Daily shifts in regulatory focus: The influence of work events and implications for employee well‐being

• Author: Kristie Campana,Klodiana Lanaj,Jaclyn Koopmann,Joyce Bono
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/job.2105
• Published date: 01 November 2016
• Date: 01 November 2016

Daily shifts in regulatory focus: The influence of

work events and implications for employee

well-being

JACLYN KOOPMANN

1

*, KLODIANA LANAJ

1

, JOYCE BONO

1

AND

KRISTIE CAMPANA

2

1

Department of ManagementWarrington College of Business Administration,University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida,

U.S.A.

2

Department of Psychology, Minnesota State University Mankato, Mankato, Minnesota, U.S.A.

Summary Although theory suggests that regulatory focus fluctuates within person and such fluctuations impact

employee well-being, there is little empirical investigation of such propositions. These are important research

questions to address because work events may elicit within-person fluctuations in regulatory focus, which can

then affect well-being. The primary purpose of this study is to examine specific predictors of daily regulatory

focus at work and the foci’s impact on employee well-being at work and home as indicated by mood and

psychosomatic complaints, respectively. We present and test an overarching theoretical framework that

integrates conservation of resources theory, the cognitive-affective processing system framework, and

regulatory focus theory to delineate why and when work events affect regulatory focus and how the foci affect

well-being. Consistent with our expectations, we found that positive work events positively predicted daily

promotion focus, but this effect was weaker when employees had high-quality relationships with leaders.

Furthermore, daily regulatory focus was associated with employee well-being (mood and psychosomatic

complaints) such that (i) promotion focus improved well-being; (ii) prevention focus reduced well-being;

and (iii) the effects of promotion focus on well-being were strongest when prevention focus was low. We

discuss theoretical and practical implications and offer directions for future research. Copyright © 2016 John

Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Keywords: regulatory focus; work events; well-being; spillover

Introduction

Regulatory focus theory posits that people utilize two distinct systems for self-regulation: promotion-focused and

prevention-focused strategies (Higgins, 1997, 1998). Promotion focus is aspirational and growth-oriented, associ-

ated with the strategy of approaching desired end-states, and can be thought of as motivation for experimentation

and change. In contrast, prevention focus is concerned with responsibility and security, associated with the strategy

of avoiding undesired end-states, and can be thought of as motivation for safety and stability (Kark & Van Dijk,

2007). Promotion and prevention focus have differential relations with work performance outcomes and attitudes.

For example, recent meta-analytical work shows that promotion focus has a positive influence on organizational

citizenship behavior, job satisfaction, and innovative performance, whereas prevention focus increases safety

performance and counterproductive work behavior (Lanaj, Chang, & Johnson, 2012).

Promotion and prevention focus are both dispositional as well as context-specific (Scholer & Higgins, 2010).

However, the majority of organizational research has treated regulatory focus as tendencies toward promotion- or

*Correspondence to: Jaclyn Koopmann, University of Florida, Warrington College of Business Administration, Department of Management,P.O.

Box 117165, Gainesville, Florida 32611-7165, U.S.A. E-mail: Jackie.koopmann@warrington.ufl.edu

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Received 07 November 2014

Revised 19 January 2016, Accepted 01 March 2016

Journal of Organizational Behavior, J. Organiz. Behav. 37, 1293–1316 (2016)

Published online 28 March 2016 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/job.2105

Research Article

prevention-focused strategies (Lanaj et al., 2012), based on individual traits or stable factors of the work envi-

ronment, such as climate (Wallace & Chen, 2006) and leadership style (Neubert, Kacmar, Carlson, Chonko, &

Roberts, 2008). With the exception of experimental studies, which manipulate regulatory focus and study its

immediately subsequent attitudes and behavior (e.g., Freitas, Liberman, Salovey, & Higgins, 2002; Friedman

& Förster, 2001; Liberman, Idson, Camacho, & Higgins, 1999), little research has examined whether promotion

and prevention focus vary daily as a function of work experiences and whether they have carry-over effects from

the work context into the home domain. This is surprising given evidence that employees experience a variety of

positive and negative work events on a day-to-day basis (Bono, Glomb, Shen, Kim, & Koch, 2013), events that

are likely to have implications for regulatory focus. Furthermore, such work experiences not only affect

employees’well-being during the workday but may also spillover and affect them at home (e.g., Bono et al.,

2013; Gross et al., 2011).

The primary purpose of our study is to examine the role of naturally occurring positive and negative work events

on daily fluctuations in regulatory focus. More importantly, we link regulatory focus at work to employees’affective

well-being at work (i.e., mood) and physiological well-being (i.e., physical and mental health complaints or psycho-

somatic complaints) at home. To address this study’s goals, we draw from and integrate conservation of resources

(COR) theory (Halbesleben, Neveu, Paustian-Underdahl, & Westman, 2014; Hobfoll, 1989, 2002), with the

cognitive–affective processing system (CAPS) framework (Mischel & Shoda, 1995, 1998), and regulatory focus

theory (Higgins, 1997, 1998; Kark & Van Dijk, 2007). By doing so, we develop a theoretical model, which suggests

that positive work events enhance and negative work events diminish employee well-being because they elicit

fluctuations in two different goal-directed strategies at work. Specifically, positive work events stimulate promotion

focus whereas negative work events drive prevention focus at work. In turn, promotion focus is expected to have

beneficial effects, whereas prevention focus is expected to have detrimental effects on specific indicators of daily

well-being: mood and health complaints. Moreover, our theoretical model identifies the cross-level influence of

employees’stable resource base as indicated by leader-member exchange (LMX) (Dienesch & Liden, 1986;

Halbesleben et al., 2014; Hobfoll, 1989), which is likely to influence the dynamic within-person associations

between work events and regulatory focus. Finally, our theoretical model suggests that daily promotion focus

and prevention focus may jointly and interactively determine fluctuations in employee well-being. This is a

particularly important effort because the foci are independent and have unique associations with losses and gains

(Higgins, 1997), which receive differential attention by individuals (e.g., Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Finkenauer, &

Vohs, 2001).

Our integrative framework makes several important theoretical contributions. First, it responds to recent calls to

study the dynamics of regulatory focus and to understand the implications of these distinct goal pursuit strategies for

employee well-being (Lanaj et al., 2012). Second, our model integrates COR theory with two other theories of

motivation, thus meeting a well-recognized need in the COR literature (Halbesleben et al., 2014). Third, we identify

motivation-based mediating mechanisms (i.e., promotion and prevention focus) that can explain the differential

resource-enhancing and resource-depleting effects of daily work events on employee well-being (e.g., Bono et al.,

2013; Gross et al., 2011; Wang, Liao, Zhan, & Shi, 2011). Identifying motivation-based mediators is important

because it expands on previous research linking work events and employee well-being via affect-based explanations

(e.g., Baethge & Rigotti, 2015; Fuller et al., 2003; Ilies, Keeney, & Scott, 2011). Finally, integrating CAPS, regu-

latory focus, and COR illustrates that individual differences in resources at work (as indicated by LMX) determines

how reactive individuals’motivation will be to their daily work environment.

We tested our conceptual model (Fig. 1) using an experience-sampling methodology, wherein employees

completed multiple daily surveys for 10 consecutive workdays. Because we measured work events, regulatory

focus, and mood in the afternoon at work and employee health complaints several hours later at home, our study

can account for more than the immediate effects of manipulating regulatory focus in the laboratory or stable effects

of the workplace. In addition to these theoretical and empirical contributions, our research also has important

implications for organizations, which may be unknowingly influencing both employees’regulatory focus and their

well-being via stable interactions with supervisors and ordinary workplace events.

1294 J. KOOPMANN ET AL.

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Organiz. Behav. 37, 1293–1316 (2016)

DOI: 10.1002/job