Emotional Suppression and Psychological Well-Being in Marriage: The Role of Regulatory Focus and Spousal Behavior

Emotional suppression has been considered a critical factor in determining one’s mental health and psychological well-being in intimate relationships such as marriage. The present study aimed to delineate the nuanced association between emotional suppression and psychological well-being in marriage by considering two critical factors: (a) individual differences in motivational orientation and (b) the perceived level of a partner’s emotional suppression. A set of two online survey studies were conducted on a large sample of married participants. The participants were asked to indicate (a) their own level of emotional suppression, (b) the perceived level of their spouse’s emotional suppression, (c) relationship motivation, and (d) satisfaction with marital life. The results consistently indicated that for prevention-focused individuals being emotionally suppressive was associated with greater marital satisfaction, but only for those who perceived their spouses as also emotionally suppressive. Conversely, for promotion-focused individuals, being less emotionally suppressive was associated with greater marital satisfaction, but again, only for those who perceived their spouses as also being less emotionally suppressive. These findings provide insights into research on emotion regulation and self-regulatory strategies in influencing psychological well-being and mental health in an intimate relationship.

Emotion Dysregulation as a Mediator of the Relationship between Anxiety, Compulsive Exercise and Eating Disorder Symptoms in Adolescents

Anxiety has been suggested to be a key contributing factor for compulsive exercise, however, existing literature has demonstrated contradictory relationships between anxiety and compulsive exercise among adolescents. According to the Emotional Cascade Model (ECM), factors such as rumination and emotional suppression may mediate the association between affect and exercise. The current study therefore aimed to investigate whether rumination and emotional suppression mediate the relationship between anxiety and compulsive exercise in predicting ED symptoms in adolescents. Questionnaires assessing compulsive exercise, anxiety, depressive rumination, emotional suppression, and ED symptoms were completed by 212 adolescent males (Mage = 13.39, SD = 1.22) and 189 adolescent females (Mage = 13.64, SD = 1.29). The structural equation model showed indirect effects between anxiety and compulsive exercise through rumination and emotional suppression in males but not in females. Moreover, anxiety had an indirect effect on eating disorder symptoms through rumination, emotional suppression and compulsive exercise in both males and females. In line with ECM, the results suggest that rumination and emotional suppression may have a key role in the association between anxiety, compulsive exercise and eating disorder symptoms in adolescents. These findings suggest that compulsive exercise may be used as a dysfunctional coping mechanism to escape from a negative emotional cascade generated by the interaction of anxiety, rumination and emotional suppression. Future longitudinal studies to test the role of compulsive exercise as a dysfunctional behaviour in the ECM are needed.

Emotion may predict susceptibility to fake news but emotion regulation does not seem to help

Misinformation is a serious concern for societies across the globe. To design effective interventions to combat the belief in and spread of misinformation, we must understand which psychological processes influence susceptibility to misinformation. This paper tests the widely assumed -- but largely untested -- claim that people are worse at identifying true versus false headlines when the headlines are emotionally provocative. Consistent with this proposal, we found correlational evidence that overall emotional response at the headline level is associated with diminished truth discernment, except for experienced anger which was associated with increased truth discernment. A second set of studies tested a popular emotion regulation intervention where people were asked to apply either emotional suppression or emotion reappraisal techniques when considering the veracity of several headlines. In contrast to the correlation results, we found no evidence that emotion regulation helped people distinguish false from true news headlines.

Hostile Organizational Climate as an Antecedent to Paranoid Cognition and Sleep: Moderating Role of Emotional Suppression

Introduction.- Hostile organization climates can pave way for hostile, aggressive behavior and attitude which later become norm of the workplace. The hostile climate in an organization can ensure a damaging impact on employee behavior and mental health. Objectives.- Using Cognitive Activation Theory of Stress (CATS) this study aims to investigate the activation of paranoid cognitions due to stress stimuli coming from explore hostile climate and its impact on the sleep quality of employees which further lead to negative employee outcomes like counterproductive work behaviors, and psychological well-being with the moderating role of emotional suppression. Method and Results.-A time-lagged data segregated at three-time intervals are collected from employees and peers (n=497) working in the Telecom sector of Pakistan. Our study utilized PROCESS in SPSS technique to prove serial mediation of paranoid cognition and sleep quality between hostile climate, counterproductive work behavior, and psychological well-being and moderation analysis. Conclusion.- This study discovers new avenues in the existing literature of CATS and hostile climate by examining paranoid cognition and sleep quality as the underlying mechanisms through which hostile organizational climate can defoliate psychological well-being and can cause harm to an organization through counterproductive work behaviors.

Emotion Regulation Failures Are Preceded by Local Increases in Sleep-like Activity

Emotion self-regulation relies both on cognitive and behavioral strategies implemented to modulate the subjective experience and/or the behavioral expression of a given emotion. Although it is known that a network encompassing fronto-cingulate and parietal brain areas is engaged during successful emotion regulation, the functional mechanisms underlying failures in emotion suppression (ES) are still unclear. In order to investigate this issue, we analyzed video and high-density EEG recordings of 20 healthy adult participants during an ES and a free expression task performed on two consecutive days. Changes in facial expression during ES, but not free expression, were preceded by local increases in sleep-like activity (1–4 Hz) in brain areas responsible for emotional suppression, including bilateral anterior insula and anterior cingulate cortex, and in right middle/inferior frontal gyrus (p < .05, corrected). Moreover, shorter sleep duration the night before the ES experiment correlated with the number of behavioral errors (p = .03) and tended to be associated with higher frontal sleep-like activity during ES failures (p = .09). These results indicate that local sleep-like activity may represent the cause of ES failures in humans and may offer a functional explanation for previous observations linking lack of sleep, changes in frontal activity, and emotional dysregulation.

“There was Something Inside of me I Needed to Let Out”: Occupied Masculinities, Emotional Expression and Rap Music in a Palestinian Refugee Camp

Although normative constructions of masculinity in Palestine denote emotional suppression as an idealized attribute, extreme subjugation under the grinding realities of a colonial military occupation requires that this ideal is negotiated. This article explores Palestinian rap as a channel through which emotions related to individual and collective oppression are expressed within the (fluid) parameters of a particular emergent masculine performance. Through qualitative research with young Palestinian men living in a refugee camp, I argue that emotional expression within this musical culture both functions to reconfigure binary gendered dynamics, while simultaneously masculinizing emotionality through a dialogic performance of emotion, nationalism, resistance, and paternalism. In some ways, patriarchal gendered binaries are hence challenged in and through the performance of Palestinian rap, while in other ways these are reconfigured so that men’s emotional expression can be subsumed within them. This article, therefore, examines the negotiation of “masculinity as emotional suppression” through rap, in a context in which internal patriarchal powers are routinely threatened by colonial patriarchal forces.

Emotional Regulation in Mothers and Fathers and Relations to Aggression in Hong Kong Preschool Children

This study explored the associations among emotional regulation in mothers and fathers and preschool children’s physical and relational aggression using a Hong Kong Chinese sample. This study also explored whether child gender would moderate the association between parental emotional regulation strategies and children’s physical and relational aggression. Participants were 168 children aged 4–6 years. Parents reported on their own emotional regulation approaches and kindergarten class teachers rated children’s aggression 6 months later. Path analyses showed that higher levels of reappraisal and lower levels of suppression by mothers was associated with higher levels of child relational aggression. There were no significant associations among fathers’ emotional regulation and children’s aggression. Results from multi-group analysis showed that there were no significant moderation of the associations by child gender. Results highlight the importance of mothers’ emotional regulation in child aggression and suggest that the maladaptive consequences of emotional suppression are culturally relative.

How Power Affects Emotional Communication During Relationship Conflicts: The Role of Perceived Partner Responsiveness

Prior research indicated that lack of power leads to emotional suppression and low emotional expression during conflicts among strangers. However, little is known about how power affects emotional inhibition in close relationships, where partners are highly interdependent, and achieving one’s goals greatly depends on their partner’s cooperation. In three studies among romantic couples (total N = 994), we examined whether (a) power is related to emotional inhibition during conflicts, (b) perceived partner responsiveness moderates this effect and, (c) which conflict-resolution responses are subsequently enacted. Findings consistently showed that powerless individuals were more likely to inhibit their emotions and consequently to use passive responses during conflicts. However, this only occurred when they perceived lack of responsiveness from their partner. If the partner was perceived as responsive (i.e., showed care, validation, and understanding), power was not related to emotional inhibition and passive resolutions. The importance of partner’s responses in relation to power asymmetry is discussed.