Sensemaking and Negative Emotion Sharing: Perceived Listener Reactions as Interpersonal Cues Driving Workplace Outcomes

Emotions are a ubiquitous part of the workplace, and research on emotion sharing suggests that people often seek out others to express and share their emotions, in particular their negative emotions. Drawing from theory on sensemaking within organizations, we argue that employee perceptions of listener responses to negative emotion/stressful-event sharing have a significant impact on how included employees feel with their peers and their...