- Title
- Mix It to Fix It: Emotion Regulation Variability in Daily Life
- Creator
- Blanke, Elisabeth S.; Brose, Annette; Kalokerinos, Elise K.; Erbas, Yasemin; Riediger, Michaela; Kuppens, Peter
- Relation
- Emotion Vol. 20, Issue 3, p. 473-485
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/emo0000566
- Publisher
- American Psychological Association (APA)
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2020
- Description
- Emotion regulation (ER) strategies are often categorized as universally adaptive or maladaptive. However, it has recently been proposed that this view is overly simplistic: instead, adaptive ER involves applying strategies variably to meet contextual demands. Using data from four experience-sampling studies (Ns = 70, 95, 200, and 179), we tested the relationship between ER variability and negative affect (NA) in everyday life. The constantly changing demands of daily life provide a more ecologically valid context in which to test the role of variability. We calculated 2 global indicators of variability: within-strategy variability (of particular strategies across time) and between-strategy variability (across strategies at one time-point). Associations between within-strategy variability and NA were inconsistent. In contrast, when controlling for mean strategy endorsement, between-strategy variability was associated with reduced NA across both individuals and measurement occasions. This is the first evidence that variably choosing between different strategies within a situation may be adaptive in daily life.
- Subject
- emotion regulation; variability; flexibility; experience sampling
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1438936
- Identifier
- uon:40771
- Identifier
- ISSN:1528-3542
- Language
- eng
- Reviewed
- Hits: 718
- Visitors: 717
- Downloads: 0