Abstract
Interpersonal emotion regulation occurs during the workday between leaders and their employees. For example, an employee may perceive that their leader makes them feel better (“affect-improving” interpersonal emotion regulation). The current study examines short- and long-term benefits of perceived leader daily affect-improving. Positive affect (as an affective reaction) and perceived leader effectiveness (as an outcome of an inferential process) serve as daily outcomes and explanatory mechanisms for longer-term job satisfaction and trust in the leader, respectively. We suggest that when employees already start the day with high positive affect, or affect-improving is perceived as inauthentic, the associations are weaker. A daily diary study (N = 193, n = 934) showed that perceived affect-improving from one’s leader benefited daily positive affect and perceived leader effectiveness. Start-of-day positive affect was not a significant moderator, but perceptions of inauthenticity weakened the relationship between affect-improving and leader effectiveness. A longitudinal investigation (N = 109) showed that employees who generally experienced higher after-work positive affect and leader effectiveness during the diary part, associated with affect-improving, reported higher longer-term job satisfaction and trust in the leader 12 weeks after the diary study, highlighting the benefits of affect-improving in the long run.