Emotion Regulation

This authoritative volume provides a comprehensive road map of the important and rapidly growing field of emotion regulation. Each of the 30 chapters in this handbook reviews the current state of knowledge on the topic at hand, describes salient research methods, and identifies promising directions for future investigation. The contributors—who are the foremost experts in the field—address vital questions about the neurobiological and cognitive bases of emotion regulation, how we develop and use regulatory strategies across the lifespan, individual differences in emotion regulation, social psychological approaches, and implications for psychopathology, clinical interventions, and health.

Emotion regulation difficulties are central to a range of clinical problems, yet many therapies for children and adolescents lack a focus on emotion and related skills. In a flexible modular format, this much-needed book presents cutting-edge strategies for helping children and adolescents understand and manage challenging emotional experiences. Each of the eight treatment modules can be used on its own or in conjunction with other therapies, and includes user-friendly case examples, sample dialogues, and engaging activities and games. Emotion-informed assessment and case conceptualization are also addressed. Reproducible handouts can be downloaded and printed in a convenient 8 1/2" x 11" size.

Highly practical and accessible, this unique book gives therapists powerful tools for helping patients learn to cope with feared or avoided emotional experiences. The book presents a menu of effective intervention options--including schema modification, stress management, acceptance, mindfulness, self-compassion, cognitive restructuring, and other techniques--and describes how to select the best ones for particular patients or situations. Provided are sample questions to pose to patients, specific interventions to use, suggested homework assignments, illustrative examples and sample dialogues, and troubleshooting tips. In a large-size format for easy photocopying, the volume is packed with over 65 reproducible handouts and forms. Purchasers also get access to a companion website where they can download and print the reproducible materials.

Emotion Regulation is currently one of the most popular topics in clinical psychology. Numerous studies demonstrate that deficits in emotion regulation skills are likely to help maintain various forms of psychological disorders. Thus, enhancing emotion regulation has become a major target in psychotherapeutic treatments. For this purpose, a number of therapeutic strategies have been developed and shown to be effective. However, for practitioners it is often difficult to decide which of these strategies they should use or how they can effectively combine empirically-validated strategies. Thus, the authors developed the Affect Regulation Training as a transdiagnostic intervention which systematically integrates strategies from cognitive behavior therapy, mindfulness-based interventions, emotion-focused therapy, and dialectical behavioral therapy. The effectiveness of ART has been demonstrated in several high-quality studies.

One of the most important advances in the study of emotion regulation is understanding it as a dynamic process that develops across the life span. Emotion Regulation focuses on current conceptual and methodological issues in terms of change over various time scales: developmental change across years, as well as changes from day to day, from situation to situation, and from moment to moment. Written by top experts in the field, the volume is organized around three age periods of the life span: infancy and childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. By taking the matter of time seriously, these chapters represent promising and necessary approaches to broadening our knowledge of emotion regulation as a dynamic process that changes with age. The volume provides guidance for future research that will enable researchers to leave behind facile and static conceptualizations of emotion regulation in favor of richer and more explanatory frameworks.

Emotion regulation (ER), which refers to the ability to identify, experience, modulate, and express emotions, is critical to adaptive functioning. Although the term ER has been used synonymously with coping strategies, affect regulation, and self-regulation, it is important to differentiate ER from these other constructs to ensure optimal construct validity and accurate measurement. To this end, ER has been defined as "the process by which individuals influence which emotions they have, when they have them, and how they experience and express these emotions" (Gross, 1998 p. 275). Emotion is experienced in three primary ways: behaviourally, physiologically, and experientially (Gross, 1998); therefore, ER refers to strategies that alter these three aforementioned emotional processes. This book discusses the processes, cognitive effects, and social consequences of emotion regulation.

Emotion is a basic phenomenon of human functioning, most of the time having an adaptive value enhancing our effectiveness in pursuing our goals in the broadest sense. Regulation of these emotions, however, is essential for adaptive functioning, and suboptimal or dysfunctional emotion regulation may even be counterproductive and result in adverse consequences, including a poor well-being and ill health. This volume provides a state-of-the art overview of issues related to the association between emotion regulation and both mental and physical well-being. It covers various areas of research highly relevant to both researchers in the field and clinicians working with emotion regulation issues in their practice. Included topics are arranged along four major areas: • (Neuro-)biological processes involved in the generation and regulation of emotions • Psychological processes and mechanisms related to the link between emotion regulation and psychological well-being as well as physical health • Social perspective on emotion regulation pertaining to well-being and social functioning across the life span • Clinical aspects of emotion regulation and specific mental and physical health problems This broad scope offers the possibility to include research findings and thought-provoking views of leading experts from different fields of research, such as cognitive neuroscience, clinical psychology, psychophysiology, social psychology, and psychiatry on specific topics such as nonconscious emotion regulation, emotional body language, self-control, rumination, mindfulness, social sharing, positive emotions, intergroup emotions, and attachment in their relation to well-being and health. Chapters are based on the “Fourth International Conference on the (Non) Expression of Emotions in Health and Disease” held at Tilburg University in October 2007. In 2007 Springer published “Emotion Regulation: Conceptual and Clinical Issues” based on the Third International Conference on the (Non) Expression of Emotion in Health and Disease,” held at Tilburg University in October 2003. It is anticipated that, depending on sales, we may continue to publish the advances deriving from this conference.

Emotions are a cardinal component of everyday life, affecting one's ability to function in an adaptive manner and influencing both intrapersonal and interpersonal processes. This book brings together leading experts in the field to provide a guide to dealing with emotional problems in children and adolescents.

The main goal of this volume is to present, in an integrated framework, the newest, most contemporary perspectives on emotion regulation. The book includes empirically-grounded work and theories that are central to our understanding of the processes that constitute emotion regulation and their consequences. This volume has several secondary aims, as well. One is to highlight several newer subareas in the domain of emotion regulation that hold much promise, such as the relationship between psychopathology and emotion regulation. The book also presents data and theory that have applied value that may be useful for people working in such fields as communication, psychotherapy, and counseling. Finally, the volume gathers contributions across a variety of subfields and includes authors working not just in North America but in other areas of the world. To help achieve these goals, the volume has been organized to begin with the presentation of the most molecular aspects of emotion regulation and to end with the most molar ones. It comprises four parts, each integrating different lines of research from related domains. Part I is devoted to basic processes in emotion regulation, such as neurological, physiological or cognitive processes; part II examines the interplays between emotion regulation and individual regulation; part III presents work on individual differences and developmental processes in emotion regulation; and part IV examines the social functions and constraints of emotion regulation.

Emotion regulation skills should be mastered by early childhood, but many enter school with deficits that may not have been addressed effectively or early enough. This vital new text presents in-depth background and practical information on the subject so school professionals can craft interventions that are developmentally appropriate and timely. It also offers practical tools that can be taught to children and shared with parents and teachers.