TY - JOUR
AU - Holmes, Mary
AU - Thomson, Rebecca
PY - 2022
DA - December
TI - Emotional reflexivity in the time of COVID: Working class emotional practices
JO - Emotions and Society
DO - https://doi.org/10.1332/263168922X16680946441057
AB - We share findings from a qualitative study on emotions in Scottish working-class households during lockdown. The results challenge existing research focused on emotional capital, which often suggests that working class people struggle to provide emotional resources to those close to them. Using the concept of emotional reflexivity we show how these household members cared for each other’s feelings, challenging deficit views of working class emotionality. This research offers a novel understanding of working class participants collaboratively making space for each other to feel, many favouring acts of care rather than talking. COVID lockdown, however, tended to reinforce gendered practices of emotion work, although some participants drew on emotional support beyond the household to try to mitigate this burden. The emotionally reflexive practices seen in these households suggest that sustaining more equality in emotional well-being relies on navigating material circumstances, is not always about verbal sharing, is often an interactional achievement but also means resisting unrealistic expectations of intimate relationships within households as the fountainhead of all emotional succour.
PB - Bristol University Press
UR - https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/84462db5-53d0-4ed0-88ed-39599171c0ea
KW - Coronavirus (COVID-19)
KW - Mental health and wellbeing
ER