Abstract
Previous research suggests that employees perform emotional labour (EL) in their
professional roles. The legal profession requires lawyers to display emotions that an
organisation deems appropriate. Lawyers tend to represent cases that are highly emotive or
sensitive; despite this, there is an expectation for lawyers to perform emotion management and
not give in to anger and anxiety that may be prevalent in the case. This ensures the portrayal of
rationality and professionalism. Literature posits that EL can potentially negatively affect
employees' psychological well-being (PWB). On the other hand, studies show that perceived
organisational support (POS) enhances employees’ PWB. However, within the South African
context, no studies could be identified that address this research problem of the relationship
between EL and PWB. Furthermore, no studies in the South African context could be identified
that explain the role of POS on the relationship between EL and PWB. For these reasons, the
study set out to address the following overarching objectives: first, to determine the effect of
EL on the PWB of lawyers within the South African workplace. Second, to determine the
moderating role of POS in this relationship. The study adopted a quantitative cross-sectional
research design with a sample of 152 participants. The data were analysed using Hayes
PROCESS software in SPSS. The data revealed that surface acting had a significantly negative
relationship with PWB. The results also showed that no moderation effect exists. The research
findings imply that increased levels of surface acting reduce employees’ PWB.
Keywords: emotional labour, surface acting, deep acting, psychological well-being,
perceived organisational support, lawyers