Cultural context shapes the selection and adaptiveness of interpersonal emotion regulation strategies.

In everyday life, we commonly experience, express, and regulate our emotions in interpersonal contexts. However, much of the existing research on utilizing others for modulating one's emotions has focused on Western, individualistic cultures, leaving a significant gap in understanding how the selection and adaptiveness of interpersonal emotion regulation (IER) strategies vary across cultural contexts. This cross-national comparison study aims to bridge this gap by examining intrinsic IER in 1,187 participants from Turkey and Germany, which are characterized by different cultural norms, values, and socialization practices regarding emotional experience and expression.

What empathizers do: Empathy and the selection of everyday interpersonal emotion regulation strategies.

Background: Empathic behavior is crucial in promoting positive social outcomes and strengthening interpersonal bonds. Research on how empathy modulates responses to others' emotions remains scarce yet is fundamental for elucidating mechanisms of impaired social functioning in psychopathology and its treatment.

Methods: Two ecological momentary assessment studies (Ns = 125 and 204) investigated participants' empathy and usage of interpersonal emotion regulation strategies in 5537 social interactions.

Interpersonal emotion regulation and symptom dimensions of psychosis proneness in young adults.

This study investigated the relative associations of psychosis proneness symptom domains with habitual interpersonal emotion regulation (IER) use in a sample of young adults (n = 420, age 18-29). Multiple regression models showed that attenuated negative symptoms were related to using less, while attenuated positive symptoms and depression were related to using more IER. These findings suggest symptom-specific IER patterns across different symptom dimensions of psychosis proneness.

Web-Based Cognitive Behavioral Treatment for Bulimia Nervosa: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: Despite the existence of effective treatments, many individuals with bulimia nervosa (BN) do not receive evidence-based therapies. Integrating digital interventions into routine care might reach more patients and reduce the clinical burden of BN.

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of a web-based cognitive behavioral self-help intervention for individuals with BN.

Effectiveness of a Web-Based Cognitive Behavioral Self-Help Intervention for Binge Eating Disorder: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: Binge eating disorder (BED) is one of the most frequent eating pathologies and imposes substantial emotional and physical distress, yet insufficient health care resources limit access to specialized treatment. Web-based self-help interventions emerge as a promising solution, offering more accessible care.

Objective: To examine the effectiveness of a web-based cognitive behavioral self-help intervention for individuals with BED.

Hippocampal Involvement in Safety Signal Learning Varies With Anxiety Among Healthy Adults.

Background: Safety signal learning (SSL), based on conditioned inhibition of fear in the presence of learned safety, can effectively attenuate threat responses in animal models and humans. Difficulty regulating threat responses is a core feature of anxiety disorders, suggesting that SSL may provide a novel mechanism for fear reduction. Cross-species evidence suggests that SSL involves functional connectivity between the anterior hippocampus and the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex.

Empathy is associated with interpersonal emotion regulation goals in everyday life.

Responding to the emotions of the people around us is a phenomenon traversing human lives; however, research has only recently started exploring the predictors of interpersonal emotion regulation (IER). In two ecological momentary assessment studies conducted in 2021 and 2022, we tested whether facets of empathy (i.e.

If it Ain't Broke, Don't Fix it: Positive Versus Negative Emotion Regulation in Daily Life and Depressive Symptoms.

Background: Despite the importance of positive emotions for affective psychopathology, prior research primarily focused on negative emotion regulation. To address this gap, this ecological momentary assessment study compared a broad set of emotion regulation strategies in the context of positive versus negative emotions regarding their effectiveness and associations with depressive symptoms.

Methods: We analyzed data from 1066 participants who were notified five times daily for seven consecutive days to complete a smartphone survey assessing their predominant emotions, strategies to regulate them, and subsequent emotional outcomes.

Contextual variations in emotion polyregulation: How do regulatory goals shape the use and success of emotion regulation strategies in everyday life?

Emotion regulation strategies are frequently combined within one emotional episode, a phenomenon labeled emotion polyregulation. Nevertheless, there is a scarcity of studies examining which regulatory strategies are commonly combined across different contexts and how effective these combinations are in everyday life. Targeting this research gap, the present ecological momentary assessment study modeled emotion polyregulation and its success for contexts of (a) downregulation, (b) upregulation, and (c) maintenance goals in = 321 adults.

Evaluation of a Web-Based Self-Help Intervention for Patients With Generalized Anxiety Disorder: Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial.

Background: Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is a highly prevalent and severely distressing condition that can lead to functional impairments and is considered one of the most difficult anxiety disorders to treat. Following new technological developments, a highly structured cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) approach that has already shown success in face-to-face psychotherapy can be implemented: internet-delivered CBT (iCBT). There is now evidence for the efficacy of both guided and unguided iCBT interventions for GAD regarding symptom reduction.

Examining the strategy-situation fit of emotion regulation in everyday social contexts.

The strategy-situation fit hypothesis suggests that emotion regulation strategies are only beneficial to mental health if they meet contextual demands. Previous studies support this assumption but focused on properties of the emotional stimulus and reported cross-sectional associations with mental health, thus neglecting the social context and long-term mental health outcomes. To address these limitations, we examined (1) whether reappraisal, social sharing, and suppression varied depending on the social context (i.

Integrating a web-based intervention into routine care of binge-eating disorder: Study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

Background: Although binge eating disorder (BED) is the most common eating pathology and carries a high mental and physical burden, access to specialized treatment is limited due to patient-related barriers and insufficient healthcare resources. Integrating web-based self-help programs into clinical care for BED may address this treatment gap by making evidence-based eating disorder interventions more accessible.

Methods: A two-armed randomized controlled trial will be conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of a web-based self-help intervention for BED in routine care settings.

Applying a web-based self-help intervention for bulimia nervosa in routine care: Study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

Background: Individuals with bulimia nervosa (BN) experience persistent episodes of binge eating and inappropriate compensatory behavior associated with impaired physical and mental health. Despite the existence of effective treatments, many individuals with BN remain untreated, leading to a high burden and an increased risk of chronicity. Web-based interventions may help facilitate access to evidence-based treatments for BN by reducing barriers to the health care system.

A cognitive control framework for understanding emotion regulation flexibility.

What are the cognitive processes that allow flexible responses to the changing demands of varying emotional contexts? Previous research suggests that higher levels of cognitive control are linked to successful emotion regulation. In particular, the implementation of emotion regulation strategies has been associated with individual differences in cognitive control, including (a) inhibiting prepotent responses, (b) updating information in working memory, and (c) shifting mental sets. Although most of this work has focused on the relationship between cognitive control and the short-term implementation of regulatory strategies, cognitive control may be even more important for understanding the dynamic adaptation to varying emotional contexts, that is, emotion regulation flexibility.

Attention and anticipation in response to varying levels of uncertain threat: An ERP study.

Individual differences in responding to uncertainty have been proposed as a key mechanism of how anxiety disorders develop and are maintained. However, most empirical work has compared responding to uncertain versus certain threat dichotomously. This is a significant limitation because uncertainty in daily life occurs along a continuum of probability, ranging from very low to high chances of negative outcomes.