Compensatory effects of emotion avoidance in adult development

Although compensatory strategies can offset regulatory losses that occur in later adulthood, they often break down under conditions of over-activation. Two emotion regulation tasks examined compensatory effects related to attachment classification (AC). Study 1 examined emotional Stroop performance in young (17-39) and old adults (60-89). Among the elder, participants with dismissing AC showed increased response times (RTs) for anger and fear words, whereas participants with secure AC showed increased RTs for joy words. Participants with anxious AC responded slowest overall. In Study 2, heart rate (HR) was monitored while adult (25-82) mother-daughter pairs discussed three emotion events (conflict, neutral, happy). During conflict discussion, older dismissing women had highest initial HR and slowest recovery, whereas anxious older women had lowest initial HR and fastest recovery. Results suggest that in old age protective functions of dismissing AC break down under over-activation, whereas anxious AC may serve a protective role.