Successful implementation of cognitive reappraisal: effects of habit and situational factors

ABSTRACT

Reappraisal is an adaptive emotion regulation strategy associated with favourable mental health outcomes. It is unclear whether the adaptive outcomes of habitual reappraisal are associated with better implementation of reappraisal when faced with negative affective situations. The current study aimed to examine whether habitual reappraisal predicts the implementation of instructed reappraisal and to evaluate the potential moderating effects of situational factors, namely – emotional intensity and reappraisal affordance. To address this question, 100 participants reported their habitual reappraisal tendency and were asked to imagine themselves in different hypothetical interpersonal situations. Participants rated emotional intensity levels and reappraisal affordance for each situation, followed by instructions to implement reappraisal. Implementation success was measured by self-reported affect pre-and-post-implementation. Results indicated that habitual reappraisal was associated with greater reappraisal implementation success. While higher intensity scores predicted greater reappraisal implementation success, intensity did not moderate the association between habitual reappraisal and reappraisal implementation success. Reappraisal affordance did not predict reappraisal implementation success, nor did it moderate the association between habitual reappraisal and reappraisal implementation success. Our findings suggest that individual-centred factors play a significant role in reappraisal implementation success, while the effects of situation-centred factors demand further investigation.

KEYWORDS:

• Emotion regulation
• habitual reappraisal
• emotional intensity
• reappraisal affordances

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Noa Tsuk Ram and Adi Moka for their assistance in reviewing and coding the data provided by participants.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Gender representation was not balanced in our sample. Nevertheless, a model where gender was inserted as a covariate was not found preferable over the model that was eventually used.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.