سبک های مقابله ای کارکنان خدمات هتلداری : نقش هوش عاطفی، دو صفت شخصیتی اساسی ، و عوامل اجتماعی و جمعیتی

This study examines the relationship between emotional intelligence (EI) and three coping strategies (task-, emotion-, and avoidance-oriented coping) using an adult, hospitality industry population specifically in hotel and restaurant work environments. The hierarchical regression indicates that EI is by far the most dominant predictor of task coping among all selected explanatory variables; EI does not have much influence on emotion coping after the entry of two basic personality traits (neuroticism and extraversion); and EI is significantly related to avoidance coping encompassing distraction and social diversion. In addition, this study reveals the role played by age and work experience in individual coping efforts and a high possibility of female workers as a task-oriented coper in hospitality work settings.

Emotional intelligence (EI), which originates from social intelligence (Thorndike, 1920) has begun to be studied relatively recently and has received massive attention in the individual differences field. Despite debates between the personality model and the ability model of EI, management scholars in favor of EI argue the utility of EI in the work place. Recent management studies suggest that individual employee's EI is positively related to his/her job performance, job satisfaction, and organizational citizenship behaviors (Day and Carroll, 2004, Higgs, 2004, Lopes et al., 2006, Sy et al., 2006 and Wong and Law, 2002) and that leader EI contributes to the financial performance of the company (Boyatzis, 2006) and followers’ satisfaction and behaviors (Sy et al., 2006 and Wong and Law, 2002). In the similar vein, hospitality literature shows that managerial EI leads to team satisfaction, customer satisfaction, and business profit in the restaurant operation (Langhorn, 2004). Besides the work-related performance, the critical area where EI can make a noteworthy contribution involves individual health behaviors and stress (Fernandez-Berrocal and Extremera, 2006). Using the information from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health in the U.S. (Office of Applied Studies, 2007), Pizam (2008) reports that foodservice employees have the second highest incidence of depressive episodes in all job categories and female foodservice workers’ depression is so severe that their depression rate ranks first among all female full-time workers in the nation. Several recent studies also note the high level of stress for hospitality employees in the other parts of the world due to frequent face-to-face customer contacts and long working hours (Faulkner and Patiar, 1997, Murray-Gibbons and Gibbons, 2007 and Pienaar and Willemse, 2008). Literature has shown that coping is a mediator between antecedent stressful events and outcomes such as anxiety, depression, psychological distress, and somatic complaints (Billings and Moos, 1981, Billings and Moos, 1984, Coyne et al., 1981 and Pearlin and Schooler, 1978). Therefore, it is imperative for hospitality employees to have adaptive coping skills to remain psychologically healthy and productive at work. Some evidence exists that EI may influence the choice of coping methods that individuals make under stressful circumstances (Baker and Berenbaum, 2007 and Salovey et al., 2002). Although EI has emerged as an important individual variable that may protect people against stress, to date few studies have analyzed this issue. Moreover, due to the necessity of the proper coping skills in hospitality environments, coping behaviors of hospitality workers require in-depth research. To fill this gap, this study investigates the relationship between trait EI and coping responses using hotel and restaurant employees. To detect the incremental predictive validity of trait EI, two basic personality traits, namely extraversion and neuroticism, are incorporated into the proposed coping model. This way the unique role of trait EI in coping can be attested along with the basic personality factors. Second, the researchers of this study are interested in the effect of key socio-demographic variables, such as gender, age, education, position, and job experience, on trait EI and coping. There are limited findings on this fundamental query in hospitality academia whereas the information is abundant in other disciplines (Brackett et al., 2004, Ciarrochi et al., 2000, Endler and Parker, 1994, Mayer et al., 1999 and Feifel and Strack, 1989). The reminder of this paper is organized as follows: Section 2 introduces the theoretical background of EI and coping to formulate a series of study hypotheses; Section 3 describes the data collection procedure and instruments; statistical test results and major findings are discussed in Sections 4 and 5, respectively; Section 6 provides summary and future research directions; and Section 7 concludes the paper with managerial implications for hospitality operators.

This study attempted to find coping strategies favored by high and low EI individuals using an adult, hospitality industry population specifically hotel and restaurant employees. Among trait EI measures, no findings have been reported regarding the effect of WLEIS on coping styles. Trait EI scales often address different domains of emotional skills. Thus, it is worthwhile to investigate the similar research questions with various, available EI scales. This study reveals that each coping disposition has its unique personality predictors: for task coping, EI; for emotion coping, neuroticism; and for avoidance coping, EI, extraversion, and neuroticism. Compared to earlier studies (Endler and Parker, 1990 and McCrae and Costa, 1986), adaptive or task coping behaviors by extraverts are weak. Hospitality literature shows a robust negative relationship between extraversion and burnout (Kim et al., 2007) and thus adaptive or task-oriented coping behaviors are expected from extraverts. Additional research may be helpful to discover the true effect of extraversion on adaptive coping. This study implies that people on both ends of the emotional and social skills spectrum, full or short of emotional and social abilities, resort to avoidance-oriented coping. It is well known that neurotic individuals are inclined to maladaptive coping (emotion and avoidance), but it is less known that extraverted or high-EI individuals may employ selective maladaptive coping methods such as social diversion and distraction. Most published EI studies tend to emphasize the brighter side of EI, but this study indicates a mixed view. Perhaps EI has both positive and negative influences. Distraction is typically perceived as an ineffective coping behavior although the role of social diversion is disputable (Carver et al., 1989). For example, for social diversion, the stressful person may visit a friend to obtain advice (effective coping); the person may visit a friend for emotional support (ineffective coping); and the person may visit a friend to engage in activities to forget about the problem temporarily (ineffective coping). The coping measure used in this study (MCI) obviously focuses on the ineffective function of social support. As the concept of EI is becoming more popular, it is important to understand the nature of EI thoroughly and objectively. To have a complete picture on the association between EI and coping responses, in the future it may be helpful to consider a scale with a large number of specific coping mechanisms rather than a few broad categories. With more specific coping responses, for example, researchers can compare the impact of EI on effective and ineffective sides of social support and also learn how EI interacts with other missing coping behaviors in this study such as humor or turning to religion. During the investigation of incremental predictive validity of EI, this study finds a likelihood of EI as a mediator variable. A recent study reports that EI mediates the relationship between basic personality traits and exercise behaviors in the structural equation model (Saklofske et al., 2007). As EI is being recognized as a sound construct, the more exploration of EI as a mediator or possibly as a moderator (buffering variable) is recommended for the advancement of the theory. This new concept is likely to help answer many unknown reasons for employee burnout and health behaviors in the service work setting including the hospitality industry. The effect sizes of socio-demographic variables appear to be pretty small, but it is not an uncommon phenomenon in coping or burnout literature. Cohen (1988) acknowledges that many effects sought in social and behavioral research are likely to be small. Therefore, it is important to recognize the small effects in social science. Also, small effects may add up and become a sizable effect to explain an outcome variable. The results of this study demonstrate that small effects such as industry and socio-demographic factors make up 5% of the variance for task coping. The additional regression analyses of this study indicate the need for gender specific research. It is critical to note the existence of different predictors or the different strength of the same predictors behind the behaviors of men and women. In this study, women have more variety of influential task coping drivers; aging does not decrease women's avoidance coping; and a greater number of psychological traits are related to women's avoidance coping. The hospitality industry typically recruits a large number of females. Gender focused studies are rarely performed by hospitality scholars although it is likely to serve the industry well. It may be worth reanalyzing the past hospitality studies on job stress or burnout based on gender. Researchers may discover certain job resource variables have different impacts on burnout between men and women. In reference to the result of this study (women's sensitivity to social support and learning through industry intervention, age, and experience), job resources such as feedback, coaching, and coworker or supervisor support are expected to reduce the feeling of burnout for females more effectively than for males. In addition, it is likely to see some difference in the effect of personality traits on burnout between the two genders. This study does not fully support the developmental criterion of EI. Although the moderate effect of work experience (p = .07) sends some possibility that EI can develop and be teachable at work, continued research is recommended for a more solid conclusion. It is acknowledged that men tend to overestimate and women underestimate their (emotional) ability. However, the current sample did not fall into this phenomenon. Female respondents in this study appear confident enough to evaluate their EI objectively demonstrating their self-assurance. Note that studies, which report no significant gender differences in trait EI, mostly used student samples (e.g., Brackett et al., 2004 and Petrides and Furnham, 2000). Young students are more likely to misjudge their EI level due to limited opportunities to learn about their EI. The result of this study seems to indicate that researchers should not be overly concerned about the use of a self-reported, trait EI measure with mature respondents engaged in preferably service occupations. Lastly, the population of this study is limited to Hawaii. The results of this study, therefore, must be interpreted with caution. Hawaii has its own unique culture with ample influence from Asia. Although ethnic information was not sought in this study, a fairly large percentage of respondents were Asian Americans or Asians. Using college student samples, coping scholars have shown different coping behaviors favored by Asians against non-Asians (Chang, 1996 and Radford et al., 1993). In the future, a comparative analysis, after separating hospitality workers into different ethnic groups, may enrich the existing literature on cultural differences in coping.