From Feelings to crafting: Four-quadrant investigation of job-related affect and job crafting from within-person perspective

Drawing on the broaden-and-build (B&B) and the job demands-resources (JD-R) theories, this study investigates the relationship between positive and negative affect - differentiated by arousal levels - and two categories of job crafting: approach-oriented behaviors (i.e., increasing structural resources, social resources, and challenging demands) and avoidance-oriented behaviors (i.e., reducing hindrance demands). Using a diary study design, data were collected from 200 customer service employees over five consecutive workdays. Hypotheses were tested using multilevel structural equation modeling. The results showed that daily positive affect, regardless of arousal level, was positively associated with all three approach-oriented crafting behaviors. Low-arousal negative affect was linked to reduced engagement in seeking structural resources and challenging demands, while high-arousal negative affect was unrelated to any job crafting behaviors. These findings extend the B&B theory to the domain of organizational behavior, offering novel insights into the drivers of approach- and avoidance-oriented job crafting.