Momentary emotion differentiation and emotional clarity predict emotion regulation strategy use in adolescents

Understanding the key prerequisites for successful emotion regulation (ER) may identify strategies to strengthen adaptive ER skills. However, it is unclear how two proposed mechanisms, momentary emotional clarity and emotion differentiation, relate to ER processes. Accordingly, this study investigated whether momentary emotion differentiation and emotional clarity are associated with concurrent momentary ER strategy selection and strategy differentiation in a child and adolescent (8-17 years) sample. Using experience sampling methodology, 47 participants (M_age = 13.81 years, SD_age = 2.27; 55.3% girl) repeatedly completed surveys (5×/day, 4 weeks) about their emotions, perceived emotional clarity, and their use of six ER strategies in daily life: acceptance, distraction, expressive suppression, thought suppression, forgetting and rumination. Emotion ratings were used to calculate momentary emotion differentiation, and the ER strategies were used to calculate momentary ER strategy differentiation. Results showed that both emotion differentiation and emotional clarity relate to concurrent use of specific ER strategies. Moreover, higher emotion differentiation, but not clarity, predicted higher ER strategy differentiation. These observations support the notion that both clarity and differentiation are essential for subsequent ER. Future research should focus on crucial contextual and between-person factors that influence the ER process, as well as its subsequent effect on momentary well-being.