No description available.

No description available.

Social anxiety and depression are commonly comorbid, and together they result in greater functional impairment and a poorer prognosis than when either condition occurs alone. Although the onset of social anxiety precedes the development of depression in the large majority of comorbid cases, little research has directly examined factors that contribute to the occurrence of depression in individuals with social anxiety. Theoretical models implicate emotion and emotion regulation in the development and maintenance of internalizing disorders. Emotion regulation research has predominantly focused on expressive suppression (ES), the suppression of outward emotion, and cognitive reappraisal (CR), the modification of cognitions to manage emotion. Social anxiety and depression are both characterized by maladaptive patterns of emotion regulation, exhibiting an overreliance on ES and an underutilization of CR. The present study investigated the role of emotion regulation, specifically ES and CR, in the relationship between social anxiety and depression over time. Our primary aim was to evaluate ES and CR, separately, as mediators of the relationship between social anxiety and depression. Our secondary aim was to evaluate additional mediating and/or moderating effects of related variables (i.e., relationship quality, positive and negative affect, and reward sensitivity). Our final exploratory aim was to evaluate whether emotion regulation (i.e., ES and CR) for positive emotions differs from emotion regulation for negative emotions in the relationships proposed by our primary and secondary aims. Undergraduate participants (N=137) completed an in-person laboratory session (i.e., baseline), followed by a 14-day daily diary period. During the daily diary period, participants reported on their daily experiences of social anxiety, depressed mood, emotion, emotion regulation, and relationship quality. Approximately two weeks after the end of the daily diary period (i.e., four weeks after baseline), participants completed a final in-person laboratory session (i.e., endpoint). Multilevel modeling was used to analyze observation-level data over the two-week diary period, and bootstrapping methods were used for person-level analyses over the full four-week study period. Daily diary analyses failed to support the hypothesized mediation models. Average social anxiety across the daily diary period was positively associated with daily depressed mood, but observation-level social anxiety was not. Exploratory analyses revealed affect-specific effects of emotion regulation, such that higher perceived success in ES (i.e., daily ES self-efficacy) for positive affect and less frequent use of CR (i.e., daily CR frequency) for negative affect significantly predicted higher next-day depressed mood. Person-level analyses across the four-week study period yielded some support for our hypotheses, in that ES frequency and positive affect acted as sequential mediators of the relationship between social anxiety and depression. Higher social anxiety predicted more frequent ES, which predicted lower positive affect, which then predicted higher depression. However, the mediation model was no longer significant after controlling for baseline depression. Our results highlight the role of emotion dysregulation in predicting depression and provide initial support for the mediating effects of ES and CR in the relationship between social anxiety and depression. These findings also emphasize the importance of investigating affect-specific effects, with particular attention paid to emotion regulation for positive affect and its role in the co-occurrence of social anxiety and depression. Future research would benefit from longitudinal studies across longer time periods and examining these relationships within a clinical sample. / Psychology

In adolescence, the use of cognitive reappraisal (CR) is adaptive for general emotion regulation and for decreasing symptoms of depression. Still, with all of the literature indicating the usefulness of CR, minimal research attempts to understand the childhood processes contributing to CR in adolescence. My dissertation study examined individual factors of executive function and frontal EEG asymmetry during late childhood, and environmental factors of parenting in adolescence, as predictors of adolescent CR and depressive symptoms. Data were from 123 participants in late childhood (age 10) and adolescence (age 14.5). During the late childhood visit, executive function and frontal EEG asymmetry were assessed. The adolescent visit included questionnaires for maternal CR, maternal supportive and unsupportive responses to adolescent's negative emotions, adolescent CR and depressive symptoms. Results indicated that maternal unsupportive reactions moderated the association between maternal CR and adolescent CR, such that higher unsupportive reactions were associated with higher adolescent CR when mothers reported higher CR. Higher CR in turn was associated with lower depressive symptoms. Regarding individual factors, frontal EEG asymmetry moderated the association between inhibitory control during late childhood and adolescent CR, such that better inhibitory control during late childhood was associated with higher CR when children had right frontal asymmetry. Higher CR was associated with lower depressive symptoms in adolescence. The results suggest the potential for targeting inhibitory control and parenting as two mechanisms for improving CR among adolescents to diminish depressive symptoms. / Doctor of Philosophy / Changing the way one thinks of an emotional event is considered highly adaptive, this strategy is referred to as cognitive reappraisal (CR). 123 participants during late childhood and adolescence and their mothers participated in this study. During the late childhood visit, children completed executive function tasks and electrical brain activity was collected during rest. For the adolescent visit, mothers completed questionnaires regarding their emotion regulation strategies and parenting styles, adolescents completed questionnaires regarding their own emotion regulation strategies and depressive symptoms. Results indicated that when mothers indicated more CR and higher unsupportive reactions this was associated with higher adolescent CR. Higher CR in turn was associated with lower depressive symptoms. Late childhood electrical brain activity and a child's ability to inhibit prepotent responses (inhibitory control) were associated with higher adolescent CR. Higher CR was associated with lower depressive symptoms in adolescence. The results suggest the potential for targeting inhibitory control and parenting as two mechanisms for improving CR among adolescents to diminish depressive symptoms.

Syftet med föreliggande studie var att undersöka sambandet mellan trygga anknytningsrelationer och emotionsreglering under adolescensen. Totalt deltog 82 ungdomar i studien, 47 kvinnor och 35 män mellan 17 och 20 år, genom att fylla i självskattningsformulären Viktiga personer i mitt liv (VIPIL) och Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ). Resultaten visar att det finns olika starka samband mellan anknytningsrelationerna och emotionsregleringsstrategierna kognitiv omvärdering och undantryckande. Anknytningsrelationerna är en svag prediktor för användandet av kognitiv omvärdering och förklarar cirka 5 procent av variansen, medan de predicerar cirka 41 procent av användandet av undantryckande. En jämförelse mellan könen visar att unga män använder kognitiv omvärdering oftare än unga kvinnor. Vänskapsrelationerna framstår som särskilt betydelsefulla för emotionsreglering under adolescensen, vilket kan bero på att ungdomar söker sig till vänner i större utsträckning när de frigör sig från föräldrarna och blir mer självständiga. Därför är det viktigt att vidare undersöka hur avsaknad av trygga vänskapsrelationer påverkar ungdomar i stort inklusive deras emotionsreglering. / The aim of this study was to examine the links between secure attachment relationships and emotion regulation during adolescence. In total 82 adolescents, 47 women and 35 men, between the ages of 17 and 20 years participated in the study by completing Swedish versions of the self-assessment forms Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA) and Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ). The results show that the relationships between attachment and the emotion regulation strategies cognitive reappraisal and suppression, differ in strength. The attachment relationships are a weak predictor of cognitive reappraisal and explains approximately 5 percent of the variance, while they predict approximately 41 percent of the variance of suppression. A comparison between women and men showed that young men use cognitive reappraisal more frequently than young women. The relationships with friends appears to be particularly significant to emotion regulation during adolescence, which may be due to that adolescents rely on their friends to greater extent when they separate themselves from their parents and become more independent. Therefore, it is important to further examine how the absence of secure friendships affect young people in general including their emotion regulation.

En la presente investigación se buscó establecer una relación entre la regulación emocional y la expresividad emocional, así como realizar correlaciones y comparaciones entre las variables de estudio y demográficas. Para ello, se evaluaron a 163 docentes del género femenino, tanto profesoras como auxiliares, con una media de 33 años de edad, que ejercían en diez diferentes jardines de educación inicial privados de Lima. Se utilizó el Cuestionario de Autorregulación Emocional (ERQ-P), el cual mide dos estrategias, la reevaluación cognitiva y la supresión emocional. Además, se aplicó el Cuestionario de Expresividad de Berkeley (BEQ) para medir la expresividad emocional, que abarca la expresión de emociones positivas, negativas y la fuerza del impulso. Se comprobó que sí existe una relación significativa entre la reevaluación cognitiva y la expresividad positiva, demostrando así la hipótesis principal. Además, se encontró una correlación negativa entre dicha estrategia y la edad de los niños a cargo, así como también se hallaron diferencias significativas al realizar comparaciones entre la muestra, obteniendo que el grupo de las docentes que son madres, y las del cargo de profesoras, expresan más emociones positivas. Es de gran valor el rol de las docentes para el aprendizaje de la regulación y la expresión emocional en los niños, resultando necesario que las mismas logren regularse adecuadamente, ya que cumplen de modelos en dicho aprendizaje observacional. Finalmente, se señalan las limitaciones del estudio, como lo fue descartar la supresión por baja confiabilidad, y las implicancias prácticas en la labor y formación docente. / The present investigation intended to establish a relation between emotion regulation and emotional expressivity in private Pre-School teachers and helpers of Lima, as well as correlate and compare the study and demographic variables. Therefore, 163 female teachers and helpers from ten different Pre-Schools were measured, and the mean age was 33 years old. There are two main regulation strategies, cognitive reappraisal and emotional suppression. On the other hand, emotional expressivity covers positive expressivity, negative expressivity, and impulse strength. These variables were measured with the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire and the Berkeley Expressivity Questionnaire. Results showed that cognitive reappraisal correlated positively with positive expressivity, demonstrating the main hypothesis. Also, this strategy correlated negatively with children’s age, and as of the comparisons, there were significant differences between teachers and helpers, and between mothers and non-mothers, regarding positive expressivity. Since teachers and helpers play the valuable part of being models in children’s learning process of regulation skills, it is crucial they manage to regulate their own emotions adequately, given its impact on their socioemotional development. At last, limitations and future implications are mentioned, so as the removal of emotional suppression due to low reliability, and the practical implications of this study regards the work, training and education of teachers and helpers. / Tesis

Heart rate variability (HRV), a physiological marker of autonomic nervous system (ANS) engagement, has been associated with a wide variety of clinical and psychological processes. High frequency (HF) HRV power, specifically, has been linked with the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) and self-regulation. The current inquiry used a random effects growth model to study the HF HRV response to an emotional task and to predict individual differences in HF HRV as a function of trait hostility, neuroticism, and emotion regulation strategies (e.g., positive reappraisal, positive refocusing). Results indicated that the task engaged both branches of the ANS. HF HRV was not related to either hostility or neuroticism. However, positive reappraisal was associated with both high baseline values of HF HRV (i.e., greater initial parasympathetic activation) and lower rates of reactivity (i.e., less parasympathetic withdrawal). Overall, these results add to the evidence that positive reappraisal is a powerful component of emotion regulation and may be an important intervention target.

Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) is thought to be characterized by emotion regulation deficits, including decreased use of adaptive strategies such as reappraisal, but little is known about the exact nature of these deficits and whether or not they are specific to the depressed mood state. The late positive potential (LPP) is a sustained positive deflection of the event-related potential (ERP) associated with responding to emotionally-valenced stimuli, and reappraisal strategies have been found to reduce LPP magnitude in response to emotional stimuli in healthy individuals, but this effect has not been examined in MDD. This study utilized ERPs to examine emotional reactivity to positive and negative pictures during passive viewing and a reappraisal condition in a sample 25 of individuals with current MDD, 26 with remitted depression (RMD), and 26 healthy controls. The LPP was greater for passive viewing of positive and negative relative to neutral pictures in all groups, with no significant group findings emerging. For positive pictures, all groups showed reduced LPP's for positive reappraisal relative to passive viewing with no group by condition interactions. For negative pictures, both the MDD and RMD groups exhibited abnormalities, with the MDD group failing to show a reduction in LPP for reappraised pictures relative to passive viewing and the RMD group demonstrating an unexpected increase in LPP magnitude for reappraised negative pictures. The LPP for emotional pictures and reappraisal instructions may reveal deficits in emotional reactivity and regulation among mood-disordered individuals, particularly for negative stimuli, and may suggest targets for clinical intervention.

No description available.

The conceptual model of emotion regulation (ER) of Gross and Thompson (2007) introduces families of ER strategies ordered on a temporal scale. This scale has been attributed implications both for the grouping strategies but also for the neurocognitive processing. The two event-related potential (ERP) studies of emotional regulation presented here focus on emotional regulation at different temporal distances, as well as, different stages of cognitive processing. Trying to discern if various neural processes could be disentangled by looking at different stages of the late positive potential (LPP). The theoretical background begins with the neurocognitive science of emotionality and visits cognitive processing at both early and late stages before summating results of the contemporary research of emotional regulation. 39 participants were enrolled within the two experiments aiming to compare the efficiency of different strategies in reducing negative social emotion induced by photographs of angry faces. Technical difficulties discourage conclusions about how temporal distancing is most effectively adapted. Results suggest self-focused distancing strategies are more effective than situation-focused reappraisal and could be preferred for therapeutic purposes based on greater observed LPP effect.