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  • Sleep loss and daytime sleepiness are common experiences for employees across many occupations. Although researchers commonly focus on the detrimental effects of sleep issues for attention and vigilance during task performance, we review research that examines how sleep issues influence interpretations of, and interactions in, the work environment. This review begins by differentiating between sleep loss and sleepiness. We then highlight how sleep issues can negatively bias the interpretation of environmental information and result in aggressive responding. We also examine how sleep issues impair self-regulatory ability and contribute to workplace deviance. After each section, we discuss the implications of these findings for the work environment. A closer examination of sleep’s influence on workplace interactions can spur a beneficial discussion for researchers across a variety of disciplines and employees across all organizational levels. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)

  • Three studies draw from evolutionary theory to assess whether sleepiness increases interpretive biases in workplace social judgments. Study 1 established a relationship between sleepiness and interpretive bias using ambiguous interpersonal scenarios from a measure commonly used in personnel selection (N = 148). Study 2 explored the boundary conditions of the sleepiness–interpretive bias link via an experimental online field survey of U.S. adults (N = 433). Sleepiness increased interpretive bias when social threats were clearly present (unfair workplace) but did not affect bias in the absence of threat (fair workplace). Study 3 replicated and extended findings from the previous two studies using objective measures of sleep loss and a quasi-experimental manipulation of minor sleep loss (N = 175). Negative affect, ego depletion, or personality variables did not influence the observed relationships. Overall, results suggest that a self-protection/evolutionary perspective best explains the effects of sleepiness on workplace interpretive biases. These studies advance the current research on sleep in organizations by adding a cognitive “threat interpretation” bias approach to past work examining the emotional reaction/behavioral side of sleep disruption. Interpretive biases due to sleepiness may have significant implications for employee health and counterproductive behavior. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  • Background & Objectives: Interviewers often provide positive nonverbal feedback to reduce interviewees' anxiety. Socially anxious individuals typically harbor negative self-views discrepant with positive feedback. We examined whether nonverbal feedback and social anxiety jointly influence cortisol responses to, and performance during, interviews. Design: An experimental between-subjects design randomly assigned participants to feedback condition. Methods: Undergraduate students (N = 130) provided saliva and completed social anxiety, interview anxiety, and affective measures before a simulated interview. Following a standardized script, a confederate interviewer provided positive, ambiguous, or negative nonverbal feedback. Participants then provided saliva and completed self-focused attention and self-awareness measures. Confederate interviewers and an external rater evaluated participants' anxiety displays, assertive behavior, and performance. Results: Positive feedback decreased cortisol and improved performance for low social anxiety participants. Socially anxious participants exhibited higher cortisol but did not exhibit significant differences in performance after positive compared to negative feedback. Conclusions: Consistent with previous findings, positive feedback did not benefit socially anxious interviewees. Positive feedback increased physiological arousal relative to negative feedback but did not hinder performance among people high in social anxiety. These results provide novel information about the interactive influence of social anxiety and nonverbal interviewer feedback on arousal, self-focus, and interview performance.

Last update from database: 3/13/26, 4:15 PM (UTC)

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