Research Methods in Tourism, Hospitality and Events Management

Objectives

To identify which gender groups are most susceptible to emotional

contagion

To identify which occupational group experiences the highest levels

of emotional contagion

To understand the attributes employees associate with an effective

leader

To recognise the preferred leadership style within occupational

groups.

Sample

A random stratified sample (Brotherton, 2015) was used for the purpose

of the study, whereby individuals were identified from three distinct,

defined occupational groups – business, service and labour industries –

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and the specific gender groups of male and female. This sampling

method was used due to the research design of the study, which required

the population to be divided into subpopulation groups. Random

stratified sampling was used to ensure the sample population best

represented the entire population being studied. Additionally, the

sampling method meant precision of the data was obtained, due to

reduced sampling bias; finally, this method of sampling was used due to

its administrative convenience (Das, 2009). The sample consisted of 360

respondents, comprising of 120 individuals from each of the three

industries, containing 193 males and 167 females who were employees

from companies within the UK. The minimum age of participants in the

sample was 17 and the maximum age was 64. The descriptive statistics

show that the mean age was 33.75. The sampling method used in the

current study decreased sampling bias, which reduced the sampling error.

This suggests that the sample in the current study is representative of the

population. To further support this, the age range of the sample indicates

diversity and a wide range of understanding of variation amongst the

groups; therefore, the findings are considered generalisable.