Tri-level anxiety and depression symptom trajectory in adolescents: The role of emotion regulation diversity

Anxiety and depression are associated with impaired emotion regulation (ER). Recently, a novel construct named ER diversity has been proposed to assess the diversity in ER strategy use. Low ER diversity, particularly under stressful circumstances, may be a transdiagnostic vulnerability factor for anxiety and depression. This study utilized a longitudinal design to examine the association between ER diversity and transdiagnostic anxiety and depressive symptom trajectory in adolescents (N = 627 at baseline), while accounting for life stress. Measures of ER strategy use, chronic interpersonal life stress, neuroticism, and transdiagnostic dimensional symptoms of anxiety and depression were assessed. The ER diversity index and the traditional ER sum score were computed. Higher ER diversity index was associated with steeper decline in the Fears symptom factor over time, above and beyond the ER sum score and neuroticism. Moreover, chronic interpersonal life stress influenced these associations. When chronic interpersonal life stress was low, Fears declined over time regardless of the ER diversity level; when chronic interpersonal life stress was high, Fears only declined when ER diversity was high. Thus, low diversity in ER strategy use, particularly under stressful circumstances, may be a vulnerability factor for fear symptom development.