Engendering connection: The embodied emotional labor of U.S. cosmetic surgeons

Emotional labor has typically been analyzed as a gendered phenomenon in managed workers like nurses. Broadening this frame, this study analyzes how a different strata of workers perform emotional labor: surgeons. Drawing on 42 in-depth interviews with U.S. cosmetic surgeons and a content analysis of online reviews by patients, we argue that cosmetic surgeons perform both intimate and professionalized strategies of emotional labor to build long-term relationships with patients. We highlight how some surgeons strategically use their gender and bodies to forge emotional connections with patients, combining physician authority and their own embodied experiences. We identify two intimate, embodied strategies of emotional labor used by cosmetic surgeons (Paternalistic and Empathic) which are highly gendered and two additional strategies that more closely resemble professional norms (Egalitarian and Technical). Cosmetic surgeons can and do switch between strategies, subject to the constraints of gender norms and expectations; embodied strategies have different payoffs for men and women. Women surgeons, in particular, may sometimes adopt professionalized strategies of emotional labor to assert their physician authority and status and resist expectations of feminized emotional labor. In commercialized medicine, emotional labor enables elite healthcare providers to negotiate power dynamics with dependent patients. In addition to making patients feel better, embodied labor can confer meaning on surgeons’ work. •Cosmetic surgeons perform emotional labor to build relationships with patients.•Intimate strategies of emotional labor involve surgeons' use of their own gendered bodies.•Professionalized emotional labor strategies more closely resemble professional norms.•Surgeons switch between strategies, though they are constrained by gender norms.•These strategies enable professionals to negotiate power dynamics with patients.