“Living a lie at the workplace”: Ghanaian Media Practitioners’ understanding of emotional labour and response patterns

Abstract

The authors saw the need to explore the emotional labour experiences of media practitioners owing to the sparse literature on the phenomenon from an  African perspective. The study explored how media practitioners explain emotional labour, the factors that predispose them to emotional labour  experiences, and the emotions they display in carrying out their daily roles. Adopting a qualitative approach, thirteen (13) media practitioners (including  journalists) were sampled using both purposive and snowball sampling techniques. Nine (9) of the participants were male, with most of them being  Christians (N=11). It was found that participants’ responses clustered around four (4) themes: generic level meaning, where they described emotional  labour as constituting “living a lie” or “intentional pretense”; dimensions of emotional labour, which were identified to be enhancement and suppression.  Also, two main predisposing factors to media practitioners’ emotional labour experiences were found: Occupational display culture and feedback/pressure from the public. Media practitioners exhibit both negative and positive emotions as they dispense their duties at work. It is  recommended that regulatory bodies and journalist associations advance occupational safety and health standards to boost the psychological health of  media personnel through collaborations with psychologists and other mental health professionals. We urge all institutions that train journalists and  media practitioners to incorporate psychology and mental health modules in their curricula