Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1

Indian Journal of Behavioural Sciences Vol-1` Issue- 1` March 2016

Well-Being at Work in India

Gargi Sandilya* and Ghazi Shahnawaz**

*Corresponding Author **Professor, Department of Psychology, JamiaMilliaIslamia,

Introduction Happiness has been the universal goal of human survival since time immemorial. From the earliest time in the recorded history till today, happiness has been a topic of great interest to philosophers, religious preachers, saints etc. across the world. The concept of happiness has been discussed in detail in many ancient texts – the Upanishads and the Holy Quran. Greek Philosophers - Socrates, Plato and Aristotle have also spoken about happiness and given theoretical analysis of happiness, which broadly came under two broad categories of eudaimonia and hedonia, which in the current terms researchers classify as eudaimonic and hedonic happiness. Albert Camus (n.d.), a French existential writer, also added his ideas to this pool when he said, “You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.”In the last two decades, following Seligman’s call for a more balanced view in psychology, there has been significant focus on positive psychology beginning in the West and now across the globe. In addition, a number of researchers have established the significance of cultural influences in the perception and experience of happiness or well-being (Oishi, 2010; Veenhoven, 2010; Diener, Oishi& Lucas, 2003; etc.). Therefore, any study on happiness or well-being needs to take into account the prevalent culture of the locale where the target population is. However, a review of current literature in India reveals that a large majority of studies on well-being and related components use Western scales and/or constructs, such as Satisfaction With Life Scale by Diener; Well-being scales by Ryff, etc. This gap in the current literature unearths the need for a bottom up inductive approach to first understand what well-being means to a majority of Indians, and then proceed to explore the factors that contribute to or reduce the experience of well-being by an individual. Page 1 Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1

Moreover, given the fact that, an average individual invests more than one-third of his or her waking hours performing work-related activities,one maydeduce that the workplace greatly influences an individual’s overall sense of happiness. It is therefore, imperative to explore the concept of well-being of an individual in the organizational context. Even with an increasing focus on positive psychology research in India, indigenous studies in the area of organizational behavior have been few and far between, where one does observe a recent paradigmatic shift towards the subjective aspects of human beings—Emotions, Employee Engagement, Spirituality and so on with Happiness at Work being a fresh addition. Despite this new trend, there seems to be a paucity of research to understand well- being in the workplace keeping in mind the socio-cultural context, since a large number of studies use and validate scales and concepts developed in the Western world. The present paper is a modest attempt to fill this gap in knowledge, by suggesting a theoretical framework for Happiness at work, more suited to the Indian psyche.

Current meanings of well-being Several different terms have been used in the context of happiness by different researchers such as Flow by Chiksentmihaly (2001), Flourish by Seligman (2011), Authentic Happiness by Seligman again (2003), Subjective Well-Being by Diener (1984), etc. These words are often used interchangeably though they differ somewhat in their definitions. In this paper the words Happiness and Well- Being have been used interchangeably. Generally speaking, whatever the definition one follows, happiness or well-being falls into two broad categories as per research in the last two decades: hedonic and eudemonic. As Grinde (2012) puts it, the dissent pertaining to the nature and pursuit of happiness led to these two opposing approaches or philosophical traditions. We shall now take a look at both these approaches separately.

Hedonic happiness revolves around the concept of pleasant experiences and good life (Baumgardner& Crothers, 2011). The hedonic perspective suggests that maximising one’s pleasurable moments is the pathway to happiness (DelleFave, Massimini, &Bassi, 2011). According to hedonic philosophers, the desire to maximise their experience of pleasure and to minimise pain is inherent in human beings.Therefore, pleasure and pain areconsidered powerful indicators of good and bad and hence maximising pleasure was seen as a way of maximising the good in one’s life (Henderson, & Knight, 2012).A few concepts related to hedonic happiness include Subjective Well-being by Diener(1984); and Authentic Happiness(2003) among others.

Eudaimonic Happiness is often contrasted with, and considered philosophically opposed to, the hedonic tradition (Deci & Ryan, 2008). The concept of eudaimonia was first introduced by Aristotle, who suggested that the pursuit of complex and meaningful goals, while developing one’s potentials was the best way to achieve a good life(Keyes &Annas, 2009).He distinguished between pleasure

[Type text] Page 2 Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1 and the good life, at times belittling hedonism as a lower ideal, as he believed it made humans slaves of their desires. Although positive emotional experiences were not central to Aristotle’s conception of a good life, he recognized and acknowledged that action taken with eudaimonicmotives often resulted in hedonic pleasure (Kashdan et al., 2008).One may, therefore, say that eudaimonic happiness deals with deeper concepts of meaningfulness of life, fulfillment and achievement of one’s potential with a stronger focus on why people are happy rather than if a person is happy (Baumgardner& Crothers, 2011).Concepts related to this include Self- determination theory by Ryan and Deci, 2000, Happiness is not Well-being (Raibley 2011), etc.

Despite differences in these two approaches, lately eminent psychologists appear to see the benefits of both hedonic and eudaimonic approaches. Kashdan et al., (2008) oppose the philosophical distinction between hedonia and eudaimoniaand state that it is unhelpful, empirically unwarranted, and potentially harmful, insisting on the need to abandon the hedonic and eudaimonic categorical dichotomy. Instead,they recommend that the construct under investigation be explicitly defines (e.g. meaning in life), rather than giving a general reference to the philosophical tradition that the construct might be aligned with (e.g. eudaimonia). Waterman (2008) contends that having a variety of definitions is appropriate during early stages of research of a construct, from which the emerging operational definitions that correspond adequately to conceptual meanings are the ones that subsequently survive. Waterman further suggests that a purely empirically-driven approach ignores the complexities of the construct of wellbeing.Ryan and Huta (2009) concurred with this view point and further interpreted the current diversity within the wellbeing research focus as positive, and described the recent tension between hedonic and eudaimonic advocates as a generative and creative tension.As a result of this recent trend towards an integrated approach towards happiness that incorporates both aspects a new concept of ‘Flourish’ has recently been suggested.As seenin the arguments presented in the previous paragraphs, researchers today agree that there is a need to continue to investigate a broad array of wellbeing and happiness sources as well as outcomes, from both the hedonic and eudaimonic traditions.

Moreover, it is believed that such cross-fertilisation will increase the overall understanding of wellbeing. There is a general agreement that eudaimonia and hedonia should not be treated categorically, nor considered mutually exclusive.That they rather operate in tandem, in a synergistic fashion is an idea the positive psychology community is now open to exploring. There is also general consensus that a state characterised by both hedonic and eudaimonic sources and outcomes of happiness is most desirable. It is for these reasons that there is now an increased attention towards integrated conceptualisations of well-being. Seligman, Parks and Steen (2004) were the first to propose an integrated well-being theory termed Authentic Happiness theory, which suggested that the presence of positive emotion, meaning, and engagement were indicative of wellbeing. The dimensions of pleasure and of meaning in this proposed model have been equated with hedonia and eudaimonia respectively. More recently, Seligman added the facets of achievement and relationships to his definition, and labelled the combined presence of all components ‘flourishing’ (Seligman, 2011). Seligman proposes that his new theory reconciles the differing perspectives regarding the conceptualisation and measurement of well- being by including both hedonic and eudaimonic aspects (Forgeard, Jayawickreme, Kern, & Seligman, 2011). Although there is currently a lack of empirical support, Seligman claims he is in the process of developing measures to investigate the validity of his

[Type text] Page 3 Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1 flourishing theory of wellbeing (Forgeard et al., 2011). Keyes (2007) proposed a similar model of well-being, which is in truth a Complete Mental Health Model incorporates facets of emotional wellbeing (i.e. SWB) and positive functioning in life (i.e. eudaimonic wellbeing), which further includes psychological wellbeing and social wellbeing. One may, therefore, conclude that the hedonic as well as theeudaimonic perspectives contribute to a comprehensive understanding of wellbeing, and should therefore be integrated. Research findings in this area though limited suggest that they are both distinct, yet highly related subjective experiences, and that both hedonic and eudaimonic pursuits can lead to wellbeing benefits. At the same time it is also suggested that pursuit of eudaimonichappiness leads to greater wellbeing benefits than hedonic pursuits, and that a life rich in both pursuits is associated with the greatest degree of wellbeing(Henderson, & Knight, 2012). Further empirical validation is essential to establish the accuracy of these conclusions, though.

Well-being research in India The last decade has seen a proliferation of studies on well-being and related concepts in India as well. These studies bring to light the varied approaches taken by different researchers, at times based on religious texts and beliefs and other times validating Western research. Dalal and Misra (2011),while discussing the psychology of health and well-being, quote several ancient Indian texts including the Taittiriya Upanishad and conclude that happiness, joy and wellbeing or rather the manifestation of ananda (bliss) is the original or true nature of a human being. They go on to state that getting involved in day to day hassles diverts our minds away from our true nature, and leads us to being unhappy. Gaur (2006) examined the social representation of health and well-being by analyzing the cultural practices in the Indian context. He highlighted the limits of hedonic happiness and emphasized the all-encompassing nature of eudaimonic happiness with the final word that well-being depends on a combination of appropriate conduct at the three levels of body, mind and spirit. In another study, Bhangaokar and Kapadia (2009)analyze the terms dharma and karma through in- depth interviews and revealthat an individual’s interpretation of these two terms is influenced by their life stage, gender and socio economic status. Palsane and Lam (1996)brought to light the Eastern concept of duality considering the beliefs propounded in Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, Jainism and Taoism.They highlight that in the East, focus is more on the attainment of balance rather than a pursuit of happiness. This, once again brings out that the eudaimonic construct of happinessis more applicable in the Indian cultural context. Asthana (2009)reiteratedthat the highest achievement in life, in the Eastern world, is transcendence from the dualism of life, from happiness-sorrow, pleasure-pain, love-hate, etc. Srivastava and Misra (2011)on comparing the Western and Indian concept of happiness, conclude that moderation in behavior is the key element of happiness in the Indian context, while pursuit of pleasures and life satisfaction is more important in the West. Despite these conclusions by eminent researchers, the reality on the ground seems to be different. Talking to people and eliciting their opinions brings out the fact that a majority among us is basically in pursuit of a good life. Materialistic goals seem to have taken precedence over the higher goals of balance and moderation as prescribed in the ancient texts.

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Considering the current literature on well-being in India as well as the recent trend in the West to integrate the hedonic and eudaimonic aspects of well-being, one may conclude that there is a need to delve deeper into this concept in the Indian cultural context. At the outset, one may say that well-being is an overall feeling of satisfaction with life circumstances and events, which is influenced by a number of factors such as the individual’s state of mind, personality, culture, interpretation of the context, values and spiritual inclination. While this is the case of well-being in general, the focus of this paper primarily is to build the construct of ‘well- being at work’ in the Indian cultural context.

Well-being at Work There is no denying the fact that Generic happiness is an important concept, however, there are studies which suggest that context of happiness must also be considered (Dagenais-Desmarais and Savoie, 2011). Well-being is the overall goal of life for an individual, though the way a person approaches it, or pursues it may differ from one person to another, as we have seen in the previous section on well-being. Since a large part of an individual’s life is spent in work or work related activities, it is crucial to understand the various factors that contribute to well-being at the workplace. In addition, companies too in recent times are laying much emphasis on happiness of employees through employee engagement events - happiness drives, town halls, celebrations, rewards and recognition days, etc. This recent interest of organizations to ensure that their employees are happy is based on the premise that happy employees are more productive and that, in turn, will lead to better individual, team as well as organizational performance, thus helping organizations better meet their goals. While research in the area of positive psychology proliferated in the last two decades, application of the same in organizations started a little later. Areas covered in this context include Positiveorganizational behavior (POB), Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS), Psychological capital (PsyCap), Authentic Leadership, Ethical Leadership,etc. However new this area may seem, the interest in well-being at work is not really that novel.Hersey (1930, 1932) undertook a series of investigations in the early twentieth century, to explore the possibility of relationship between employee well-being and their productivity. During the same period Fisher and Hanna (1931) in their seminal work ‘The Dissatisfied Worker’ established that 90% of attrition in organizations could be attributed to well-being and related issues. This line of research then took a back seat when other issues took precedence due to the great depression in this period. There has been a resurgence of research in this area in the last decade or so. Reasons for this could be many, right from rising cost of illness, risk to viability due to cut throat competition, the motivation to present themselves as a good employer, to the inherent belief that happy and healthy employees are more productive.

On the subject of Happiness at work, even though the context is very different from general well-being or happiness, very few studies are found. Jessica Pryce-Jones (2010), through a five year study proposed one of the first models for happiness at work. In this model, Happiness at work is defined as a mindset which allows an individual to maximize performance and achieve potential and [Type text] Page 5 Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1 encompassing job satisfaction and engagement, indicating the power an individual has over his/her level of happiness.This model is construed with achievement of potential at its centre. Achievement of potential, which is strongly associated with feeling energized, utilizing strengths, learning new skills and overcoming challenges, is found to be central to being happy at work.The 5 C’s placed around this centre are – Contribution (constructive and productive effort), Conviction (that includes motivation, efficiency and resilience along with a positive perception of job importance), Culture (made up of norms, values and behavior of an organization), Commitment (an interacting set of feelings and beliefs) and Confidence (consisting of self-control; high levels of self-beliefs; clear understanding of role).The outer circle is conceptualized with pride, trust and recognition, where the first two are the individual’s contributions to the organization, the latter is received from the organization in return for a job well-done. Results of the study revealed that happy employees perform better than unhappy ones.

Another study by Dagenais-Desmarais and Savoie (2011) is more relevant to the work context. Stating that in recent trends there is more preference for context free measures, the authors go on to affirm that there is no adequate conceptual framework devoted specifically to psychological well-being at work. Previous research has focused on specific characteristics of organizations that lead to overall employee well-being.Building the case with the argument that work is a life domain distinct from others such as leisure, friends and family, since the workplace involves specific parameters leading to unique experiences for individuals, they add that individuals invest more than half of their waking hours at their workplace which in turn provides them sustenance, decent living conditions, and opportunities to use their potential. Incorporating these ideas, and working in a bottom up inductive manner, the authors have identified five dimensions that are likely to impact psychological well-being at work: (a) Interpersonal Fit at Work - Perception of experiencing positive relationships with individuals interacting with oneself within the work context; (b) Thriving at Work - Perception of accomplishing a significant and interestingjob that allows one to fulfill oneself as an individual; (c) Feeling of Competency at Work - Perception of possessing the necessary aptitudes to do one’s job efficiently and have mastery of the tasks to perform; (d) Perceived Recognition at Work - Perception of being appreciated within the organization for one’s work and one’s personhood; (e) Desire for Involvement at Work - Will to involve oneself in the organization and to contribute to its good functioning and success. According to the results, these five themes arrived at are not separate constructs manifesting themselves independently. Rather, they belong to an all-encompassing construct, psychological well-being at work, and interact with one another to reflect a larger theme.The researchers also propose a measure for well-being at work with 25 items on a 6 point scale, arrived at following the inductive approach starting at the grassroots. Therefore, internationally there are two constructs, as presented above, that look specifically at the concept of well-being or happiness in the work context, as seen above. However, when we look at the Indian organizational research scenario, there are no such context specific constructs or measures for this concept.

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Well-being at work in India As noted earlier, 90% of the studies in the area of organizational behavior in India are based on theories from Western countries which account for only 30% of the world population (Triandis as quoted in Prakash, 2011), though in recent years researchers have started looking at the cultural context in research and indigenous research has received much attention. A study by Kakkar and Shukla (2007)to explore the pattern of well-being in the Kumaun society as affectied by employment level, gender and age on well-being, indicates that variations in levels of employment and/or age causes variation in well-being measures. This study used an indigenously developed tool, the SwastiMapani tests with 110 adjectives designed by Kakkarand Shukla themselves.Gunthey& Singh (1982) examined the relationship between job satisfaction and mental health of the employees and found that anxiety, social introversion, peptic ulcer, etc. were significantly and negatively related to job satisfaction. Another study by Srivastava and Misra (2007) to explore the correlation between social support and psychological well-being among University male teachers found that all three elements of social support are positively and significantly correlated with psychological well-being. Tools used in this study were both Western - Social Support Scales developed by Cohen et al. and Psychological Well-being Scale developed by Warr.As we can see, these studies use context-free measures generally developed in the Western world, without really taking into account the cultural influences that are at play in the Indian organizations.

While this is the generic scenario, some researchers have contributed significantly to indigenous research in the organizational context. The seminal work by JBP Sinha (2008)in the areas of leadership and organizational culture is internationally acclaimed. On the subject of Leadership, he discovered the Nurturant-Task Leader to be most effective in the Indian organizational context. He also found that social identity is more pronounced for Indians than work identity (which is not the case in Western countries) and that leader-member relationship is communal and not professional or exchange based. S K Chakraborty is another recognized and well- respected researcher, an authority on the subject of ethicswho has authored more than 20 books providing a systematic conceptual and empirical presentation of Vedantic and allied principles relevant to management. He has explored the subject of management by values in much detail. P N Khandawalla is another renowned researcher who has contributed to indigenous organizational research significantly in the area of effective organizational design and strategies. Likewise, one cannot ignore the pivotal indigenous contribution of I J Parikh in the area of gender and sensitivity studies in the context of organizations. These are a few significant contributors who have attempted to provide the research scenario in India a more indigenous direction. However, these are only a few drops in the ocean of organizational research that is carried out in India. Moreover, studies in the area of well-being at work are few and far between, despite the fact that well-being has been established as one of the most significant parts of an individual’s overall growth and development even in terms of contributing to the organization. Therefore, there is a need to first look at the concept ‘well- being’ as perceived by an average Indian, then take it further to see what factors at work influence this perceived well-being either positively or negatively, more importantly, the context in which the individual lives and works, along with the socio-cultural influences need to be considered. This brings us to the conceptual framework this paper proposes.

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Well-being at Work – A proposed conceptual framework As discussed in the previous sections, there is a need for more indigenous research in the area of well-being in India, today, especially in the work or organizational context. With India rising in all domains, the Indian psychology fraternity too needs to establish its worth globally. To do this, we need to start at the grassroots and develop indigenous models. Taking into account, the existing research in India as well in the West in the area of well-being, and considering the factors that impact the Indian psyche, the following model is proposed for the study of happiness or well-being at work in the Indian organizational context:

Well-Being at Work – A model for an Indian employee

The model has at its core, the individual or person with his/heridentity, beliefs, values, the significance of work over personal life, the individual’s personality, etc. Research in the past has shown that in India self-identity is defined by the interdependent self - a combination of the familial self (success of a person can rarely be at the expense of family); ‘jati’ or community self (at the next level the in-group a person belongs to takes precedence over everything else, eg. regional, religious, caste or creed); and Spiritual self (religious and spiritual experiences and beliefs of the family and environment in which the person is brought-up) (Roland, 1991). All this put together has a significant impact on what an individual perceives as happiness as well as the means that he/she employs to attain it.

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Fig. 1 Model of Well-being at Work in India

This further influences the balance between work life and personal life. In fact in India, personal life is rarely found to be separate from work life, both being intermingled into a web (Kakkar, 2007). In the current context, with changing paradigms all around, we may find people to be outwardly Western (in terms of clothing, eating habits, etc.); yet strongly Indian at the core with all the rituals and sometimes even myths ingrained in the core. This brings to mind an incident observed in Delhi by the author. A highly educated couple was once travelling in a car, when the road was crossed by a black cat right in front of the car, the man, who was driving,

[Type text] Page 9 Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1 immediately stopped the car and a discussion ensued between the husband and wife as to what the next step should be. Finally, they reversed slightly and drove forward slightly three times, before proceeding on their way. This incident, though a one off example, is not such a rare experience but rather a reality as most readers familiar with the Indian people and culture would also affirm. Moreover, the described incident took place in the National Capital Region, revealing the fact that education and exposure, do not always change the grass root beliefs, corroborating the statement that though many Indians appear to be ‘Westernized’, at heart they are still very ‘Indian’. All these aspect that add to the sense of ‘self’ have a direct influence on the well-being experienced and acknowledged by the individual, thereby making them all important aspects of this current study.

In the organizational context, each individual works within a group or team– The individuals who need to work together, bring with them different identities from diverse backgrounds and these often interfere with team work and cause conflicts at work. The dynamics of the impact of diversity is significant in India and is very different from that which exists in other countries, since India is a very diverse country in several aspects such as geography, culture, language, cultural practices to name a few. Each of these aspects adds to the differences among groups, especially when the organization is located in a metropolitan or cosmopolitan city. It, therefore, elicits a need for special consideration.

Third aspect to be understood is that of Leadership, because each group or teamhas a leader, whose personality, leadership and communication all influence the work area of the individual. For the Indian employee, approval is very important, so the leader must be free in providing support and accepting people as they are. Therefore, Nurturant-task leader (Sinha, 2008) – needs to take interest in employee’s personal life, family problems and adjust/adapt. Then employee gives much more than he/she gets back. This leads to a fruitful relationship on both sides. Haslam, Reicher and Platow (2011) in their book The New Psychology of Leadership, have opined that leadership is not simply about getting people to do things, but is about getting them to 'want' to do. They further state that “leadership is not about brute force, raw power or incentivization”, on the contrary these are the failure of leadership. There is a need for a supportive leader who encourages participation, gives as well as receives positive and constructive feedback, and the absence of such a leader is sure to have an impact on the overall feeling of well-being of the team as well as the individuals therein.

Leaders themselves operate within the paradigm of the prevalent Organizational Culturewhich strongly influences the way work gets done and in that manner affects an employee’s sense of satisfaction and well-being. It derives from the individual, the group as well as the leaders in the organization, and most importantly it derives from the vision and mission statement of the organization propounded by the senior management. It influences and is influenced by all the other factors considered above and forms an essential part of an individual’s experience in and of an organization, stipulating the need for a special mention while studying well-being of employees. As much as a leader holds much responsibility to create an amiable work experience for his/her team, the organization’s leaders, the top management hold the reins of the overall culture that the leaders down the hierarchy see, observe and follow.

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Finally, we have the Indian socio-cultural milieu in which all this takes place. India is a context sensitive country. Whether an organization is Indian or multinational, as long as it is situated in India, and has Indians as employees, the socio-cultural mileu plays a significant role in shaping its culture, and the organization in turn also brings about some changes in the society in subtle ways. It is important to note here that all these aspects – the individual, the team, the leader, the organization and finally the socio-cultural milieu - are all significant influences that impact and are impacted by each other. They are not completely independent variables and are therefore, separated by dotted lines, allowing for intermingling.

Conclusion Based on a review of literature in the area of well-being in India as well as the West, the researcher proposes an indigenous model of well-being at work in the Indian organizational context. This model proposes that an individual employee’s happiness is influenced by several factors operating at different levels. To begin with the individual comes to the organization with his/her own set of beliefs, values, personality, identity, etc. that have a direct impact on his/her perceived happiness. This individual when he/she enters the organization becomes part of a team or group, the characteristics of which are of great value for the person. Further this group or team reports into a leader or manager whose leadership style further impacts the job related experience of the individual in question. This leader is bound by the culture of the organization, within whose constraints he/she has to operate. Finally, the organization itself exists in the socio-cultural milieu of the country where it is located, which further impacts how work gets done there. Taking into consideration all these factors, the given model is suggested.However, being a conceptual model, it needs to be validated on the ground.It is important to take a deeper plunge into the area of happiness of individuals at work, and considering the rich cultural diversity of India, such a study must be done in a bottom-up manner starting at the grass-roots using an inductive approach. This paper has been a humble attempt at proposing a possible model for further research in this area reiterating the need to focus on happiness of employees and for more indigenous work in the area of organizational behavior constructing models that are more applicable to the current Indian audience. The proposed model, being conceptual, needs to be ratified through qualitative and quantitative approaches, and the author aspires to carry forward this research and hopes that others too would be inspired to take up similar research.

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Seligman, M. E. P. (2011). Flourish: A new understanding of Happiness and Well-being – and how to achieve them. London: Nicholas Brealey Publishing. Sinha, J.B.P. (2008). Culture and Organizational Behaviour.Sage Publication. Srivastava, A.K. &Misra G. (2011). Happiness and Well-being: An Indian Perspective. Handbook of Psychology in India.India: Oxford Publishing. Veenhoven, R. (2010). How Universal is Happiness?In International Differences in Well-Being, edited by Ed Diener, John F. Helliwell, & Daniel Kahneman, pp. 328-350. Oxford: Oxford University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199732739.003.0011 Waterman, A. S. (2008).Reconsidering happiness: a eudaimonist's perspective.The Journal of Positive Psychology, 3(4), 234-252. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17439760802303002

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Role of Emotion Regulating Strategies over Health and Wellbeing Nitin Verma*

Abstract

Emotion regulation strategies and its varied use by the individuals has been a topic of great interest to the psychologists. The way individual regulates emotions also has a greater impact over the aspects of well-being. In this respect it seems interesting to focus on emotion regulatory strategies and its link with well-being and health related issues. The emotional responses has greater role to play in adaptive functioning. Studies reveal that some emotion regulatory strategies are maladaptive. Many health problems are the consequence of maladaptive emotion regulation, which may lead to emotional and behavioural disturbances. Studies reveal that emotion regulation may influence help seeking behaviour, symptoms report, medical adherence and somatic health of the people. The way people regulate their emotion is shaped by bio-psychosocial and cultural processes. Gender differences have been reported in emotional regulation strategies as studies indicate that women are comparatively better than men in attending, valuing, and expressing emotions in daily life. It has also been found that styles of emotional expression are related with health as individuals who repress their emotional symptoms exhibit poor health outcomes. While the Individuals, who feel emotions with greater intensity, differentiate among them and regulate them properly, show better health outcomes in their health related issues. Key words : Emotion Regulation Strategy , Health and Well Being *Research Scholar, Department of Psychology, University of Delhi, Email Id: [email protected]

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Introduction The ways emotions are regulated and dealt with during complexities affect their physical, mental and psychological well-being. The capacity to successfully regulate emotional responses to aversive situations has been indicated as prerequisite condition by several investigators for adaptive functioning (Gratz & Roemer, 2004). A large proportion of health problems are characterized by maladaptive emotion regulation, which may disturb the proper emotional functioning of an individual. Consensual process model of emotion postulates that emotions are thought to be initiated as people starts evaluating emotional cues. Emotions arise as people feel that something meaningful is happening to them (Mennin et al., 2002). Emotion is not only felt, but also includes taking necessary actions and in bringing about a coordinated set of behavioural, experiential, and physiological response tendencies that combines influences of how they should meet the professed challenges (Gross, 2002; Miles & Gross, 1999). Emotion regulation refers to individuals’ attempt to influence which emotions they have, when they have them, and how these emotions are experienced and expressed (Gross et al., 2006). Evidences indicate some emotion regulatory strategies to be maladaptive. It is not sufficient to merely regulate emotions but the ways in which emotions are regulated matters a lot for an individual (John & Gross, 2004). Recent researches focus on two different emotion regulation strategies i.e., cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression. Cognitive reappraisal, being a form of cognitive change, is thought of as an antecedent-focused strategy. Suppressing an emotional response cannot be always viewed as negative. Larsen and Prizmic (2004) assert that it is a wrongful assumption to presuppose that suppression is inherently pathogenic. In fact, studies on neural correlates of emotion demonstrate that a person’s ability to regulate the duration of negative affect and to suppress the negative emotions may be crucial in explaining mood disorders such as depression (Larsen & Prizmic 2004). Models of Emotion Regulation

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The process model approach of emotion regulation classifies emotion-regulation strategies on the basis of time. The time at which people intervene in the emotion-generation process (Gross, 1998, 2001). The model assumes that emotional responses are generated in a fixed cycle. Attention to emotionally relevant information precedes cognitive appraisals, which in turn leads to emotionally expressive behavior. Bodily movements may directly activate emotional experiences (Niedenthal et al., 2005), and merely attending to emotional stimuli may directly trigger emotional behaviour without any intervening cognitive appraisals (Neumann, Forster, Strack, 2003). Emotion regulation may also facilitate personality functioning in two major ways. First, to prevent people becoming locked up in specific motivational and emotional state by promoting flexibility in personality functioning (Rothermund, Voss & Wentura, 2008). Second, by stimulating the dynamic exchange among personality processes by promoting coherence and long-term stability within the overall personality system (Baumann, N., Kaschel, R. & Kuhl, H., 2005).When people experience emotional distress, boosting positive emotions may simultaneously satisfy hedonic needs. Emotion regulation may thus serve multiple functions, including the satisfaction of hedonic needs, facilitation of specific goals and tasks, and optimization of personality functioning. Emotion regulation may not be so much concerned with getting people in or out of discrete emotional states like anger, sadness, or joy. Rather, emotion regulation may change person’s emotional state along valence, arousal, and approach avoidance performs dimensions. Goals of Emotion-Regulation Emotional responses are targeted for manipulation by emotion regulation which is partially determined by the way people use it. The emotion-generation system targeted for regulation may thus serve as a higher-order category to classify different emotion- regulation strategies. Emotional generating systems include broad ranges like attention, knowledge, and bodily expressions of emotion which are used in emotion regulation process (Gross, 1998, 2001; Philippot, Baeyens, Douilliez, & Francart, 2004). Several important emotion-regulation strategies, such as suppression (Gross, 1998a) and progressive muscle relaxation primarily target bodily manifestations of emotion(Esch, Fricchione, & Stefano, 2003). For instance, repressive coping (Langens &

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Morth, 2003) and mindfulness training (Brown et al., 2007) may both target attention, even though the latter involves purposefully paying attention to negative emotion, whereas the former avoids negative emotion altogether. Functions of Emotion-Regulation The functions of emotion regulation signifies a basic category for characterizing different forms of emotion regulating strategies, a category that is independent of which emotion-generating system is targeted. Psychologists have assumed that people’s emotion-regulation efforts serve hedonic needs that are aimed at promoting pleasure and preventing pain (Larsen, 2000; Westen, 1994). Negative emotional states are expensive because they activate a wide array of mental and physical resources within the individual (Sapolsky, 2007). Need-oriented emotion regulation may thus be adaptive by allowing individuals to conserve these resources by promoting a rapid return to hedonically agreeable states. Hedonic needs may be immediately activated upon encountering emotional stimuli (Berridge & Winkielman, 2003; Neumann, Forster, & Strack, 2003). The need-oriented functions of emotion regulation are directed towards immediate gratification, which often has an impulsive quality (Tice, Bratslavsky & Baumeister, 2001). The strongest evidence for need-oriented emotion regulation is provided by emotion- regulation behavior that maximizes short-term emotional benefits at the expense of long-term well-being. Theoretically, need-oriented emotion regulation mainly undermines long-term well-being in cases a conflict exists between short-term hedonic benefits and long- term outcomes. Categorical use of need-oriented emotion regulation can be beneficial, whereas chronic use of need-oriented emotion regulation is likely to have adverse consequences. Although hedonic needs are important, they cannot account for the full range of emotion-regulation processes (Erber, 1996; Erber & Erber, 2000). The changes in task demands may decrease the relevance of emotionally charged information, leading people to devote fewer processing resources to emotion-eliciting information (Van Dillen & Koole, in press). Rather than being hedonically oriented devoting resources for emotion regulation are oriented towards the priorities that are set by specific norms, goals, or tasks. Emotion regulation may also serve important goal-oriented functions. Goal-oriented emotion regulation is directed by a single verbally reportable goal, norm, or task. There are two major ways in which goal-oriented emotion regulation may operate. First,

[Type text] Page 18 Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1 usefulness of particular emotional state are believed to be influenced by verbal instructions about the desirability of certain emotional states (e.g., Achtzinger et al., 2008; Gross, 1998a), by implicit or explicit beliefs about the utility of particular emotional states (Tamir, Chiu, & Gross, 2007a), or by more abstract thoughts that people have about emotion regulation (Tamir, John, Srivastava, & Gross., 2007b) that is based on the belief system of a person. Second, an ongoing goal, task, or norm may change the relevance of emotionally charged information. A critical factor in goal-oriented regulation of attention appears to be the availability of distracting stimuli. Indeed, simply instructing individuals ‘‘not to think about’’ an unwanted emotion may ironically serve to heighten the activation of this emotion (Wegner, Erber, & Zankos, 1993; Wegner & Gold, 1995). Research on mental control has revealed that providing people with a focused distracter (such as, ‘‘Think about a red Volkswagen) greatly increases the efficiency of thought suppression attempts. Depressed individuals seem to have particular difficulties in finding suitable distracters (Wenzlaff, Wegner, & Roper, 1988). Goal-oriented emotion regulation may conflict with person-oriented emotion regulation because the goal-oriented emotion regulation has a narrower focus

Emotion Regulation and Wellbeing

Emotion differentiation is one of the key dimension on which individuals differs in processing affective information, has an important implication for effective use and regulation of affective experiences, particularly for reducing the possible bias induced effects of momentary feelings (Barrett & Gross, 2001; Ciarrochi, Catuti, & Mayer, 2003; Salovey et al., 1995). A study was carried out by Seo and Barrett (2007) on stock investors to examine the link between the emotional experience and decision making performance. Results showed that individual who experienced more intense emotions, differentiated of what was going on and regulated them properly, achieved greater decision making performance. Emotions and the way people handle them during decision

[Type text] Page 19 Indian Journal of Behavioral Sciences 2016 Vol. 1 No.1 making has important consequences for both decision making outcomes and feelings thus, emotions are said to facilitate decision making process. Some approaches have also considered emotion regulation by the external environment. Developmental research indicates that caregivers may play a key role in regulating children’s emotional states (Southam-Gerow & Kandell, 2002). Researchers have also shown that natural settings of rural surrounding can promote more rapid recovery from stress than urban settings (Van den Berg, Hartig, & Staats, 2007). Emotion regulation strategy may not work properly in condition where people display unwanted emotions despite their best efforts to avoid them. When people are chronically unable to regulate their emotions, this may seriously disrupt psychological functioning. Researchers have found that chronic deficits in emotion regulation contribute to all major forms of psychopathology (Kring & Werner, 2004). Midden drop, Rinie, & Sorbi (2005) examined the role of emotion regulation styles (e.g. ambiguity, control, orientation and expression) in predicting the change of perceived health among patients with rheumatoid arthritis. The findings indicated that ambiguity and control were mutually correlated, as were orientation and expression. Styles of emotion regulation were not uniquely correlated to perceived physical functioning and disease activity. Emotional ambiguity and orientation were related to poorer, whereas expression and control were related to more favourable psychological well-being and social functioning. They concluded that emotion regulation was related to psychological well-being and social functioning not to somatic health. Emotion regulation has been found to be correlated with some physical and mental problems. Cognitive appraisal is one of the emotion regulation strategies that is used for maintaining social anxiety disorder (SAD) which is of interest to the researchers. Effective regulation of emotions can reduce stressful, anxiety-provoking situations. Conversely, difficulties in regulating emotions has been postulated as the core mechanism of anxiety disorders (Campbell-Sills & Barlow, 2007; Werner & Gross, 2009), and accordingly, clinical treatments focus on enhancing the use of emotion regulation skills to modulate emotional reactivity (e.g., Hayes, Strosahl, & Wilson, 1999).

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SAD does not include the differential use of emotion regulation strategies and this is the biggest drawback as emerging clinical researches suggests that emotional deregulation may underlie many mood and anxiety disorders (Kring & Werner, 2004), including SAD (Etkin & Wager, 2007; Turk, Heimberg, Luterek, Mennin, & Fresco, 2005). Emotion regulation and its role in well-being Age and well-being of an individual greatly affects regulation of emotion. Loss in physical, cognitive and social domain is the marker of old age but despite these losses, older adults often report higher levels of well-being than do younger adults. Number of studies has shown that compared to younger adults, older adults experience higher levels of hedonic well-being. Cross-sectional and longitudinal studies have also indicated that older adult reports lower levels of negative affect and higher levels of positive affect and subjective well-being (Stawski, Almeida, Sliwinski, & Smyth, 2008). Researchers have pointed out that reduced activation of emotion-generative brain structures such as the amygdala leads to reduced experience of negative emotion which is due to aging process. Previously studies have shown that the way people regulate their positive emotions can have a crucial impact on their well- being as savouring being beneficial while dampening becomes detrimental (Bryant, 1989, 2003; Bryant & Veroff, 2007; Eisner, Johnson, & Carver, 2009; Gross, Richards, & John, 2006). Individual differences exists in the way people typically regulate their positive emotions (Gross & John, 2003). Wood et al. (2003) showed that high self-esteem individuals are more likely to savour positive experiences, whereas low self-esteem individuals tend to dampen them. Sometimes dumping positive emotional experience holds a purpose. One such reaction is that of suppression (i.e., repressing or hiding positive emotions due to shyness, sense of modesty, or fear). Gross and John (2003) showed a negative correlation between suppressing positive emotions with positive affectivity, life satisfaction, health and psychological well-being. The expressive suppression of positive emotions also bears physiological costs and leads to a decrease in the subjective enjoyment of a positive experience (Gross & Levenson, 1997). Individuals can also dampen their positive experiences through distraction, that is, by engaging in activities and thoughts that often worries and unrelated to the current positive event.

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Emotion Regulation and Coping Several coping strategies are applied by an individual during difficulties in emotion regulation. A sophisticated model of repressive coping is vigilance-avoidance theory, which proposes that repressors generally respond to threatening stimuli in two stages (Derakshan et al., 2007). The first stage, which is presumably automatic and non-conscious, consists of a vigilance response of elevated behavioral and physiological anxiety. The second stage, which presumably involves more strategic and controlled process, consists of attentional avoidance and cognitive denial of anxiety. When faced with threatening information, repressors may also increase their attention to positive information (Boden & Baumeister, 1997; Langens & Morth, 2003). Repressive coping is associated with short-term relief from emotional distress (Boden & Baumeister, 1997). Repressive coping is also associated with adverse health outcomes (Myers, 2000), such as heightened susceptibility to infectious disease (Jamner, Schwartz, & Leigh, 1988), inhibited immune functioning (Barger, Bachen, Marsland, & Manuck, 2000), cancer, asthma and increased risk for coronary heart diseases (Weinberger, 1990). Reappraisal processes have been intensely researched in neuro-imaging studies (e.g., Beauregard, Levesque, & Bourgouin, 2001; Ochsner, Bunge, Gross, & Gabrieli, 2002). These studies have shown consistently that cognitive reappraisal inhibits activation in emotional regions, including the amygdala and insula, and increases activation in dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and prefrontal cortex, regions that support working memory, language, and long-term memory. During reappraisal, emotional regions of the brain may become inversely coupled to the activation of specific regions in the prefrontal cortex (Urry et al., 2006). These findings are consistent with the idea that reappraisal triggers top-down control of emotion-generating systems. Reappraisal activates some of the same brain regions as tasks involving top-down attention control (Ochsner, Bunge, Gross, & Gabrieli, 2002), and the effects of reappraisal are partly explained by shifts in visual attention away from emotion-eliciting stimuli. The foregoing researches suggests that expressive suppression may often create a discrepancy between inner experience and outer expression, a condition that may arouse ‘‘expressive dissonance’’ (Robinson & Demaree, 2007). Indeed, individuals who chronically use expressive suppression report a sense of being inauthentic or ‘‘fake’’ in their social relationships (Gross & John,

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2003). These alienating effects may be part of the reason why chronic expressive suppression is linked to low emotional well-being (Gross & John, 2003). Another redirection strategy of coping for emotional regulation is venting which is an intentional free control of emotional impulses (Breuer & Freud,1995; Bushman et al., 2001). Venting is a popular strategy in controlling anger and aggression (Bushman, Baumeister, & Philips, 2001). It promotes angry emotional response and behavior by adding fuel to the flame by heightening the activation of angry thoughts and action tendencies (Bushman, 2002). Person-oriented emotion regulation maintains the integrity of the overall personality system, which consists of the whole of a person’s needs, goals, motives, and other self-aspects. The first mark of person-oriented emotion regulation process is its functioning at holistic level but, need-oriented and goal-oriented emotion regulation processes focuses on emotional or task-related functioning aspects. The second mark of person-oriented emotion regulation process is its contextual sensitivity. It is expressed in the ability to alter between different motivational, cognitive, or affective subsystems in a context appropriate manner (Rothermund,Voss, & Wentura, 2008). Lastly, the third signature of person oriented emotion regulation is integration, which is manifested in the coordinated functioning of personality systems. They are traditionally regarded as antagonistic, such as positive versus negative emotions, body versus mind, passion versus reason, and top-down versus bottom-up processing. Conclusions In conclusion, present review paper has explored the different insights and findings on the psychology of emotion regulation. Emotion regulation refers to the set of processes whereby people manage all of their emotionally charged states, including specific emotions, affect, mood, and stress. Researchers have identified several higher-order categories that could lay the foundation for such a classification. The most viable higher-order categories for classifying emotion regulation strategies are currently the emotion- generating systems that are targeted in emotion regulation (Gross, 1998) and the psychological functions of emotion regulation. Among the chief targets of emotion regulation are attention, emotion-relevant knowledge, and bodily manifestations of emotion.

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Among the major psychological functions of emotion regulation are the satisfaction of hedonic needs, supporting goal pursuits, and maintenance of the global personality system. Using a process model of emotion regulation as an overarching framework, researchers found that suppression decreases not only negative but also positive emotion-expressive behaviour. With increase in suppression tendency positive emotional experiences decreases but appears to have little impact on negative emotional experience. In contrast to this, reappraisal decreases negative emotional experience and expression, while increasing positive emotional experience and expression. Unlike suppression, reappraisal is not associated with increased sympathetic activation. Emotion regulation may thus serve multiple functions, including the satisfaction of hedonic needs, facilitation of specific goals and tasks, and optimization of personality functioning. In many cases, people may combine these functions together. At a general level, the present article attests to the considerable growth and vitality of modern research on emotion regulation. Focusing on the past studies of emotional regulation, its continuing progress with recognition and vital interaction in physical and psychological well-being made by the researchers at recent times asks for a noble motive to consider that it would continue to flourish with the development of more powerful methods of investigation.

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