Interpersonal Emotion Regulation in the Workplace: A Systematic Literature Review

Abstract

Interpersonal emotion regulation (IER) has importance in the area of research due to its influence on organizational dynamics, employee well-being, and leadership effectiveness. Most of the research have studies only intrapersonal emotion regulation, the interpersonal emotion regulation remains underexplored, particularly in organizational contexts. The present review attempts to systematically examine the interpersonal emotion regulation and its implication in the workplace. The study focuses on understanding the various dimensions of IER, and how these dimensions influence the employee workplace behaviour, leadership effectiveness, and overall organizational performance. Further, this review also considers its relationship with emotional intelligence, organizational performance, and conflict management. The present study adopts a systematic literature review by analysing various peer-reviewed studies, related to interpersonal emotion regulation. This helps in identifying the vital themes, patterns, and research gaps in existing literature. Findings of this study indicated that IER strategies have a significant impact on workplace relationships and performance. However, the existing literature shows variations in conceptual understanding and measurement of IER, which creates challenges in establishing a unified framework. Hence, there is need for more consistent theoretical models and empirical studies to strengthen the interpersonal emotion regulation studies in organizational context. The present review highlights the importance of interpersonal emotion regulation into organizational settings, and suggests that future research can be focused on developing a standardized framework and exploring its practical implication in diverse organizational contexts.