Ziel der vorliegenden Dissertation war es zum einen die experimentelle Prüfung von Faktoren der Emotionsregulierung auf empathische Reaktion sowie die Identifikation von Ansatzpunkten zur Verbesserung von Emotionsregulierung als Handlungskompetenz in einem beruflichen Umfeld zu überprüfen. Der Schwerpunkt der Dissertation wurde auf das Modell der adaptiven Emotionsregulierung (Adaptiv Coping with Emotion, ACE-Modell, Berking and Heizer, 2010; Berking and Schwarz, 2014; Berking, et al., 2008) gelegt. In Studie I wurde in einem Experiment untersucht, ob Kompetenzen der Emotionsregulierung eine Interaktion mit Stress in Bezug auf Schmerzeinfühlung zeigen. Bei 120 randomisierten Versuchspersonen kam in der Versuchsgruppe der Trierer-Stress-Test (TSST, Kirschbaum, et al., 1993) als valides Instrument zum Einsatz, mit dem akuter Stress induziert wird. Als psychophysiologischer Manipulationscheck für die Stress-Induktion erfolgte die kardiovaskuläre Reaktion durch die Messung der Herzrate. Die Ergebnisse zeigen Interaktionseffekte zwischen selbsteingeschätzten emotionsregulatorischer Kompetenzen (Klarheit, Verstehen und Akzeptanz) und Stress auf Schmerzeinfühlung. Unter akutem Stress und fehlenden Kompetenzen der Emotionsregulierung kommt es tendenziell zu einer eingeschränkten empathischen Reaktion. Studie II war eine ressourcenorientierten Interventionsstudie zur Förderung sozial-emotionaler Kompetenzen der Emotionsregulierung durch das standardisierte Training emotionaler Kompetenzen (TEK, Berking, 2014) bei 96 Beschäftigten der stationären Altenpflege in einem quasi-experimentellen Design. Es fanden sich signifikante positive Effekte über die Zeit (Post und Follow-Up nach 6 Monaten) für einzelne Kompetenzen der Emotionsregulierung (vor allem Toleranz und Modifikation). Außerdem zeigte sich ein direkter Zusammenhang der Regulierungskompetenzen mit psychischem Wohlbefinden, in dem Sinne, dass die durch das Training erhöhten Kompetenzen direkt zu einer Erhöhung des Wohlbefindens beitrugen. Abschließend kann festgestellt werden, dass emotionale Zustände und ihre Regulierung im Sinne emotionaler und personaler Ressourcen zukünftig verstärkt Eingang in gesundheitswissenschaftliche Konzepte finden sollten. / Therefore, the aim of the present thesis was to experimentally investigate the influence of emotion regulation on empathic responses on one hand and the identification of approaches to improve emotion regulation in an occupational environment on the other hand. Thus, the thesis focused on the Adaptive Coping with Emotion (ACE) - Model, (Modell der adaptiven Emotionsregulierung, Berking and Heizer, 2010); (Berking and Schwarz, 2014); (Berking, et al., 2008). Relating to this, study I experimentally investigated whether an interaction between emotion regulation competencies and stress experiences impact the evaluation of feeling of pain in others. In 120 subjects, randomly assigned to an experimental or a control group, the Trier Social Stress Task (Trierer-Sozial-Stress-Test, TSST, Kirschbaum, et al., 1993) was used to validly trigger acute stress reactions. Heart rate measurements were used as a manipulation check. Results indicate a target interaction effect of specific emotion regulation skills (tolerance, acceptance) in the prediction of feeling of pain. With unavailable adaptive emotion regulation competencies the empathic reaction is apparently reduced during acute stress. Study II has been conducted to analyze a resource-oriented intervention for fostering individual emotion regulation competencies in 96 employees in inpatient elderly care following a quasi-experimental design. Results show significant positive effects over time (pre to post- and follow-up-intervention after 6 months) for certain emotion regulation competencies (in particular tolerance and modification). Moreover, a direct relation between intervention-related improvement in emotion regulation skills and increases in psychological well-being could be found. Hence, aiming at personality development, the Adaptive Regulation Training is significantly contributing to health promotion at work. In sum, it can be concluded that emotional states and their regulation in the sense of emotional and personal resources should increasingly be incorporated into the public health research, because designing healthy work places and fostering healthy behavior is bound to the opportunity of personality development. Moreover, the results of the thesis prove the importance of emotion regulation serving as an additional approach and a personal resource for strengthening and maintaining mental health at work.

The frequency of social dysfunctions in a general population sample and in different diagnostic groups was investigated by using the Social Interview Schedule (SIS). Based on the results of the general population sample, several of the a priori derived cut-off scores of the SIS were modified. The analysis of the general population sample revealed sex-specific relationships between age and different aspects of social functioning. Especially for younger women significantly more objective social restrictions, were found due to the burden of multiple role responsibilities. With regard to different diagnostic subgroups including patients and mostly untreated cases from the community sample with Affective Disorders and Anxiety Disorders, results indicate that the degree of social impairment and dysfunctions and the degree of satisfaction with different role areas are strongly dependent on type of disorder and on former treatment status. Specific findings are: (1) The highest number of social impairments and dysfunctions were found in cases and patients with affective syndromes and in schizophrenic patients, but not in schizoaffective patients. (2) Management difficulties and dissatisfaction in intimate relationships were primarily found in depressed women. (3) Unlike anxiety patients, anxiety cases, although mostly chronically ill, had significantly less objective impairments and a lower rate of dissatisfaction than depressed cases. The results are discussed with special reference to the possible key role of depression for the development of social dysfunctions, as measured by the SIS. (4) Problems were, however, acknowledged concerning the use of the SIS with severely disturbed chronic schizophrenic patients.

In der qualitativen Forschungsarbeit wird die Frage bearbeitet: "Wie interpretieren sich von Langzeitarbeitslosigkeit betroffene Menschen hinsichtlich ihrer sozialen Anerkennung in einer Arbeitsgesellschaft, in der Arbeit als verpflichtender Wert eine zentrale Stellung einnimmt und in der aber zugleich nicht genügend Arbeitsmöglichkeiten zur Verfügung stehen?". Dazu wird zuerst das Verhältnis von Erwerbsarbeit und Arbeitsgesellschaft diskutiert, um so ein begriffliches Verständnis von Erwerbsarbeit herauszuarbeiten. Anschließend werden Wandlungsprozesse der Arbeitsgesellschaft betrachtet, um einen Bedeutungszuwachs von Erwerbsarbeit im Zuge dieses zu verdeutlichen und um das Konzept der Ökonomisierung des Sozialen und der ökonomischen Einstellung einzuführen. In das bis dahin Skizzierte, soll dann über den Zwischenschritt der Einführung eines Konzeptes von sozialer Anerkennung ein Verständnis von Arbeitslosigkeit und Langzeitarbeitslosigkeit platziert werden. Aus den dadurch deutlich werdenden Schnittflächen, Kontrasten und Querverbindungen, kann dem dann anstehenden Forschungsvorhaben eine Form gegeben werden. Das Konzept der sozialen Anerkennung ist dabei bewusst zwischen den Betrachtungen zur Arbeitsgesellschaft und denen zur Arbeitslosigkeit platziert. Denn dieses soll bei der Explikation des Begriffsverständnisses von Langzeitarbeitslosigkeit, schon als Hintergrundfolie mitgedacht werden können. Daran anschließend wird eine theoretische Verknüpfung von Langzeitarbeitslosigkeit und sozialer Anerkennung vorgenommen und mit einem Blick auf den aktuellen Forschungsstand zur Thematik der Übergang zum Forschungsteil geschaffen.

Theory of Mind (ToM) is the ability to infer others’ mental states and thus to predict their behavior (Perner, 1991). Therefore, ToM is essential for the adequate adjustment of behavior in social situations. ToM can be divided into: 1) cognitive ToM encompassing inferences about intentions and beliefs and 2) affective ToM encompassing inferences about emotions (Shamay-Tsoory, Harari, Aharon-Peretz, & Levkovitz, 2010). Well-functioning skills of both ToM aspects are much-needed in the developmental period of adolescence because in this age phase peer relationships become more important and romantic relationships arise (Steinberg & Morris, 2001). Importantly, affective psychopathological disorders often have their onset in adolescence. ToM development in adolescence might be based on underlying cognitive mechanisms such as the ability to inhibit one’s own thoughts in order to understand another person’s thoughts (Carlson & Moses, 2001). Another possible mechanism relates to functional brain development across adolescence (Blakemore, 2008). Therefore, neurocognitive mechanisms may underlie ongoing ToM development in adolescence. First studies indicate an ongoing behavioral and functional brain development of ToM (e.g. Blakemore, 2008). However, ToM development in adolescence and how this might relate to underlying (neuro)cognitive functions remains largely underexamined. The major aims of the current thesis were first to answer the overall question whether there is an ongoing development of ToM in adolescence. This question relates to both behavioral and functional brain development. As a second major aim, the present work sought to elucidate possible (neuro)cognitive mechanisms of ongoing ToM development across adolescence. Specifically, these cognitive mechanisms might be basic cognitive functions as well as executive functions. Additionally, the present work aimed at exploring potential (neuro)cognitive mechanisms through an integration of both behavioral and functional brain studies. The current experimental work spans three cross-sectional studies investigating adolescents (aged around 12-15 years) and young adults (aged around 18-22 years) to examine for the first time both the behavioral (studies I and II) and functional brain development of ToM (study III) in adolescence and its underlying (neuro)cognitive mechanisms. In all three studies, more complex, advanced ToM tasks were employed to avoid ceiling effects. Study I was aimed at investigating if cognitive and affective ToM continues to develop in adolescence and at exploring if basic cognitive variables such as verbal ability, speed of processing, and working memory capacity underlie such development. Hence, two groups of adolescents and young adults completed tasks of ToM and basic cognitive abilities. Large age effects were revealed on both measures of ToM: adolescents performed lower than adults. These age differences remained significant after controlling for basic cognitive variables. However, verbal ability covaried with performance in affective ToM. Overall, results support the hypothesis of an ongoing development of ToM from adolescence to adulthood on both cognitive and affective aspects. Results may further indicate verbal ability being a basic cognitive mechanism of affective ToM. Study II was designed to further explore if affective ToM, as measured with a dynamic realistic task, continues to develop across adolescence. Importantly, this study sought to explore executive functions as higher cognitive mechanisms of developing affective ToM across adolescence. A large group spanning adolescents and young adults evaluated affective mental states depicted by actors in video clips. Additionally, participants were examined with three subcomponents of executive functions, inhibition, updating, and shifting following the classification of Miyake et al. (2000). Affective ToM performance was positively related to age and all three executive functions. Specifically, inhibition explained the largest amount of variance in age related differences of affective ToM performance. Overall, these results indicate the importance of inhibition as key underlying mechanism of developing an advanced affective ToM in adolescence. Study III set out to explore the functional brain development of affective ToM in adolescence by using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The affective ToM measure was the behavioral developmentally sensitive task from study II. An additional control condition consisted of the same emotional stimuli with the instruction to focus on physical information. This study faced methodical challenges of developmental fMRI studies by matching performance of groups. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vMPFC) was significantly less deactivated in adolescents in comparison to adults, which might suggest that adolescents seem to rely more on self-referential processes for affective ToM. Furthermore, adolescents compared to adults showed greater activation in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) in the control condition, indicating that adolescents might be distracted by the emotional content and therefore needed to focus more on the physical content of the stimulus. These findings suggest affective ToM continues to develop on the functional brain level and reveals different underlying neurocognitive strategies for adolescents in contrast to adults. In summary, the current thesis investigated whether ToM continues to develop in adolescence until young adulthood and explored underlying (neuro)cognitive mechanisms. Findings suggest that there is indeed an ongoing development of both the cognitive and affective aspect of ToM, which importantly contributes to the conceptual debate. Moreover, the second benefit to the debate is to demonstrate how this change may occur. As a basic cognitive mechanism verbal ability and as an executive functioning mechanism inhibition was revealed. Furthermore, neurocognitive mechanisms in form of different underlying neurocognitive strategies of adolescents compared to adults were shown. Taken together, ToM development in adolescence seems to mirror a different adaptive cognitive style in adolescence (Crone & Dahl, 2012). This seems to be important for solving the wealth of socio-emotional developmental tasks that are relevant for this age span.