Autobiographical memory specificity and affect regulation: An experimental approach.

This study investigated J. M. G. Williams's (1996) affect-regulation hypothesis that level of specificity of autobiographical memory (AM) is used to minimize negative affect. It was found that a negative event leads to more reports of subjective stress in high- as compared with low-specific participants. Also, afterward, high-specific participants rated their unprompted memories for the event as more unpleasant. The results indicate that, relative to high specificity, being less specific in the retrieval of AMs is associated with less affective impact of a negative event. Results are discussed within the affect-regulation model. It is suggested that future research take a more functional perspective on AM specificity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Understanding child-based effects on parenting: Temperament as a moderator of genetic and environmental contributions to parenting.

The degree to which child temperament moderates genetic and environmental contributions to parenting was examined. Participants were drawn from the Nonshared Environment and Adolescent Development project and included 720 sibling pairs, ages 13.5 + 2.0 years (Sibling 1) to 12.1 + 1.3 years (Sibling 2). The sample consisted of 6 sibling types: 93 monozygotic twin pairs, 99 dizygotic twin pairs, and 95 full sibling pairs from never-divorced families and 182 full-sibling, 109 half-sibling, and 130 unrelated-sibling pairs residing in stepfamilies. Composite child temperament ratings (negative emotionality, activity, shyness, and sociability) were derived from mothers' and fathers' reports. Composite parenting ratings (negativity, warmth) for mothers and fathers were generated from children's and parents' reports. Analyses indicated that at higher levels of negative emotionality and sociability, child-based genetic contributions to mothers' and fathers' negativity increased, whereas the contributions of environmental factors declined. The opposite pattern was observed for child shyness. These same characteristics had less impact on parental warmth. For fathers only, nonshared environmental contributions to fathers' warmth increased in the presence of high child activity and sociability but declined when children were very shy. Overall these findings indicate that child-based effects on negative parenting are enhanced when children demonstrate potentially challenging characteristics but are weaker in the absence of such characteristics. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Individual differences in two emotion regulation processes: Implications for affect, relationships, and well-being.

Five studies tested two general hypotheses: Individuals differ in their use of emotion regulation strategies such as reappraisal and suppression, and these individual differences have implications for affect, well-being, and social relationships. Study 1 presents new measures of the habitual use of reappraisal and suppression. Study 2 examines convergent and discriminant validity. Study 3 shows that reappraisers experience and express greater positive emotion and lesser negative emotion, whereas suppressors experience and express lesser positive emotion, yet experience greater negative emotion. Study 4 indicates that using reappraisal is associated with better interpersonal functioning, whereas using suppression is associated with worse interpersonal functioning. Study 5 shows that using reappraisal is related positively to well-being, whereas using suppression is related negatively. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Affect regulation and temporal discounting: Interactions between primed, state, and trait affect.

Previous research has largely focused on the influence of experienced affect on decision making; however, other sources of affective information may also shape decisions. In two studies, we examine the interacting influences of affective information, state affect, and personality on temporal discounting rates (i.e., the tendency to choose small rewards today rather than larger rewards in the future). In Study 1, participants were primed with either positive or negative affect adjectives before making reward choices. In Study 2, participants underwent either a positive or negative affect induction before making reward choices. Results in both studies indicate that neuroticism interacts with state unpleasant affect and condition (i.e., positive or negative primes or induction) to predict discounting rates. Moreover, the nature of the interactions depends on the regulatory cues of the affective information available. These results suggest that irrelevant (i.e., primes) and stable (i.e., personality traits) sources of affective information also shape judgments and decision making. Thus, current affect levels are not the only source of affective information that guides individuals when making decisions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Revisiting the affect regulation model of binge eating: A meta-analysis of studies using ecological momentary assessment.

The affect regulation model of binge eating, which posits that patients binge eat to reduce negative affect (NA), has received support from cross-sectional and laboratory-based studies. Ecological momentary assessment (EMA) involves momentary ratings and repeated assessments over time and is ideally suited to identify temporal antecedents and consequences of binge eating. This meta-analytic review includes EMA studies of affect and binge eating. Electronic database and manual searches produced 36 EMA studies with N = 968 participants (89% Caucasian women). Meta-analyses examined changes in affect before and after binge eating using within-subjects standardized mean gain effect sizes (ESs). Results supported greater NA preceding binge eating relative to average affect (ES = 0.63) and affect before regular eating (ES = 0.68). However, NA increased further following binge episodes (ES = 0.50). Preliminary findings suggested that NA decreased following purging in bulimia nervosa (ES = –0.46). Moderators included diagnosis (with significantly greater elevations of NA prior to bingeing in binge eating disorder compared to bulimia nervosa) and binge definition (with significantly smaller elevations of NA before binge vs. regular eating episodes for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders definition compared to lay definitions of binge eating). Overall, results fail to support the affect regulation model of binge eating and challenge reductions in NA as a maintenance factor for binge eating. However, limitations of this literature include unidimensional analyses of NA and inadequate examination of affect during binge eating, as binge eating may regulate only specific facets of affect or may reduce NA only during the episode. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Affect regulation: Two clinical approaches.

The panel on affect was presented in the Spring 2001 Meeting of Division 39 (Psychoanalysis) of the American Psychological Association. Judith Levene and Kenneth Barish presented a theoretical framework and clinical experiences indicating how their work attempts to facilitate affect regulation. David Landau discussed several similar qualities shared in these papers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Trauma, repetition, and affect regulation: The work of Paul Russell: Book review.

Review of book, Judith Guss Teicholz and Daniel Kriegman (Eds.), Trauma, Repetition, and Affect Regulation: The Work of Paul Russell. New York: Other Press, 1998, 154 pp., $22.00. Reviewed by Rafael Art. Javier. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Attachment, play and authenticity: A Winnicott primer.

Reviews the book, Attachment, play and authenticity: A Winnicott primer by Steven Tuber (2008). Based on Tuber’s lectures in the doctoral program in clinical psychology at the City University of New York at City College, and his clinical work for the past 30 years or so, this book is the culmination of countless hours of playing with Winnicott—after all, becoming “real...takes a long time”—and Tuber makes no bones about his perspective. His admiring immersion in Winnicott is unabashed, unapologetic, and unencumbered by an allegiance to any particular overarching school of psychoanalytic thinking. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reduced autobiographical memory specificity and posttraumatic stress: Exploring the contributions of impaired executive control and affect regulation.

Reduced specificity of autobiographical memories retrieved to word cues on the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) is associated with increased posttraumatic stress in traumatized samples. Theoretical debates concerning the dominant influences on this effect have focused on affect regulation, whereby specific personal information is avoided more by those experiencing greater distress, versus compromised executive control, whereby increased distress is associated with an inability to set aside inappropriately general responses on the AMT. The present study compared these 2 views in a correlational design using a reversed version of the AMT (the AMT-R) for which trauma-exposed participants (N=36) had to generate general memories from the past and avoid specific memories. An emphasis on the role of affect regulation would predict that distress would be associated with reduced specificity (as in the standard AMT), whereas emphasis on the role of executive control would predict that this relationship would be reversed. The data supported the affect regulation account, with greater posttraumatic stress being associated with reduced memory specificity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Affect optimization and affect complexity: Modes and styles of regulation in adulthood.

In this research, the authors hypothesize that affect regulation involves 2 independent strategies: affect optimization, the tendency to constrain affect to positive values, and affect complexity, the amplification of affect in the search for differentiation and objectivity. Community residents age 15 to 86 were assessed by using 2 convergent measurement domains: 1 based on measures of positive-negative affect and cognitive-affective complexity and 1 based on measures of coping and defense. Both domains yielded the hypothesized affect optimization and affect complexity dimensions. As predicted, the affect optimization dimensions are primarily related to relationship quality variables, and the affect complexity dimensions to socioeconomic status and education. Hence, positive affect and its maximization have different significance in the context of high- or low-affect complexity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Temperament profiles from infancy to middle childhood: Development and associations with behavior problems.

The authors applied I-States as Objects Analysis (ISOA), a recently proposed person-oriented analytic approach, to the study of temperament development in 921 Norwegian children from a population-based sample. A 5-profile classification based on cluster analysis of standardized mother reports of activity, sociability, emotionality, and shyness at ages 18 months, 30 months, 4-5 years, and 8-9 years was interpretable and highly replicable. The prevalence of temperament profiles changed markedly with age, and individual stability in temperament profiles was significant. Specific typical and atypical developmental sequences of profiles were identified. Selective patterns of concurrent group differences in externalizing and internalizing problems by temperament profiles were remarkably similar across ages. The findings to some degree support the notion that individual temperament-variable values take on meaning in relation to the whole individual configuration and indicate some lawfulness in temperament changes over time. Future person-oriented studies of temperament development should replicate the current results using multiple data sources, rigorous tests of gender differences, and latent group modeling. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Affective experience in adulthood and old age: The role of affective arousal and perceived affect regulation.

The aim of the present study was to investigate age-related differences in self-reported affect in adulthood. Measurement of affect encompassed high- and low-arousal positive and negative affect. The sample consisted of 277 participants who were between 20 and 80 years old. Older participants showed a higher level of low-arousal positive affect and did not significantly differ from the two younger age groups in high-arousal positive affect. Both high- and low-arousal negative affect decreased from middle to older adulthood. Only partially are these age effects explained by sociodemographic characteristics, education, or self-reported health and personality. The perceived regulation of affect in the face of difficulties or threatening situations emerged as a central mediator in the association between age and the three age-graded facets of affect. In contrast, future time perspective had no mediating effect on the age–affect relationship. Results suggest that age-related advantages in perceived affect regulation seem to be one central component of resilience in old age. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The functions of nonsuicidal self-injury: Support for cognitive–affective regulation and opponent processes from a novel psychophysiological paradigm.

Although research on the reasons for engaging in nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) has increased dramatically in the last few years, there are still many aspects of this pernicious behavior that are not well understood. The purpose of this study was to address these gaps in the literature, with a particular focus on investigating whether NSSI (a) regulates affective valence in addition to affective arousal and (b) serves a cognitive regulation function in addition to an affect regulation function. To elucidate these issues, the present study utilized a sample of 112 participants (33 controls, 39 no pain controls, 16 NSSI individuals, and 24 controls matching the affect dysregulation levels of the NSSI group), employed psychophysiological measures of affective valence (startle-alone reactivity) and quality of information processing (prepulse inhibition), and used experimental methods involving an NSSI-proxy to model the NSSI process. Results largely were consistent with predictions, supporting the hypotheses that NSSI serves to regulate cognitive processing and affective valence. On this latter point, however, the control groups also showed a decrease in negative affective valence after the NSSI-proxy. This unexpected finding is consistent with the hypothesis that opponent processes may contribute to the development of self-injurious behaviors (Joiner, 2005). Overall, the present study represents an important extension of previous laboratory NSSI studies and provides a fertile foundation for future studies aimed at understanding why people engage in NSSI. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

New directions for basic psychoanalytic research: Implications from the work of Benjamin Rubinstein.

Basic, theoretically relevant research on psychoanalysis needs the theory to be restated in nonmetapsychological terms. B. B. Rubinstein's (1975, 1976) hierarchical restructuring of the clinical theory provides such a framework of testable propositions. Because the propositions are intrinsically probabilistic, research therefore cannot follow a standard experimental paradigm, but must seek empirical generalizations. Paradoxically, this means a new emphasis on the individual. Moreover, Rubinstein showed, psychoanalytic theory deals not with single acts or thoughts but with classes of them. Numerous implications of this position for research done by teams and by solo practitioners are developed with examples. If basic research is to flourish, a number of changes in psychoanalytic institutes and organizations are needed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Rising verbal intelligence scores: Implications for research and clinical practice.

Evidence suggests that scores on various intelligence tests have been rising at a fast rate. To find out whether performance on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) Vocabulary subtest has also been rising, the authors searched major psychology journals for investigations involving healthy younger and older adult participants and collected the reported WAIS Vocabulary scores. The meta-analysis shows that WAIS Vocabulary scores have been rising at the rate of 0.117/year (corresponding to 1.52 IQ points/decade) for younger adults and 0.367/year (corresponding to 4.79 IQ points/decade) for older adults. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Don't worry, be happy? Neuroticism, trait-consistent affect regulation, and performance.

People regulate their affect either to feel good or to achieve instrumental success. The present experiments show that when driven by performance goals, people can be motivated to experience unpleasant affect when it is trait-consistent, because of its instrumental benefits (e.g., M. Tamir & M. D. Robinson, 2004). In 4 studies, individuals high in neuroticism were more likely than those low in neuroticism to choose to increase their level of worry, as indicated by self-reported preferences (Study 1) and by behavioral choices in experimental settings (Studies 2-4). As predicted, such preferences were evident when expecting to perform demanding tasks but not when expecting an undemanding task (Study 2). Study 4 suggests that such preferences for short-term unpleasant affect may be beneficial to performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive reappraisal of negative affect: Converging evidence from EMG and self-report.

Prior psychophysiological studies of cognitive reappraisal have generally focused on the down-regulation of negative affect, and have demonstrated either changes in self-reports of affective experience, or changes in facial electromyography, but not both. Unfortunately, when taken separately, these measures are vulnerable to different sources of bias, and alternative explanations might account for changes in these indicators of negative affect. What is needed is a study that (a) obtains measures of self-reported affect together with facial electromyography, and (b) examines the use of reappraisal to regulate externally and internally generated affective responses. In the present study, participants up- or down-regulated negative affect in the context of both negative and neutral pictures. Up-regulation led to greater self reports of negative affect, as well as greater corrugator and startle responses to both negative and neutral stimuli. Down-regulation led to lesser reports of negative affect, and lesser corrugator responses to negative and neutral stimuli. These results extend prior research by (a) showing simultaneous effects on multiple measures of affect, and (b) demonstrating that cognitive reappraisal may be used both to regulate responses to negative stimuli and to manufacture a negative response to neutral stimuli. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stress and binge drinking: A daily process examination of stressor pile-up and socioeconomic status in affect regulation.

The goal of this study was to enhance understanding of the interconnections between stress, negative mood, and alcohol use. Daily diary data collected over eight consecutive nights from a nationally representative adult cohort were used to identify if (1) daily stress and cumulative stress pile-up were associated with increased risk of binge drinking, (2) negative affect mediated associations between stressors and binge drinking, and (3) associations among stress, negative affect and binge drinking were moderated by educational attainment as an indicator of socioeconomic status. Results indicated that the odds of binge drinking were higher on days that individuals experienced more severe stressors in contrast to no-stress days. Further, the odds of binge drinking also increased as stressors piled-up over consecutive days. There was no evidence that negative affect mediated associations between stressors and binge drinking. Associations of daily stressors and stressor pile-up with binge drinking were moderated by educational attainment. Study results suggest that affect regulation researchers need to handle "stress" in a multidimensional way and better situate stressors and individuals stress responses within their social context. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotion regulation in schizophrenia: Affective, social, and clinical correlates of suppression and reappraisal.

Individuals can exert considerable control over their experience and expression of emotion by applying different regulatory strategies such as reappraisal and suppression. However, although it has been suggested that blunted affect in schizophrenia, characterized by markedly reduced emotion expressivity alongside apparently normal emotion experience, may reflect overuse of suppression, no study to date has assessed self-reported use of these different emotion regulatory strategies in relation to this disorder. In the present study, 41 individuals with schizophrenia and 38 control participants completed a self-report measure that differentiated between use of suppression and reappraisal. Symptom severity and various aspects of cognitive and psychosocial functioning were also assessed. Relative to controls, individuals with schizophrenia did not differ with regard to their reported use of suppression and reappraisal, and reported use of both strategies was unrelated to clinical ratings of blunted affect. However, whereas (lower) use of reappraisal was associated with greater social function impairment for both groups, only for controls was (greater) use of suppression associated with reduced social functioning. Implications for understanding blunted affect and social dysfunction in schizophrenia are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)