Emotional labor profiles among teachers : associations with positive affective, motivational and well-being factors

Research indicates that teachers perform emotional labor on a daily basis. However, previous studies have mostly used a variable-centered approach that examines the associations of emotional labor strategies with particular outcome variables. This approach did not consider the possibility that teachers use different emotional labor strategies simultaneously. Therefore, in this study we took a person-centered approach and explored the emotional labor profiles in a large sample of Croatian teachers (N = 2,002) employed across educational levels (i.e., elementary, middle, and high school levels) by using latent profile analysis. In addition, we examined differences among profiles with regard to teachers’ positive affect, self-efficacy, work engagement, and job satisfaction. Results indicated the existence of six emotional labor profiles that were characterized by different combinations of deep acting, hiding feelings, and faking emotions. Profiles of teachers who dominantly rely on deep acting had the most adaptive patterns of analyzed outcomes, while profiles of teachers who reported higher levels of hiding feelings, regardless the level of deep acting, exhibited less desirable levels of positive affect, self-efficacy, work engagement, and job satisfaction.