emotions Sleep: less sleep or poor quality sleep puts people in a bad mood Exercise: regular exercise enhances positive emotions Age: emotional experience improves with age and as we grow older we experience fewer negative emotions Gender: studies have shown that woman experience emotions more intensely and are more emotionally expressive than men

Impact of Emotions on Attitude

Can be measured through physiological cues like facial expression, vocal changes and body rate measures like increased body tension and increased heart rate. The impact of an emotional appeal on attitude is influenced by:
Attitude Accessibility: if your attitude towards a particular object or event is easily accessible to you, it is more resistant to change. Issue Involvement: If involvement in the issue is high it is more difficult to change attitude with emotional appeal Characteristics of the Source: quality of content of the message, personality of the source, non verbal communication also affect attitude Self Efficacy: confidence that the person has in dealing with the situation determines his resistance to an emotional appeal

Emotional Labor
Effort, planning and control needed to express organizationally-desired emotions during interpersonal transactions Emotional labor higher when job requires:
Frequent and long duration display of emotions Displaying a variety of emotions Displaying more intense emotions

Challenges of Emotional Labor:

Cultural implications Difficult to display expected emotions accurately, and to hide true emotions Potentially stressful with surface acting Less stress through deep acting

Emotional Intelligence

Emotional Intelligence is a persons ability to:

Be aware of his own emotions Detect emotions in others Manage the emotional cues and information successfully The ability to persist in the face of set backs and failures

Pros and Cons of Emotional Intelligence

Pros:
Emotional Intelligence can help a person influence people and manage relationships with colleagues, subordinates, customers and bosses Emotions have the power to motivate and knowing how to make the right use of emotions keeps the work force positive and motivated Teams that have emotionally intelligent people would perform more efficiently as they spend more time solving problems than blaming others

Cons:
Emotional Intelligence is a very vague concept that is studied by different researchers from different angles Unlike general intelligence it is not possible to quantify and measure Emotional Intelligence Emotional Intelligence is very closely related to intelligence and personality and has nothing new to offer

Applications of Emotions in the Corporate World

Selection of Employees: EI is considered by employers while selecting employees specially in the service industries which require high social interaction Decision Making: positive emotions help make good decisions, solve problems and speed up the decision making process Customer Service: a positive emotion from an employee makes a customer react positively. This is called Emotion Contagion. A positive attitude increases the chances of a sale Interpersonal conflict: emotional intelligence helps to identify the emotional elements in a conflict and get the conflicting parties to work through their emotions. Leadership: effective leaders use feelings to convey their messages. When the leaders are enthusiastic and active they energise their subordinates and convey a sense of enthusiasm and optimism in them.

Generating Positive Emotions at Work

The emotions-attitudes-behavior model illustrates that attitudes are shaped by ongoing emotional experiences. Thus, successful companies actively create more positive than negative emotional episodes.

Employee-Customer-Profit Chain

Company Practices

Satisfied Employees

Less attrition Consistent service

Customer s Perceived Value

Satisfied customers Customer referrals

Higher Revenue Growth and Profits