Political Skill in the Workplace: Unveiling its Impact on Stress through Emotional Reactivity and Resilience

Adler, N. E., Boyce, T., Chesney, M. A., Cohen, S., Folkman, S., Kahn, R. L., & Syme, S. L. (1994). Socioeconomic status and health: the challenge of the gradient. American psychologist, 49(1), 15.
Alves, P. C., Oliveira, A. D. F., & Paro, H. B. M. D. S. (2019). Quality of life and burnout among faculty members: How much does the field of knowledge matter?. PloS one, 14(3), e0214217.
Avey, J. B., Luthans, F., Smith, R. M., & Palmer, N. F. (2010). Impact of positive psychological capital on employee well-being over time. Journal of occupational health psychology, 15(1), 17.
Becerra, R., & Campitelli, G. (2013). Emotional reactivity: Critical analysis and proposal of a new scale. International Journal of Applied Psychology, 3(6), 161 168.
Block, J., & Kremen, A. M. (1996). IQ and ego-resiliency: conceptual and empirical connections and separateness. Journal of personality and social psychology, 70(2), 349.
Bylsma, L. M., Morris, B. H., & Rottenberg, J. (2008). A meta-analysis of emotional reactivity in major depressive disorder. Clinical psychology review, 28(4), 676 691.
Brouer, R. L., Harris, K. J., & Kacmar, K. M. (2011). The moderating effects of political skill on the perceived politics–outcome relationships. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 32(6), 869-885.
Brown, T. A., & Barlow, D. H. (2009). A proposal for a dimensional classification system based on the shared features of the DSM-IV anxiety and mood disorders: implications for assessment and treatment. Psychological assessment, 21(3), 256-271.
Burgdorf, J., & Panksepp, J. (2006). The neurobiology of positive emotions. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 30(2), 173-187.
Carl, J. R., Soskin, D. P., Kerns, C., & Barlow, D. H. (2013). Positive emotion regulation in emotional disorders: A theoretical review. Clinical psychology review, 33(3), 343-360.
Carver, C. S. (1998). Resilience and thriving: Issues, models, and linkages. Journal of social issues, 54(2), 245-266.
Christian, M. S., Garza, A. S., & Slaughter, J. E. (2011). Work engagement: A quantitative review and test of its relations with task and contextual performance. Personnel psychology, 64(1), 89-136.
Claes, L., Vertommen, S., Smits, D., & Bijttebier, P. (2009). Emotional reactivity and self-regulation in relation to personality disorders. Personality and Individual Differences, 47(8), 948-953.
Cohn, M. A., Fredrickson, B. L., Brown, S. L., Mikels, J. A., & Conway, A. M. (2009). Happiness unpacked: positive emotions increase life satisfaction by building resilience. Emotion, 9(3), 361.
Connor, K. M., & Davidson, J. R. (2003). Development of a new resilience scale: The Connor?Davidson resilience scale (CD?RISC). Depression and anxiety, 18(2), 76 82.
Connor, K. M. (2006). Assessment of resilience in the aftermath of trauma. Journal of clinical psychiatry, 67(2), 46-49.
Cohn, M. A., Fredrickson, B. L., Brown, S. L., Mikels, J. A., & Conway, A. M. (2009). Happiness unpacked: positive emotions increase life satisfaction by building resilience. Emotion, 9(3), 361.
De Clercq, D., Azeem, M. U., & Haq, I. U. (2022). You're draining me! When politically inept employees view organization-linked emotional exhaustion and unforgiveness as reasons for diminished job performance. Management Decision, 60(8), 2272-2293.
Di Fabio, A. (2017). Positive healthy organizations: Promoting well-being, meaningfulness, and sustainability in organizations. Frontiers in psychology, 8,1938.
Ferris, G. R., Anthony, W. P., Kolodinsky, R. W., Gilmore, D. C., Harvey, M. G., & Wankel, C. (2002). Development of political skill. Rethinking management education for the 21st century, 1, 3-25.
Ferris, G. R., Berkson, H. M., Kaplan, D. M., Gilmore, D. C., Buckley, M. R., Hochwarter, W. A., & Witt, L. A. (1999, August). Development and initial validation of the political skill inventory. In Academy of Management, 59th annual national meeting, Chicago (pp. 6-11).
Ferris, G. R., Hochwarter, W. A., Douglas, C., Blass, F. R., Kolodinsky, R. W., & Treadway, D. C. (2002). Social influence processes in organizations and human resources systems. In Research in personnel and human resources management (pp. 65-127). Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Ferris, G. R., Kane, R. E., Summers, J. K., & Munyon, T. P. (2011). Psychological and physiological health and well-being implications of political skill: Toward a multi mediation organizing framework. In The role of individual differences in occupational stress and well being (pp. 63-107). Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Ferris, G. R., Treadway, D. C., Kolodinsky, R. W., Hochwarter, W. A., Kacmar, C. J., Douglas, C., & Frink, D. D. (2005). Development and validation of the political skill inventory. Journal of management, 31(1), 126-152.
Ferris, G. R., Treadway, D. C., Perrewé, P. L., Brouer, R. L., Douglas, C., & Lux, S. (2007). Political skill in organizations. Journal of management, 33(3), 290-320.
Fredrickson, B. L. (1998). What good are positive emotions?. Review of general psychology, 2(3), 300-319.
Fredrickson, B. L. (2004). The broaden–and–build theory of positive emotions. Philosophical transactions of the royal society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences, 359(1449), 1367-1377.
Fredrickson, B. L. (2001). The role of positive emotions in positive psychology: The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions. American psychologist, 56(3), 218.
Gori, A., Arcioni, A., Topino, E., Palazzeschi, L., & Di Fabio, A. (2021). Constructing well-being in organizations: First empirical results on job crafting, personality traits, and insight. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(12), 6661.
Griffin, M. L., Hogan, N. L., Lambert, E. G., Tucker-Gail, K. A., & Baker, D. N. (2010). Job involvement, job stress, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment and the burnout of correctional staff. Criminal Justice and behavior, 37(2), 239-255.
Gruber, J., Kogan, A., Quoidbach, J., & Mauss, I. B. (2013). Happiness is best kept stable: positive emotion variability is associated with poorer psychological health. Emotion, 13(1), 1.
Hair, J.F., Hult, G.T.M., Ringle, C.M. and Sarstedt, M. (2017). A Primer on Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) second edition (p.350). Sage Publications Inc.
Harvey, P., Harris, R. B., Harris, K. J., & Wheeler, A. R. (2007). Attenuating the effects of social stress: The impact of political skill. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 12(2), 105.
Henseler, J., Dijkstra, T. K., Sarstedt, M., Ringle, C. M., Diamantopoulos, A., Straub, D. W., ... & Calantone, R. J. (2014). Common beliefs and reality about PLS: Comments on Rönkkö and Evermann (2013). Organizational research methods, 17(2), 182-209.
Hobfoll, S. E. (1988). The ecology of stress. Hemisphere Publishing Corp.
Hobfoll, S. E. (1989). Conservation of resources: a new attempt at conceptualizing stress. American psychologist, 44(3), 513.
Hobfoll, S. E. (2002). Social and psychological resources and adaptation. Review of general psychology, 6(4), 307-324.
Hochwarter, W. A., Ferris, G. R., Gavin, M. B., Perrewé, P. L., Hall, A. T., & Frink, D. D. (2007). Political skill as neutralizer of felt accountability—job tension effects on job performance ratings: A longitudinal investigation. Organizational behavior and human decision processes, 102(2), 226-239.
Hou, J., Da, S., Wei, Y., & Zhang, X. (2022). Work-family conflict and withdrawal behavior among mainland China's IT employees: the mediating role of emotional exhaustion and moderating role of job autonomy. Industrial health, 61(2), 112-124.
Jackson, D., Firtko, A., & Edenborough, M. (2007). Personal resilience as a strategy for surviving and thriving in the face of workplace adversity: a literature review. Journal of advanced nursing, 60(1), 1-9.
Jia, H., He, M., Zhang, X., Li, Y., He, S. C., & Zhang, X. Y. (2021). The relationship between job stress and job burnout moderated by BDNF rs6265 polymorphism. Psychopharmacology, 238, 2963-2971.
Lang, P. J. (1995). The emotion probe: Studies of motivation and attention. American psychologist, 50(5), 372.
Lazarus, R. S. (1993). From psychological stress to the emotions: A history of changing outlooks. Annual review of psychology, 44.
Lee, E. S., Tan, S. Y., Lee, P. S. S., Koh, H. L., Soon, S. W. W., Sim, K., ... & Chong, P. N. (2022). Perceived stress and associated factors among healthcare workers in a primary healthcare setting: the Psychological Readiness and Occupational Training Enhancement during COVID-19 Time (PROTECT) study. Singapore medical journal, 63(1), 20.
Parrish Meadows, M., Shreffler, K. M., & Mullins-Sweatt, S. N. (2011). Occupational stressors and resilience in critical occupations: The role of personality. In The role of individual differences in occupational stress and well being (pp. 39-61). Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Memon, A. W., Kanhar, N. A., Imran, M., & Aureejo, A. H. (2022). A Study of Occupational Stress and Turnover Intention Mediated by Emotional Intelligence: An Empirical Study of Public and Private Teaching Faculty of Sukkur Region Colleges, Sindh, Pakistan. Turkish Online Journal of Qualitative Inquiry, 13(1).
Mintzberg, H. (1983). Power in and around organizations.
Momm, T., Blickle, G., & Liu, Y. (2010). Political skill and emotional cue learning. Personality and Individual Differences, 49(5), 396-401.
Muchiri, C. T., Khayota, M., Oluoch, J., & Gongera, G. (2022). Occupational stress and employees performance. A case of Kenya disciplined services. Reviewed Journal International of Business Management, 3(1), 13–21
Nigg, J. T. (2006). Temperament and developmental psychopathology. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 47(3?4), 395-422.
Perrewé, P. L., Ferris, G. R., Frink, D. D., & Anthony, W. P. (2000). Political skill: An antidote for workplace stressors. Academy of Management Perspectives, 14(3), 115-123.
Perrewé, P. L., Zellars, K. L., Rossi, A. M., Ferris, G. R., Kacmar, C. J., Liu, Y., ... & Hochwarter, W. A. (2005). Political skill: an antidote in the role overload–strain relationship. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 10(3), 239.
Perrewé, P. L., Zellars, K. L., Ferris, G. R., Rossi, A. M., Kacmar, C. J., & Ralston, D. A. (2004). Neutralizing job stressors: Political skill as an antidote to the dysfunctional consequences of role conflict. Academy of Management Journal, 47(1), 141-152.
Pfeffer, J. (1981). Power in organizations. Pitman Marshfield, MA.
Qing, M., Asif, M., Hussain, A., & Jameel, A. (2020). Exploring the impact of ethical leadership on job satisfaction and organizational commitment in public sector organizations: The mediating role of psychological empowerment. Review of Managerial Science, 14(6), 1405-1432.
Ringle, C. M., Wende, S., & Becker, J. M. (2015). SmartPLS 3. SmartPLS GmbH, Boenningstedt. Journal of Service Science and Management, 10(3), 32-49.
Rocha, F. L. R., Jesus, L. C. D., Marziale, M. H. P., Henriques, S. H., Marôco, J., & Campos, J. A. D. B. (2020). Burnout syndrome in university professors and academic staff members: psychometric properties of the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory-Brazilian version. Psicologia: Reflexão e Crítica, 33, 11.
Smith, B. W., Dalen, J., Wiggins, K., Tooley, E., Christopher, P., & Bernard, J. (2008). The brief resilience scale: assessing the ability to bounce back. International journal of behavioral medicine, 15, 194-200.
Stawski, R. S., Sliwinski, M. J., Almeida, D. M., & Smyth, J. M. (2008). Reported exposure and emotional reactivity to daily stressors: the roles of adult age and global perceived stress. Psychology and aging, 23(1), 52.
Tugade, M. M., & Fredrickson, B. L. (2007). Regulation of positive emotions: Emotion regulation strategies that promote resilience. Journal of happiness studies, 8, 311 333.
Wang, P., Chu, P., Wang, J., Pan, R., Sun, Y., Yan, M., ... & Zhang, D. (2020). Association between job stress and organizational commitment in three types of Chinese university teachers: mediating effects of job burnout and job satisfaction. Frontiers in psychology, 11, 576768.
Weiss, H. M., & Cropanzano, R. (1996). Affective events theory. Research in organizational behavior, 18(1), 1-74.

Manggor, E. M., Ismail, I. R., Martin, F. F., & Nahar, N. F. M. (2025). Political Skill in the Workplace: Unveiling its Impact on Stress through Emotional Reactivity and Resilience. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 15(1), 1269–1285.

Copyright: © 2025 The Author(s)
Published by HRMARS (www.hrmars.com)
This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this license may be seen at: http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode