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Updated: Oct 14, 2025
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Psychophysiological Assessment of the Effectiveness of Emotion Regulation Strategies in Childhood
Published on: February 11, 2017
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Variability in state authenticity predicts daily affect and emotion regulation.
1Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences.
Emotion (Washington, D.C.)
|November 2, 2021
Summary
Authenticity fluctuates daily, impacting emotional well-being and emotion regulation needs. High variability in authenticity correlates with negative affect but this effect diminishes when considering average authenticity levels.
Area of Science:
- Psychology
- Social Psychology
- Affective Science
Background:
- Authenticity is congruence between inner feelings and outer behavior.
- Authenticity variability describes fluctuations in this congruence over time.
- This variability may influence emotional well-being and emotion regulation.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the link between authenticity variability, emotional well-being, and emotion regulation.
- To examine within-person fluctuations in state authenticity.
Main Methods:
- Experience sampling study with college students (N=174).
- Data collected 4 times daily for 7 days.
- Assessed state authenticity, affect, and emotion regulation during social interactions.
Main Results:
- State authenticity showed greater within-person than between-person variability.
- Higher state authenticity linked to lower negative affect, higher positive affect, and less emotion regulation.
- Authenticity variability predicted more negative affect, less positive affect, and more emotion regulation, but this effect was non-significant when controlling for mean authenticity.
Conclusions:
- Authenticity is highly variable across daily experiences.
- Variability in authenticity is associated with affective processes.
- Focusing on within-person variability offers insights beyond trait-level authenticity.
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