Activated or deactivated? Understanding how cognitive appraisals can drive emotional activation in the aftermath of daily work events

Introduction: Past research has highlighted the relevance of cognitive appraisals in the link events-emotions (e.g., appraisal of an event's importance and its pleasant or unpleasant valence). We hypothesized a 3-way interaction between affective events (hassles and uplifts), cognitive appraisals of importance and intrinsic pleasantness on emotional activation. Objective: In this study, we investigated predictors of emotional activation at workplace. Method: We collected qualitative and quantitative data from 87 employees on work-related daily events (n = 571), cognitive appraisals and emotional reactions. Results: Results showed that the cognitive appraisal of an event's importance moderated the relationship between uplifts and emotional activation: the positive relationship was stronger when uplifts were appraised as highly important. However, the intrinsic pleasantness did not moderate this relationship. Results supported the 3-way interaction hypothesized for daily hassles. Conclusion: The findings suggest that appraisals of an event's importance and intrinsic (un)pleasantness influence the link between daily events and emotional activation differently for hassles and uplifts. We discuss the implications of these findings for research and practice.