Repressors benefit from reappraising a threatening emotional event

The malleability of emotion-focused coping was investigated by manipulating the situational context so that dispositional repressors, who typically utilize an avoidant strategy when confronted with a stressor, were led to use reappraisal and then were reexposed to the stressor.

A mixed design with one measured between-subjects factor (dispositional repression), two randomized between-subjects factors (performance feedback and coping strategy), and multimodal assessments across phases of the experiment was used.

During a face-perception task, participants (170 female and 120 male university students) received bogus performance feedback that was inconsistent with and thus threatening to self-concept. Participants then completed a writing activity encouraging them to perceive a face-perception task as either an invalid (reappraisal) or a valid (control) assessment tool. Afterward, participants continued with the task.

A repressive disposition was associated with a defense response (decreased perceived emotion to actors' expressions, increased skin conductance levels, and increased heart rates) during the face-perception task that participants perceived as threatening, but not during reexposure to the event after they had reappraised it as nonthreatening.

This research provides a more detailed understanding of the dynamic nature of emotion-focused coping by exploring how the disposition-situation interaction affects self-regulation of emotion.