Approaches to the study of employees' territoriality, conflict, emotions and well-being

This chapter is structured in two parts. In the first part, based on the tenets of affective events theory (AET) (Weiss and Cropanzano, 1996), we argue that employees’ territoriality shapes the course of their experiences of conflict and emotions, and ultimately their wellbeing - especially where employees occupy a common workspace (that is, the open-plan office). In the second part of this chapter, and given that territoriality is a relatively new construct in organizational behavior (OB) literature (Ayoko et al., 2010), we review research into the effects of the office environment on employees especially paying attention to the different methodological approaches used in the studies reviewed. In particular, we note that research has rarely addressed the nexus of workspace, conflict, and emotions; and suggest opportunities to incorporate these variables into future research