Emotion experience and expression goals shape emotion regulation strategy choice

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Social Psychology
• Cognitive Psychology

Background:

• Emotion regulation is crucial for psychological well-being.
• Previous research focused on desired emotional experiences, neglecting expressive goals.
• Understanding emotion goals is key to explaining strategy selection.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how desired emotional experiences and expressions influence emotion regulation strategy choice.
• To introduce and define four unique emotion goals.
• To examine the relationship between these emotion goals and specific regulation strategies.

Main Methods:

• Six experiments were conducted.
• Participants' emotion goals (experience/express vs. not) were manipulated.
• Choices between six common emotion regulation strategies were analyzed.

Main Results:

• Rumination and amplification were linked to experiencing and expressing emotions.
• Expressive suppression was used to experience but not express emotions.
• Amplification was chosen to express without experiencing, while distraction was used to neither experience nor express.

Conclusions:

• Emotion goals encompass both desired experience and expression.
• Four distinct emotion goals influence emotion regulation strategy selection.
• Reappraisal emerged as a universally common strategy, irrespective of specific goals.