Abstract

This research focuses on emergency service providers and their emotional labor. In their work, emergency service providers are subject to positive and negative emotions, ranging from mild to traumatic. This is due to the nature of their work where they face sickness, death and violent accidents. Workers have to keep a professional demeanor and to stay calm and confident despite their true emotions. The research studies the relationships between the emotions felt, their emotional labor and their resulting performance. We survey 90 emergency workers in the Montreal Fire Department and the Lebanese Red Cross First Aid Teams. Participants are asked to describe a recent emergency call, and their emotions, emotional display and performance during the call. An independent sample of 87 respondents also provides ratings of the emotional tone of the events described. Our results show, depending on the sub-sample studied, different correlation among the variables. Some of the findings in the overall sample are a negative relationship between positive emotions and emotional labor, and a positive relationship between positive emotions and performance. As for the sub-samples, among the results are a negative relationship between surface acting and performance for the firefighters, and a negative relationship between positive emotions and deep acting for the paramedics.