When Coworkers Try to Change Each Other’s Emotions

The short answer: listen when the aim is to help

When you want to change a coworker’s emotional response, first ask what you are trying to accomplish. In the direct field evidence, a goal of helping a coworker feel better, paired with receptive listening, was associated with lower relationship conflict. Efforts to keep up appearances by asking a coworker to hide emotional expression were associated with higher conflict. The study, “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes,” measured these links; it did not show that either response causes conflict to rise or fall. The distinction is practical: your purpose shapes how you respond, and the coworker’s experience of that response may matter for the relationship. Listening gives the other person room to explain what happened before you offer a reframe, distraction, or instruction to move on. That is a reason to understand first when time allows, not a promise that listening will settle the disagreement. A deadline, customer need, or immediate safety concern may require a clear limit or pause. In that case, name the constraint and make room to return to the conversation, rather than treating emotional expression itself as the problem.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes

What are coworkers trying to change—and what counts as conflict?

When one coworker steps in during another’s frustration, they may be trying to change the feeling itself, the way it is shown, or simply the conditions around the work. Those aims can look similar in a tense exchange, but they are different interventions. The 2025 study “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes” calls an attempt to influence another person’s emotional experience extrinsic emotion regulation. In this setting, one person is the regulator and the coworker whose emotions are being addressed is the target. The term covers efforts to affect whether an emotion occurs, how intense it becomes, or how long it lasts; it does not mean that the regulator can control the other person’s feelings. The study distinguishes four responses by what they ask of the target. Receptive listening gives the coworker room to talk about the problem. Reappraisal offers a different way to interpret it. Distraction redirects attention away from the emotion-producing situation. Expressive suppression asks the coworker to hide the emotion in their face, voice, or body. The last response chiefly changes what colleagues can see; it does not, by definition, change what the person feels. That difference matters when a coworker’s visible irritation is treated as though it were the whole problem. The outcome in the study is also specific. Relationship conflict means interpersonal friction, including personality clashes. It is distinct from task conflict, which concerns what work should be done, and process conflict, which concerns how the work should be done. A coworker can feel heard and still disagree about a deadline, allocation of responsibility, or method. Conversely, a discussion may reach agreement on the task while leaving personal resentment between colleagues. The 2025 paper separates these conflict types before testing relationship conflict; its result therefore cannot establish that a response settles the substantive disagreement. A 2024 review, “Interpersonal Emotion Regulation: Process and Motivation,” makes a related scope distinction: people may try to change someone else’s emotions, or seek another person’s help changing their own. The coworker study examines the first direction. Keeping the roles clear prevents a common mix-up: asking a colleague to listen while you explain your frustration is different from trying to regulate that colleague’s feelings. The practical question here is narrower still: when a coworker does intervene, what are they trying to change, and does the response bear on personal friction between them? A smoother display, a different feeling, and agreement about work are separate outcomes; evidence about one should not be used as a promise about the others.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes; Interpersonal Emotion Regulation: Process and Motivation

Why the motive changes the response

Wanting a coworker to feel better is a goal about that person's emotional experience. Instrumental goals aim at some other result: preserving the relationship, getting a task done, or shaping how the exchange appears to others. The 2025 study, “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes,” keeps those purposes distinct. Its authors call the first aim pro-hedonic; they distinguish pro-social, task-focused, and impression-management goals within the instrumental group. A colleague who hopes to avoid a clash is pursuing a different end from one who wants a report finished before a deadline, even if both would prefer the conversation to become calmer.

The categories help explain why the word “instrumental” cannot carry a moral verdict by itself. A pro-social aim concerns getting along; a task-focused aim concerns completing work; an impression-management aim concerns how one appears, such as seeming professional in front of a customer. The study measured regulators’ reported goals and strategies; it did not authorize diagnosing motives from behavior. These labels describe aims, not fixed kinds of people. One person may pursue more than one aim during a single exchange, and the priority may change as circumstances develop.

A conceptual framework in Niven’s “Why do people engage in interpersonal emotion regulation at work?” helps place these motives in a wider account of why people try to influence one another’s feelings. It is theoretical context, not a test of which motive reduces coworker conflict. The newer 2025 paper supplies that direct comparison. The paper’s online experiments tested whether prompted goals shifted reported strategy choice, not whether a goal improved an actual relationship.

The field study’s pattern makes the distinction consequential. Appearance management was the instrumental goal most clearly connected with expressive suppression: asking someone to hide emotional expression. The authors found that instrumental goals, especially keeping up appearances, were more likely to accompany this response. Before intervening, ask: is the immediate need to help the coworker through the feeling, meet a work requirement, protect the relationship, or manage an audience’s impression?

For a reader trying to reduce interpersonal friction, this is a check on purpose, not a test of character. If the aim is the coworker’s emotional experience, begin by finding out what happened and what they want from the exchange. If a task genuinely cannot wait, say what must happen and why. When appearance is the main concern, notice whether “professionalism” is being used to avoid hearing a legitimate concern. Naming the real need makes the next response easier to choose; the field study links motives to response patterns, while the causal effect on conflict remains a separate question.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes; Why do people engage in interpersonal emotion regulation at work?

What the experiments establish—and what they do not

The first two studies tested a narrow link in the proposed chain: whether a stated goal changes the emotion-regulation response a worker says they would use. In “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes,” working adults recruited online were randomly assigned to goal conditions and asked about strategies for influencing a coworker’s emotions. Study 1 retained 216 participants from an initial 398; Study 2 included 471. Because the goal prompt was assigned, differences in reported strategy choice can be interpreted as evidence that the prompt influenced responses in those survey tasks. The experiments did not follow coworkers through a real disagreement or measure whether any response later reduced relationship conflict.

Study 1 compared a pro-hedonic goal, meaning helping a coworker feel better, with two instrumental goals: getting work done together and avoiding conflict. The authors report that Study 1 excluded 182 people, or 46% of those recruited, because their answers to the manipulation check suggested that an unassigned goal was more salient than the assigned one. This is a substantial qualification: people’s motives can overlap, and the assigned frame did not cleanly replace other motives for many participants. The paper says analyses using the full sample produced the same general results, which reduces concern that this exclusion alone explains the pattern. It does not erase the fact that the experiment asked people to respond to a brief online prompt rather than manage a continuing work relationship.

Across the two experiments, the reported pattern supports a first step: prompting workers to help a coworker feel better made receptive listening more likely among the strategies studied, while instrumental prompts were more associated with suppression. Receptive listening meant allowing the coworker to talk; expressive suppression meant encouraging them to hide emotion in facial, vocal, or bodily expression. These findings concern reported choices under experimental goal conditions. They do not show that the assigned goal reliably governs behavior outside the survey, nor that listening itself causes conflict to fall. That second question belongs to Study 3, which examined coworker relationship outcomes in a field sample and found associations between reported strategies and later ratings. Random assignment in Studies 1 and 2 cannot make Study 3’s outcome associations causal. The practical reading should therefore remain two-part: the experiments lend support to the idea that purpose can shape response selection; the claim about less relationship conflict rests on separate, observational evidence.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes

Which responses show the clearest conflict links?

The clearest direct comparison in the 2025 field study is between receptive listening and expressive suppression. Receptive listening was associated with lower coworker-rated relationship conflict; suppression was associated with higher conflict and lower team-member exchange. The paper, “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes,” defines receptive listening as listening while a coworker talks about emotions or problems. Suppression means encouraging that coworker to hide emotional expression in the face, voice, or body. These are observed links between reported strategies and later relationship ratings, not proof that one response caused the difference.

Study 3 separated the accounts of the person intervening and the person receiving the intervention. At the first time point, employees reported why they tried to influence coworkers' emotions and which strategies they used with each nominated coworker. Three months later, the coworkers rated their relationship with that employee, including conflict and team-member exchange. The final analysis included 143 regulators and 277 coworkers; the regulators were university students who worked part-time or full-time, and most worked part-time. Having different people report the behavior and outcome, at different times, makes the result less dependent on one person's account. It does not remove other possible explanations or establish cause and effect.

For relationship conflict, the study reported a negative association for listening (γ = −.28, p = .02) and a positive one for suppression (γ = .22, p < .001). In plain terms, more reported listening went with lower coworker-rated interpersonal friction, while more reported encouragement to conceal emotion went with higher friction. The same analysis found suppression associated with lower team-member exchange (γ = −.10, p < .001). Team-member exchange describes the perceived quality of a coworker relationship, including whether people help, share information, and recognize one another's contributions. It is related to conflict here, but it is a separate outcome; the suppression result should not be collapsed into one general relationship score.

The authors suggest that listening may help a coworker feel understood, while asking for concealment may inhibit emotional exchange and signal less care. Those explanations fit the pattern, but Study 3 did not test understanding or perceived care as mechanisms. It measured reported goals and strategies, then coworker-rated relationship outcomes. The inference should stop at the boundary of those measures: the study found an association consistent with the proposed account, not a verified chain explaining why the association appeared.

For a colleague who wants to explain what is upsetting them, listening before advising is the response most directly supported by this conflict comparison, provided the work allows time for the conversation. Suppression is not simply a request to pause or keep an exchange respectful; in the study it specifically meant asking someone to hide emotional expression. Still, the field result cannot predict what will happen between a particular pair of coworkers. A practical choice is to make room for the account, then discuss what the work requires. If a deadline interrupts the conversation, saying when it can resume preserves a path back to the concern without asking the coworker to perform a different feeling. The practical value is in choosing a response that leaves room for both the person's account and the work conversation.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes

Why a plausible reframe is not the same as evidence for less conflict

A colleague who is upset about a client exchange may hear “look on the bright side” as premature advice, even when the speaker hopes to help. Reappraisal, in the study’s terms, means helping someone interpret a situation differently. Distraction means directing their attention elsewhere. Both can be plausible responses; plausibility, however, is not evidence that either reduces relationship conflict.

In “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker’s relational outcomes,” Study 3 tested these strategies against two separate coworker-rated outcomes. Neither reappraisal nor distraction significantly predicted relationship conflict: for reappraisal, γ = .003, p = .98; for distraction, γ = −.11, p = .21. The authors had expected both to relate to less conflict, but the observed data did not support that prediction. These estimates do not demonstrate that the strategies have no effect. They leave the study without a clear conflict link for either one.

Distraction did show a different association: it was positively related to team-member exchange (γ = .12, p = .001). Team-member exchange describes perceived quality of working relationships, including whether coworkers help, share information and recognize one another’s contributions. It is related to the social quality of a work relationship, but it is not the same measure as conflict. A result on one outcome cannot be substituted for a result on the other. The authors therefore report conflict and exchange quality separately rather than treating either as a proxy for the other.

The practical point is narrow. If the question is specifically how to avoid adding relationship friction while a coworker explains a difficult experience, a quick reframe or topic change should not be presented as an evidence-backed replacement for listening. It measured reported strategy use and later coworker ratings, not a randomized comparison of tactics in the same conversation.

So begin with the coworker’s account when they want to talk. Ask before offering another interpretation or shifting the subject. That order follows the clearer conflict association reported for receptive listening, while leaving room to use other responses when the coworker’s need or immediate circumstances call for them. The evidence supports restraint about promising what a reframe or distraction will do, not a universal ban on either response.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes

When the work constraint is real

A real deadline, customer need or safety concern can change what a coworker can do in the moment. Less relationship conflict does not require leaving every emotional conversation open-ended. The important distinction is between setting a limit on timing or conduct and asking someone to conceal a feeling so the exchange looks more comfortable to others. A limit can protect the work while still acknowledging that the concern deserves a hearing.

The study titled “Interpersonal emotion regulation strategies: Enabling flexibility in high-stress work environments” helps clarify why context matters, though it does not test ordinary coworker disagreement. Drawing on participant observation and in-depth, semi-structured interviews with police officers, the researchers describe workers adapting their emotion-regulation strategies as circumstances unfold. They identify co-regulation, where people affect one another’s emotional state, and third-party interference as factors shaping those choices. This qualitative account shows how strategy selection can respond to a changing situation; it does not measure relationship conflict or establish that suppression improves a relationship.

That boundary matters when applying the direct coworker-conflict study. In “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker’s relational outcomes,” receptive listening was associated with lower coworker-rated relationship conflict, while encouraging expressive suppression was associated with higher conflict. Those field associations do not settle what to do when work must pause or a safety instruction needs to be followed. Nor do they make appearance management equivalent to an actual operational constraint. A demand to keep a customer interaction safe has a concrete purpose; a demand to hide irritation because it makes colleagues uncomfortable may serve mainly to manage appearances.

In practice, name the constraint and preserve a route back to the conversation: “I hear that the handoff felt unfair. We need to finish this customer call now. Can we talk at 2:30?” If conduct itself must stop, describe the behavior and the boundary plainly, then address the concern when conditions allow. This is a practical inference from the studies, not a tested script. It keeps the immediate task visible without treating the coworker’s emotion as a problem that must disappear. If the pause has no return point, or if every expression of frustration is labeled unprofessional, a temporary limit can become silencing. The evidence supports listening as a useful default when time permits; a genuine constraint changes the timing, not the value of hearing what happened.

Sources: Interpersonal emotion regulation strategies: Enabling flexibility in high-stress work environments; Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes

How far can one field study carry the conclusion?

The design gives this result more weight than a report from the person doing the regulating alone. In “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes,” regulators described their goals and how they responded to nominated coworkers; those coworkers later rated relationship conflict and team-member exchange. The separation matters because the person choosing to listen or urge someone to hide emotion is not the only person whose view of the relationship counts. The target ratings also came three months after regulators’ reports, so the measures were not collected in the same survey at the same moment. That distance in reporters and time still does not make the field study an experiment. In its final analysis, the study included 143 regulators and 277 coworkers. The regulators were university students taking part for course credit, and most worked part-time. Coworkers were recruited through those regulators, who nominated colleagues they interacted with. The authors note that these students’ work commitments and sense of relational obligations may differ from those of full-time employees. They call for further research among full-time workers. So the result offers a useful signal about workplace relationships, while its reach beyond this sample remains uncertain. There are other plausible directions for the association. A coworker relationship already marked by friction could affect how one person responds to another’s emotion and how the target later rates conflict. The people nominated, the work they shared, or the target’s behavior could also shape both the strategy used and the later rating. Because the study observed existing relationships rather than assigning coworkers to listen or suppress emotion, it cannot separate those explanations from a possible effect of the strategy itself. The authors explicitly state that Study 3 cannot establish causality. This is why the evidence supports a preference, not a promise: when a colleague wants to explain and the conversation can continue, receptive listening is a reasonable response associated with lower relationship conflict in this study. It does not follow that listening will repair a strained relationship or settle a disagreement about the task. A field study of full-time coworkers in varied work settings, or an intervention that tests whether practicing listening changes later conflict against a comparison condition, could strengthen or revise the conclusion. Until then, use the finding to guide a conversation, not to predict its outcome.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes

What follows for emotional intelligence at work?

The practical lesson is a sequence of observable choices: notice what you want the exchange to accomplish, make room for your coworker to explain, then address the work issue that remains. In “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes,” pro-hedonic goals were linked with receptive listening, and listening was associated with lower coworker-rated relationship conflict. That study traces associations across goals, responses and later relationship ratings; it did not test an EQ score, a training course, or whether practicing emotional skills causes conflict to fall. So the sequence is a reasoned application of the findings, not a tested intervention.

Emotional intelligence becomes useful here as behavior a colleague could actually notice. Awareness means recognizing whether you are trying to help the person feel better, finish a task, or control how the moment looks. Listening means asking what happened and letting the answer shape your next response, rather than moving straight to advice. A boundary means naming a real constraint, such as needing to return to a deadline, and making clear when the conversation can resume.

A self-reflection tool can help you notice which part of that sequence deserves practice. The private 32-item [Emotional Skills Profile](/assessment) asks about recent behavior and emotional situations, with habits and authored scenario judgments kept separate. It is an educational profile without validated norms or established ability-test validity; it cannot establish what happened in a particular exchange, measure the study's goal-strategy pathway, or predict how another person will respond. Its appropriate role is narrower: help you identify a question about your own habits to carry into the next conversation.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes; Emotional Skills Profile

What to try in the next exchange—and what an EQ reflection can tell you

Before responding, name your aim. Are you trying to understand your coworker, meet a real deadline, or keep the exchange looking composed? “Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes” links receptive listening with lower coworker-rated relationship conflict. Listening means letting the person explain the problem, not agreeing with every conclusion or abandoning the work. Ask what is troubling them, then listen before offering a fix. This field association does not prove that listening will prevent conflict.

When work cannot wait, make the limit specific: “I want to hear the rest. We need to send this by two; can we return to it at three?” A clear pause protects the task and leaves room to resume. If the exchange turns disrespectful, name the behavior that must stop and what you can discuss instead. Neither boundary requires asking a coworker to hide feelings for appearances.

The private 32-item Emotional Skills Profile can prompt reflection on your recent habits and judgments in emotional situations. It is an educational tool without validated norms or established ability-test validity; it cannot tell you what your coworker felt or predict a conversation's result. Explore the profile if you want a structured prompt for noticing what to practice next.

Sources: Does it matter why we try? How goal-focused extrinsic emotion regulation influences co-worker's relational outcomes; Emotional Skills Profile

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