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The aim of this thesis is to offer up a structure of what I call Emotional Self-Knowledge—roughly, knowledge of one’s own emotions. I begin with a broad understanding of an emotion event, according to which emotion events include a set of bodily feelings in response to some object. I then argue that knowledge of the object and the feeling of the emotion are required parts of knowing one’s own emotions if we expect emotional self-knowledge to be prudentially useful. I then outlining three levels of emotional self. The first requires knowledge of the feeling on is experiencing; the second requires that knowledge plus knowledge of the emotionally-salient object. The final level is knowledge of one’s emotional dispositions, and as such is the most robust form of emotional self-knowledge. I conclude by examining some cases in which emotional self-knowledge can be usefully applied towards an agents own prudential goals.

Cognitive emotion regulation strategies can be used to counter the negative effects of life stress. In neuroimaging paradigms, many different types of reappraisal strategies have been used to promote cognitive coping with impersonal, emotion-evoking stimuli, but limited research has been done utilizing specific reappraisal strategies with real-life events. Big picture reappraisal is a specific emotion regulation strategy that offers a way of managing distress aiming to promote acceptance and cognitive coping. Big picture reappraisal instructions (experimental condition) were compared to distraction and rumination instructions (control conditions) resulting in activation in areas associated with cognitive control (orbital frontal cortex, superior parietal lobe, cerebellum lobule VI). Mood ratings collected after each of several condition prompts were significantly more positive in the distraction compared to the big picture reappraisal condition during the first third of the induction, but as the task progressed the effectiveness of distraction declined considerably. There were no significant condition differences in mood during the second and third segments of the induction. / text

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<p>Effective emotion regulation plays an important role in psychological health. Two commonly-researched emotion regulation strategies are reappraisal, a cognitive change-based strategy, and mindfulness, an acceptance-based strategy. Although their potential in facilitating adaptive emotion regulation has been empirically demonstrated, little work has directly compared their cognitive and emotion regulatory effects, particularly in a symptomatic population. Using an analogue depressed sample, this study examined the relative effects of mindfulness and reappraisal in reducing sad mood and whether individual differences in trait mindfulness and habitual use of reappraisal moderated the effects. The study also compared the extent to which implementation of these strategies incurred cognitive resources and affected attitudes towards negative experiences. One hundred and twenty-nine participants were randomly assigned to receive training in mindfulness, reappraisal, or no training prior to undergoing an autobiographical sad mood induction. Following mood induction, participants rated their sadness on a visual analog scale before completing a Stroop test. Results showed that mindfulness and reappraisal were superior to no training, and equivalent in their effects in lowering sad moods. Compared to the mindfulness group, the reappraisal group reported significantly higher Stroop interference scores, reflecting greater depletion of cognitive resources. Higher trait mindfulness predicted greater reductions in sadness in the reappraisal group, but not in the mindfulness group. Habitual reappraisal did not moderate the effects of either mindfulness or reappraisal. Mindfulness, relative to reappraisal or no training, resulted in significant increases in acceptance of negative experiences and decreases in maladaptive beliefs about rumination. Overall, the study suggests that although mindfulness and reappraisal are equally effective in down-regulating sad mood, they incur different levels of cognitive costs and lead to differential changes in attitudes towards negative experiences.</p> / Dissertation

Self-compassion has consistently been found to contribute significantly to psychological well-being, and previous research has found that it can be increased using a simple writing task. As the mechanism underlying task efficacy is unknown, this study investigated the role of belief. Belief was found to predict change in self-compassion, self-esteem, and depression, with higher levels being associated with less improvement, an effect in the opposite direction as hypothesized. However, increase in belief across the three trials was positively correlated with improvement in self-compassion, depression, anxiety, and stress, indicating that change in belief represents a different psychological effect than absolute level of belief. Further, those who increased in belief reported improvement in well-being, while those who decreased did not. Results suggest that task efficacy, at least in part, depends on the degree to which perspectives are reappraised to become more congruent with self-compassionate perspectives, as opposed to simply depending on task repetition.

Adolescence is a unique period of development. This life phase seems to entail being sensitive to aversive and social cues. However, adolescents' performances have been seen as equivalent to that of adults in nonemotional contexts. For this reason, questions remain regarding adolescents’ sensitivity to, and cognitive regulation of, emotional content. In line with this, the following paper aimed to provide a literature review of the successful use of an emotion regulation (ER) strategy, known as reappraisal, and its normative development during adolescence. Specifically, the main focus ofthis paper was to review studies investigating age differences of adolescents' reappraisal capacity in association with related functional activity, as measured by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Reappraisal, i.e., to rethink the appraisal of an emotionally eliciting stimulus as to change one’s emotional response, is a well-studied psychological phenomenon. Research of reappraisal ability has mainly been studied on adults when viewing aversive images. Therefore, such findings in the field that are of relevance for the more in-depth review a represented. The studies reviewed suggest that reappraisal may account more for age differences in emotional responding than emotional reactivity. Generally, reappraisal ability shows increased success with increasing age. The paper ends with a discussion of results and limitations within the field, such as regarding the various terminology and instructions used for reappraisal tactics.

Thesis advisor: Maureen Ritchey / Regulating negative emotions that arise while recalling an unpleasant event presents a persistent challenge. As a reconstructive process, recall offers an opportunity to ease the burden of repeated regulation by updating negative memories, with the potential for long-term reductions in the negative affect associated with a memory. However, little is known about the recall-related brain processes that support lasting effects of emotion regulation on episodic memories. Across three studies, the current project examined the behavioral and neural correlates of regulating emotionally negative memories. First, a stimulus database of real-life news videos optimized for studying naturalistic emotional memory was developed. Then, the behavioral effects of two emotion regulation strategies, memory reappraisal and memory suppression, were tested. Finally, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to investigate the brain processes associated with lasting reappraisal-related changes in memory valence. We found that reappraisal was associated with lasting reductions in the negative valence of naturalistic memories, whereas suppression had no effect on memory valence. We also found that recall-related activity in lateral occipital cortex was associated with a reappraisal-mediated reduction in negative valence 24-hours after reappraisal. These results suggest that brain processes involved in the initial retrieval of negative content also support the emotion regulation of those memories, consistent with research showing that memory reactivation is critical for robust memory updating. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2022. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Psychology.

Despite many positive outcomes associated with emotion coaching, factors related to individual differences in emotion coaching have yet to be explored. The current study examined cultural differences in the role of maternal characteristics, specifically emotional awareness and emotion regulation, as determinants of emotion coaching. These findings will facilitate culturally desired emotion socialization practices leading to optimal emotional development of children. In the current study, I translated two English-based questionnaires into Chinese to assess maternal emotional awareness and emotion coaching. Next, I examined relations of reappraisal, suppression, and emotional awareness to maternal emotion coaching. I also investigated the role of maternal emotional awareness as a mediator in the relation of maternal use of reappraisal and suppression to maternal emotion coaching in both Chinese and American cultures. Participants included American (n=164) and 163 Chinese (n=163) mothers. Maternal emotional awareness was measured using subscales of Toronto Alexithymia Scale 20 and Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale. Emotion regulation strategies were assessed using Emotion Regulation Questionnaire. To measure emotion coaching, mothers completed Parents' Beliefs about Children's Emotions questionnaire. Structural equation models were estimated to examine how maternal emotional awareness and emotion regulation related to emotion coaching. Results confirmed the reliability and validity of the Chinese questionnaires. Maternal emotion coaching did not include mothers' views about negative emotions because equivalence could not be established across Chinese and American cultures; therefore, the emotion coaching discussed in this study is different from previous research on emotion coaching that typically involves responses to negative emotions. Maternal emotional awareness was associated with their emotion coaching in both samples and the strength of the association was not different across cultures. However, relations of reappraisal and suppression to emotional awareness and emotion coaching were different across Chinese and American samples. Emotional awareness mediated the relation of reappraisal to emotion coaching only in the American sample. Additionally, emotional awareness was a mediator of the relation of suppression to emotion coaching in both samples. Overall, the findings of this study supported that maternal emotional awareness and use of emotion regulation strategies are important determinants of maternal emotion coaching in both cultures. / Ph. D. / This study examined the cultural differences in the role of maternal characteristics as components of emotion coaching which provides parents with practical guidelines on how to teach their children about emotions. The two maternal characteristics studied were if mothers were aware of their emotions (emotional awareness) and were able to control their emotions (emotion regulation). Two widely used emotion regulation strategies are reappraisal and suppression. Reappraisal refers to changing the interpretation of an emotional situation. Suppression refers to inhibition of emotion expressions. First, I translated two English-based questionnaires into Chinese to assess maternal emotional awareness and emotion coaching. Next, I examined how the emotion regulation and emotional awareness were related to emotion coaching. Cross-cultural differences in these relations across Chinese and American cultures were tested. Participants included 164 American mothers and 163 Chinese mothers. Maternal emotional awareness was found to be associated with emotion coaching in both samples. Emotion coaching typically includes mothers’ beliefs about children’s positive emotions, negative emotions, and parents’ roles in guiding children’s emotions. In my results, negative emotions were not included because negative emotions could not be equally compared across Chinese and American samples. Additionally, suppression was related to emotion coaching indirectly in both cultures. The relations of reappraisal to emotion coaching were different across Chinese and American samples. American mothers who used reappraisal frequently also valued positive emotions and guiding children about emotions. Conversely, the use of reappraisal was unrelated to emotion coaching for Chinese mothers. Overall, the findings of this study supported the idea that maternal emotional awareness and use of emotion regulation strategies are important determinants of maternal emotion coaching. Mothers who believed in the value of positive emotions and the value of teaching children about emotions were more aware of their emotions and better at regulating their own emotions. In general, these associations were similar for American and Chinese samples, even though each culture has a unique perspective and value related to children’s emotions. These findings will promote our understanding of factors related to emotion coaching and further facilitate culturally desired emotion socialization practices leading to the optimal emotional development of children.

This thesis provides an overview of the literature both in the field of academic anxiety and emotion regulation. The two research fields have proceeded independently in the literature at least until recently and the thesis highlights their integration. The thesis aims to answer: what happens in the brain during cognitive reappraisal and how can we use cognitive reappraisal as a strategy for dealing with academic anxiety. Brain-imaging studies show that cognitive reappraisal (an emotion regulation strategy) involves many different higher-order cognitive processes, such as emotion processing, manipulation of appraisals in working memory, inhibiting the old and selecting new appraisals. Different regions of the prefrontal cortex are believed to support these functions, moreover, the prefrontal cortex modulates amygdala activity and decreases negative emotions. Previous research in the lab and in the classroom suggests that cognitive reappraisal might be a strategy for dealing with academic anxiety. The arousal reappraisal intervention encourages students to reinterpret their increased arousal as beneficial to their performance. Only a small number of studies have tested the intervention in academic contexts, however the results are promising, e.g. students improved exam performance. The goal is to teach students that it is possible to perform well regardless of one’s anxiety. The findings presented in this thesis provide an initial glimpse into the fruitful integration of these two research fields.