oa Emotionele 112-gesprekken: emoties, reacties en effecten

Emotion in emergency calls: Emotion, responses, and effects

Call-takers in emergency call-centres report that one of their most difficult tasks is to deal with emotional callers since these have problems in collaborating to achieve the goal of the call, the quick and accurate gathering of required information. This investigation gives insight in the interaction between call-takers and emotional callers. First we map out callers’ emotion acts. Then we look how call-takers respond to these acts. And finally we will discuss the effects of these responses on the emotional caller. The research data consist of 60 calls to the national Dutch emergency call-centre in Driebergen and the local emergency call-centre in Utrecht. After categorising the emotion acts it became clear that only two of them caused interactional problems. Crying callers do not stick to the rules of sequential organization. Screaming callers go against the rules of turn organization. Not only do callers behave differently, also call-takers respond differently to different emotion acts. Crying is more often responded to with sympathetic responses while screaming more often receives directives.