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Related Experiment Videos

Expressive suppression during an acoustic startle.

Tim Hagemann1, Robert W Levenson, James J Gross

  • 1Department of Organizational Psychology, University of Dortmund, 44227 Dortmund, Germany. hagemann@orgapsy.uni-dortmund.de

Psychophysiology
|April 25, 2006
PubMed
Summary

Suppressing emotion expression increases physiological arousal, even when not directly experiencing emotions. This study found that inhibiting expressive behavior during a startling event heightened sympathetic nervous system activation.

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Area of Science:

  • Psychology
  • Psychophysiology
  • Neuroscience

Background:

  • Previous research indicates that inhibiting emotion-expressive behavior elevates sympathetic nervous system activation.
  • Conversely, inhibiting facial behavior during neutral emotional states does not yield similar physiological effects.
  • This suggests a unique aspect to suppressing emotion-related expressive behaviors.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the physiological consequences of inhibiting expressive behavior under startling conditions.
  • To examine the boundary conditions of the emotion suppression effect.
  • To determine if suppressing biologically based responses is physiologically demanding.

Main Methods:

  • 252 participants were allocated to three experimental groups.

Related Experiment Videos

  • Participants received acoustic startles.
  • Two groups underwent a countdown before a loud noise, with one group instructed to inhibit expressive behavior.

    • Main Results:

    • Startle suppression led to increased sympathetic activation.
    • The findings indicate that inhibiting expressive behavior during a startling event is physiologically taxing.
    • This effect was observed even when participants were not in an emotionally charged state.

    Conclusions:

    • Inhibiting emotion-expressive behavior increases sympathetic activation, extending prior research on emotion suppression.
    • The findings suggest that suppressing other biologically based responses may also be physiologically demanding.
    • This research highlights the physiological costs associated with behavioral inhibition.