EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Successful regulation of emotion and appropriate expression of emotion are vital for everyday social life (Gross & John, 2003) Publications discussing this important ability such as the mechanisms underlying emotion regulation, as well as the effects of different emotion regulation strategies have increased exponentially over the past years (Joormann & D’Avanzato, 2010) With the large number of studies on the effect of emotion regulation on health outcome, however, very few studies with Southeast Asian populations have been reported In line with this, the present project attempted to investigate the mechanism and effect of two emotion regulation strategies – reappraisal and suppression, on subjective well-being (SWB) and cardiovascular reactivity (CVR) among Singaporeans, focusing on two ethnic groups: Chinese and Indians Process Model of Emotion Regulation It has been widely acknowledged that people not just passively experience their emotions but rather are actively involved in all stages of emotion generation and have the ability to modify them (Eid & Diener, 2001) Emotions are believed to have evolved to serve survival functions, which can be seen in many species (Levenson, 1999) As conscious social creatures, human beings constantly engage in the process of modulating emotions to fit societal rules (Manstead & Fischer, 2000) As important and interesting the topic is emotion regulation is a very difficult topic to study empirically because emotion generation and emotion regulation processes are intertwined with each other and difficult if not impossible to tease apart in real experiences (Joormann & D’Avanzato, 2010) Researchers can still define the two processes theoretically Emotion can be seen as a response to an external or internal situation, or in other words, a person—situation transaction (Lazarus, 1991) On the other hand, emotion regulation is often defined as the “processes 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 REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH Emotional experience is dynamic, and constantly changes in response to the changing situations and the coping attempts of the person (Lazarus, 1991) Appraisal theories emphasize that it is the interpretation of the situation, but not the situation itself, that determines the nature of the emotional responses In many studies researchers have documented that people exposed to the same event displayed a variety of emotional responses depending on their different appraisals of the situation For example, Siemer, Mauss, and Gross (2007) reported that participants responded to a standardized laboratory task with a variety of different emotions, and different aspects of appraisal could predict the intensity of individual emotions across participants These theories and evidence all support the position that emotion generation (response to a situation) and emotion regulation (modulating the emotional responses) processes are recursive in nature, and in theory people can intervene to modify their emotions at any point along the chain of emotional response (Joormann & D’Avanzato, 2010) Gross (1998) has proposed the process model, which depicts emotion regulation as interventions which may take place at numerous points in the emotion generation sequence The advantage of this model is that it takes into account the aspects of both emotion generation and regulation, thereby providing a platform to empirical studies on emotion experience The process model of emotion regulation (Figure 1) differentiates two broad categories of emotion regulation strategies: antecedent-focused and response-focused strategies (Gross, Richards, & John, 2006) Antecedent-focused strategies focus on the modulation of future emotional responses, which refer to things people before the emotion tendencies become fully activated For example, situation selection and situation modification are antecedent-focused emotion regulation strategies that affect the emotion-eliciting situation directly, and thereby alter the entire emotion trajectory By comparison, the purpose of response-focused strategies is to manage the existing emotions, which refer to things people after the emotion is fully activated and the response tendencies have been generated Expression suppression is one example of the EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH response-focused strategies For example, one might bite one’s lip to appear unfazed by an unfair comment from a manager despite underlying feelings of anger Figure Process Model of Emotion Regulation (from Gross & John, 2003) Two Specific Strategies: Cognitive Reappraisal and Expression Suppression As discussed in the above section, there are numerous entry points at which one can actively intervene in the process of emotional experience It is not practical to study all of the possible regulation strategies at once Rather, two strategies are of particular interest in the current project: cognitive reappraisal, an antecedent-focused emotion regulation strategy, and expressive suppression, a response-focused strategy Despite the fact that each strategy belongs to one broad category, three factors were considered when selecting which strategies to study: (1) the two strategies are commonly used in everyday life and there are a number of available studies documenting the effects of the two strategies; (2) the two strategies are potentially influenced by culture; and (3) there are no studies reporting the comparison between Chinese and Indians in their usage of these two strategies EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH Cognitive reappraisal refers to a type of early regulatory effort to modulate one’s potential emotional responses, including changing the subject one sees in the situation, or changing the way one interprets the situation (Gross & John, 2003) It was first studied by Lazarus and colleagues, who reported that instructing participants to view an upsetting surgical procedure in a more analytical and detached way could decrease their subjective and physiological responses (Lazarus & Alfert, 1964) Expressive suppression, on the other hand, refers to efforts that come in late in the emotional generation and regulation process In particular, it is a form of response modification that inhibits ongoing emotion expressive behaviors (Gross & John, 2003) This strategy has been studied in different theoretical frameworks, such as from the perspective of self-control in Lazarus’ coping inventory (Lazarus, 1993) In addition, it has been repeatedly observed that suppression of emotion expressions is often associated with heightened physiological responses (e.g Gross & Levenson, 1993) Gross and John (2003) conceptualized the individual differences in emotion regulation based on the process model, and developed the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ), a tenitem scale, to measure one’s general usage of reappraisal and expression suppression in everyday life The ERQ has been tested in different populations and in different languages (e.g Balzarotte, John, & Gross, 2010; Zhu, Auerbach, Yao, Abela, Xiao, & Tong, 2008), and its reliability and validity have been established The current study focused on reappraisal and suppression and used the ERQ as one of the main measurements, and also extended the investigation on the mechanism and consequences of the two strategies Two Specific Health Indicators: Subjective Well-being and Cardiovascular Reactivity Much past work in health psychology has emphasized that negative emotions, such as anger, depression, and anxiety, are associated with higher morbidity and mortality from a range EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH of chronic illnesses, including cardiovascular disease (Barefoot, Brummett, Helms, Mark, Siegler, & Williams, 2000) and diabetes (Lustman, Frank, & McGill, 1991) More recent evidence has suggested that negative emotions may also play an important role in the development of such diseases (e.g Carnethon, Kinder, Fair, Stafford, & Fortmann, 2003) Positive emotions, on the other hand, may play a protective role with respect to the development of hypertension, diabetes, and respiratory tract infections (Richman, Kubzansky, Maselko, Kawachi, Choo, & Bauer, 2005) Therefore, the success of emotion regulation, that is, successful enhancement of positive emotions and decrease of negative ones, is closely related to one’s health condition in a positive manner The mechanisms that have been proposed to link emotional experiences and health outcomes include direct pathways involving physiological activation, and indirect pathways that involve behavioral and cognitive elements, as well as coping resources For physiological pathways, many studies have focused on the acute alterations of sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and/or parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) in response to an emotional episode In particular, the regulation of negative mood in relationship with cardiovascular health has attracted the interest of researchers for decades For example, it is believed that the inhibition of anger expression, as well as exaggerated anger expression, can both lead to an increased risk on the development and progression of cardiovascular diseases (Everson, Goldberg, Kaplan, Julkunen, & Salonen, 1998) The link between the acute effect of regulation in isolated anger episodes and the long-term influence of emotion regulation on the development of cardiovascular disease (CVD) is specified in the reactivity hypothesis, which proposes that frequent experience of exaggerated cardiovascular reactivity (CVR) is related to enhanced atherosclerosis progression, and therefore facilitates CVD development (e.g Jennings, Kamarck, Everson-Rose, Kaplan, Manuck, & Salonen, 2004) For indirect pathways, much work has emphasized the cognitive elements such as attitudes and beliefs, as well as health behaviors In particular, the stress and EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH coping model attempts to account for both deleterious and protective health correlates of emotion regulation According to the stress and coping model (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984), cognitive appraisal, which refers to “the process of categorizing an encounter, and its various facets, with respect to its significance for well-being” (p 31), influences individual reaction to the environment The cognitive appraisal process mediates one’s health beliefs, behaviors, as well as physiology, therefore has an important impact on one’s health outcome In this research, subjective well-being (SWB) and CVR are selected as two indicators of the consequences of emotion regulation for the following reasons Firstly, SWB and CVR are widely used as health indicators in studying the relationship between psychosocial factors and health And they are closely related to the hypothesized mechanisms linking emotional experiences and health, as discussed in the above paragraphs: CVR reflects the short-term physiological changes in one emotional episode, and SWB indicates long-term affective consequence Secondly, there is a rich literature on SWB and CVR studies, so the current research can build on a solid theoretical framework Thirdly, SWB and CVR patterns are both potentially influenced by cultural background SWB is an overall assessment on one’s self-reported well-being level and has been widely used in cross-cultural studies In short, SWB is the operationalized concept of happiness by self-report The greatest challenge has been how to define happiness in a way that enables it to be studied A very comprehensive review of the subjective well-being literature found that high levels of life satisfaction and positive affect, and low levels of negative affect are very commonly used to indicate one’s happiness level (Tov & Diener, 2007) Therefore these indicators are used in the current research as surrogates of SWB Moreover, the CES-D (Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale) was also used as an additional indicator for one’s SWB with depression indicating lower SWB The CES-D is commonly used to measure depressive symptomatology and the items focus on behavioral responses Firstly, depression itself is a EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH manifestation of impaired emotion regulation (Joormann & Gotlib, 2010) Secondly, items in the Life Satisfaction Scale are primarily focused on cognitive evaluation, whereas the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) focuses on affects that reflect personal feelings, it is believed that the CES-D provides necessary behavioral-oriented information on one’s self-reported wellbeing state In addition, many studies have included self-reported depression scales as one of the indicators of well-being (e.g Gross & John, 2003) Combining all these dimensions, an overall SWB index can be obtained, with higher scores indicating higher self-reported well-being level In laboratory experiments, researchers commonly use CVR patterns as indicators of SNS or PNS activation, which are closely linked to cardiovascular health It is believed that individuals who exhibit exaggerated cardiovascular responses to simulated challenges have an increased risk for subsequent CVD, compared to their low-reactive counterparts (Lavallo, 2005) CVD is the world’s No killer, claiming 17.1 million lives a year (WHO, 2011); therefore CVR pattern provides useful information as an indicator of health risk Affective and Physiological Consequences of Reappraisal and Suppression As social animals with societal rules, human beings constantly regulate experienced emotions through a number of effortful strategies, which is a type of adaptive behavior that is not seen in other species (Kalisch, 2009) However, emotion regulation is not cost-free, as energy and cognitive resources must be summoned in order to modulate our emotions (Muraven, Tice, & Baumeister, 1998) As proposed by the process model of emotion regulation, different regulatory strategies are associated with differentiated affective and physiological consequences By definition, reappraisal occurs early in the emotion generative and regulative process Therefore, it is hypothesized that reappraisal, when used to down regulate negative emotions, will effectively lead to reduced negative experience and expressions, with relatively little physiological cost (Mauss, Cook, Cheng, & Gross, 2007) By contrast, suppression starts late in EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH the chain of emotion generation and regulation process, and targets primarily the behavioral aspect of the emotional responses As such, suppression is hypothesized to require more effortful management, without effectively reducing negative emotional experience, and is associated with stronger physiological responses (Gross, Richards, & John, 2006) A series of survey and experimental studies have tested these hypotheses in regard to the affective and physiological consequences of reappraisal and suppression The differentiated effects between reappraisal and suppression were generally supported in the literature For example, it has been shown that people with high reappraisal scores in comparison to those with low reappraisal scores, report greater positive and less negative emotional experience, are more effective in interpersonal functions (Gross & John, 2003), and show a more adaptive profile of cardiovascular responding to a laboratory provocation procedure (Mauss et al, 2007) On the contrary, suppression has been linked to lower positive but higher negative emotional experience, impaired interpersonal functions (Gross & John, 2003), as well as magnified blood pressure responses (Roberts, Levenson, & Gross, 2008) Moderation Effect of Culture between Emotion Regulation and Consequences One obvious limitation of the previous research on emotion regulation is the failure to take into account the influence of culture on the consequences of emotion regulation Most studies were conducted in Western countries with predominantly North American participants Cultural psychologists have documented notable differences between Eastern and Western cultures As a result, the relationship between emotion regulation and health in the Southeast Asian context might be different from the existing reports that were obtained from participants in the Western countries In addition, Chinese and Indians may differ in important ways concerning emotion regulation In this section, the relationships between culture and emotion regulation and EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH its consequences will be discussed, and the specific design and implications relative to this research will be emphasized Individual and Group Differences in Usage of Reappraisal and Suppression Individuals differ in their use of various cognitive processes during any given event in order to regulate their feelings (John & Gross, 2004) For example, one individual may shift attention away from disturbing elements of a situation in order to down-regulate negative emotions, while another individual may focus on those very elements and reinterpret their meaning to feel better This illustrates that individuals may differ in their usage of cognitive reappraisal The existence of individual differences is actually the theoretical basis to further investigate the relationship between the usage of reappraisal and its consequences in different domains The mechanism underlying differences in the usage of reappraisal, however, has not been investigated systematically Research on reappraisal differences has mainly focused at the individual level (e.g see Mauss et al, 2007) Nevertheless, differences in perception and cognition have been documented between traditional Eastern and Western ways of thinking There is evidence that differences exist between different cultural groups in how people perceive and analyze specific situations For example, there are traditions of holistic versus analytic reasoning in East Asian and Western cultures respectively (Nisbett, 2003) Holistic thought involves a tendency to perceive the field as a whole by explaining the events on the basis of the relationship between objects and the field By contrast, analytic thought involves the inclination to detach the objects from their context and focus on attributes and category of the objects, and then use rules about the categories to explain the behaviors of the objects (Norenzayan, Choi, & Peng, 2007) Although both systems are available to all people in all cultures, cultural context may encourage the usage of one system over the other, giving rise to systematic cultural differences EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 10 If Westerners and Easterners focus and analyze the event differently, it is very likely that they interpret and perhaps reinterpret the entire situation differently Therefore, it can be expected that the exact mode and frequency of reappraisal usage might be different in different groups, based on their habit of activating different cognitive systems of thinking Until now, however, there has been no report of cultural differences in reappraisal usage using the ERQ reappraisal scale (ERQ.R): Asian Americans reported statistically similar levels of reappraisal usage as European Americans, African Americans, and Latino Americans (Gross & John, 2003) One possible reason to explain the discrepancy between the expected difference and the nonsignificant results may be that the ERQ.R is a general assessment on individual’s usage of the particular strategy to one type of particular regulation — down regulation of negative feelings — and may not be sensitive enough to detect cultural differences Possible group differences may emerge when other aspects of seeing the situation are tested, such as whether one keeps positive feelings down Another reason may be that the different groups in the Gross & John (2003) study were assessed within the same cultural context, American culture, which may have reduced differences A recent study conducted at NUS has documented that Chinese Singaporeans reported significantly different reappraisal usage than Caucasians to anger-provoking situations (Zhou, 2010) This research aims to take a closer look into the potential difference of reappraisal usage among Chinese and Indians On the other hand, group level differences in emotion suppression have been reported repeatedly with respect to cultural display rules for emotion As early as the 1970’s, Friesen (1972) reported a study that became very famous in the field of cultural difference of emotional display rules, even though it was an unpublished dissertation In that study, American and Japanese participants viewed a highly stressful film under two conditions Similar levels of facial signs of negative expression, such as disgust, fear, or distress, were observed for Americans and Japanese when they viewed the film alone However, in the presence of an experimenter, EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 118 Kalisch, R (2009) The functional neuroanatomy of reappraisal: Time matters Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 33(8), 1215-1226 Kang, S., Shaver, P., Sue, S., Min, K., & Jing, H (2003) Culture-specific patterns in the prediction of life satisfaction: Roles of emotion, relationship quality, and self-esteem Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 29(12), 1596 Kitayama, S., & Cohen, D (2007) Handbook of cultural psychology New York: The Guilford Press Kitayama, S., Mesquita, B., & Karasawa, M (2006) Cultural affordances and emotional experience: Socially engaging and disengaging emotions in Japan and the United States Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 91(5), 890-903 Krantz, D S., & Manuck, S B (1984) Acute psychophysiologic reactivity and rrisk of cardiovascular disease: A review and methodologic critique Psychological Bulletin, 96(3), 435-464 Lazarus, R S (1991) Emotion and adaptation New York: Oxford University Press Lazarus, R S., & Folkman, S (1984) Stress, appraisal, and coping New York: Springer Publishing Company Lazarus, R S (1993) Coping theory and research - Past, present, and future Psychosomatic Medicine, 55(3), 234-247 Lazarus, R S., & Alfert, E (1964) Short-circuiting of threat by experimentally altering cognitive appraisal Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 69(2), 195-205 Leng, Y., & Zhou, X L (2010) Modulation of the brain activity in outcome evaluation by interpersonal relationship: An ERP study Neuropsychologia, 48(2), 448-455 Levenson, R W (1999) The intrapersonal functions of emotion Cognition & Emotion, 13(5), 481-504 Lovallo, W (2005) Cardiovascular reactivity: Mechanisms and pathways to cardiovascular disease International Journal of Psychophysiology, 58(2-3), 119-132 Lustman, P., Frank, B., & McGill, J (1991) Relationship of personality characteristics to glucose regulation in adults with diabetes Psychosomatic Medicine, 53(3), 305 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 119 Mandal, M K., Bryden, M P., & Bulman-Fleming, M B (1996) Similarities and variations in facial expressions of emotions: Cross-cultural evidence International Journal of Psychology, 31(1), 49-58 Manstead, A S R., & Fischer, A H (2000) Emotion regulation in full Psychological Inquiry, 11(3), 188-191 Martini, T S., & Busseri, M A (2010) Emotion Regulation Strategies and Goals as Predictors of Older Mothers' and Adult Daughters' Helping-Related Subjective WellBeing Psychology and Aging, 25(1), 48-59 Matsumoto, D (1990) Cultural similarities and differences in display rules Motivation and Emotion, 14(3), 195-214 Matsumoto, D (1993) Ethnic differences in affect intensity, emotion judgements, display rule attitudes, and self-reported emotional expression in an American sample Motivation and Emotion, 17(2), 107-123 Matsumoto, D., Yoo, S H., Hirayama, S., & Petrova, G (2005) Development and validation of a measure of display rule knowledge: The display rule assessment inventory Emotion, 5(1), 23-40 Mauss, I., Bunge, S., & Gross, J (2007) Automatic emotion regulation Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 1(1), 146-167 Mauss, I B., Cook, C L., Cheng, J Y J., & Gross, J J (2007) Individual differences in cognitive reappraisal: Experiential and physiological responses to an anger provocation International Journal of Psychophysiology, 66(2), 116-124 Mendes, W., Reis, H., Seery, M., & Blascovich, J (2003) Cardiovascular Correlates of Emotional Expression and Suppression: Do Content and Gender Context Matter? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(4), 771-792 Mesquita, B (2001) Emotions in Collectivist and Individualist Contexts* Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80(1), 68-74 Mesquita, B., Karasawa, M., Haire, A., Izumi, K., Hayashi, A., & Idzelis, M (2005) What I fee: The role of cultural models in emotion representations Wake Forest University EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 120 Mesquita, B., & Leu, J (2007) The Cultural Psychology of Emotion In S Kitayama & D Cohen (Eds.), Handbook of Cultural Psychology (pp 734-759) New York: The Guilford Press Mischel, W., Shoda, Y., & Mendoza-Denton, R (2002) Situation-behavior profiles as a locus of consistency in personality Current Directions in Psychological Science, 11(2), 50 Muraven, M., Tice, D M., & Baumeister, R F (1998) Self-control as limited resource: Regulatory depletion patterns Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74(3), 774-789 Nisbett, R (2003) The geography of thought: New York: Free Press Norenzayan, A., Choi, I., & Peng, K (2007) Cognition and perception In S Kitayama & D Cohen (Eds.), Handbook of cultural psychology (pp 569-594) New York: The Guilford Press Oishi, S., Diener, E., Scollon, C N., & Biswas-Diener, R (2004) Cross-situational consistency of affective experiences across cultures Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 86(3), 460-472 Ounpuu, S., & Yusuf, S (2003) Singapore and coronary heart disease: a population laboratory to explore ethnic variations in the epidemiologic transition European heart journal, 24(2), 127 Pan, X H., Hu, Y., Li, L., & Li, J Q (2009) Evaluative-feedback stimuli selectively activate the self-related brain area: An fMRI study Neuroscience Letters, 465(1), 90-94 Radloff, L (1977) The CES-D Scale: A Self Report Depression Scale for Research in the General Applied psychological measurement, 1(3), 385-401 Ramanujan, A (1989) Is there an Indian way of thinking? An informal essay Contributions to Indian sociology, 23(1), 41-58 Rao, N., McHale, J P., & Pearson, E (2003) Links between socialization goals and child rearing practices in Chinese and Indian mothers Infant and Child Development, 12(5), 475-492 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 121 Ray, R D., McRae, K., Ochsner, K N., & Gross, J J (2010) Cognitive Reappraisal of Negative Affect: Converging Evidence From EMG and Self-Report Emotion, 10(4), 587-592 Reinecke, M A., Ryan, N E., & DuBois, D L (1998) Cognitive-behavioral therapy of depression and depressive symptoms during adolescence: a review and meta-analysis Journal of Amer Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 37(1), 26-34 Richman, L., Kubzansky, L., Maselko, J., Kawachi, I., Choo, P., & Bauer, M (2005) Positive emotion and health: Going beyond the negative Health Psychology, 24(4), 422-429 Roberts, N A., Levenson, R W., & Gross, J J (2008) Cardiovascular costs of emotion suppression cross ethnic lines International Journal of Psychophysiology, 70(1), 8287 Saraswathi, T S., & Pai, S (1997) Socialization in the Indian Context In H S R Kao & D Sinha (Eds.), Asian Perspectives on Psychology New Delhi: Sage Publications Schutte, N S., Manes, R R., & Malouff, J M (2009) Antecedent-Focused Emotion Regulation, Response Modulation and Well-Being Current Psychology, 28(1), 2131 Sherwood, A., Allen, M., Fahrenberg, J., Kelsey, R., Lovallo, W., & Doornen, L (1990) Methodological guidelines for impedance cardiography Psychophysiology, 27(1), 123 Siemer, M., Mauss, I., & Gross, J J (2007) Same situation - Different emotions: How appraisals shape our emotions Emotion, 7(3), 592-600 Singapore Statistics (2010) Population and Growth Rate: Singapore Department of Statistics Sinha, D., & Mishra, R C (1999) Socialization and Cognitive Functioning In T S Saraswathi (Ed.), Culture, Socialization and Humen Development New Delhi: Sage Publications Sinha, J B P., Sinha, T., Verma, J., & Sinha, R (2001) Collectivism coexisting with individualism: an Indian scenario Asian Journal of Social Psychology, 4(2), 133-145 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 122 Suls, J., & Bunde, J (2005) Anger, anxiety, and depression as risk factors for cardiovascular disease: the problems and implications of overlapping affective dispositions Psychological Bulletin, 131(2), 260-300 Suls, J., & Wan, C K (1993) The relationship between trait hostility and cardiovascular reactivity: A quantitative review and analysis Psychophysiology, 30(6), 615-626 Teoh, A N (2007) The effects of social support and trait-anger on cardiovascular reactivity of Singaporean females National University of Singapore, Singapore Tice, D M., & Wallace, H M (2003) The reflected self: Creating yourself as (you think) others see you In M R Leary (Ed.), Handbook of self and identity (pp 91-105): The Guilford Press Tov, W., & Diener, E (2007) Culture and Subjective Well-Being In S Kitayama & D Cohen (Eds.), Handbook of Cultural Psychology (pp 691-713) New York: The Guilford Press Triandis, H C (2001) Individualism Collectivism and Personality Journal of Personality, 69(6), 907-924 Triandis, H C (2007) Culture and Psychology: A History of the Study of Their Relationship In S Kitayama & D Cohen (Eds.), Handbook of Cultural Psychology New York: The Guilford Press Tsai, J L., Levenson, R W., & McCoy, K (2006) Cultural and temperamental variation in emotional response Emotion, 6(3), 484-497 Urry, H L (2009) Using reappraisal to regulate unpleasant emotional episodes: Goals and timing matter Emotion, 9(6), 782-797 Vogele, C., & Steptoe, A (1993) Anger inhibition and family history as modulators of cardiovascuar responses to mental stress in adolescent boys Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 37(5), 503-514 Watson, D., Clark, L A., & Tellegen, A (1988) Development and validation of brief measures of positive and negative affect: The PANAS scales Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54(6), 1063-1070 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 123 Westermann, R., Spies, K., Stahl, G., & Hesse, F W (1996) Relative effectiveness and validity of mood induction procedures: A meta-analysis European Journal of Social Psychology, 26, 557-580 WHO (2011) The atlas of heart disease and stroke from http://www.who.int/cardiovascular_diseases/resources/atlas/en/ Why, Y P., Bishop, G D., Tong, E M W., Diong, S M., Enkelmann, H C., Khader, M., et al (2003) Cardiovascular reactivity of Singaporean male police officers as a function of task, ethnicity and hostility International Journal of Psychophysiology, 49(2), 99110 Wood, J V., Heimpel, S A., & Michela, J L (2003) Savoring versus dampening: selfesteem differences in regulating positive affect Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85(3), 566-580 Wright, R., & Kirby, L (2001) Effort determination of cardiovascular response: An integrative analysis with applications in social psychology Advances in experimental social psychology, 33, 255-307 Wu, D Y H (1996) Chinese childhood socialization In M H Bond (Ed.), The Handbook of Chinese Psychology Hong Kong: Oxford University Press Yabar, Y., Johnston, L., Miles, L., & Peace, V (2006) Implicit behavioral mimicry: Investigating the impact of group membership Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 30(3), 97-113 Zhou, T (2010) Anger Regulation and Culture: Role of Culture in Consequences of Anger Expression, Suppression, and Reappraisal National University of Singapore, Singapore Zhu, X Z., Auerbach, R P., Yao, S Q., Abela, J R Z., Xiao, J., & Tong, X (2008) Psychometric properties of the cognitive emotion regulation questionnaire: Chinese version Cognition & Emotion, 22(2), 288-307 124 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH APPENDIX A Scales that are not fully included in the main body of the text are listed in Appendix A Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ, Gross & John, 2003) Instruction: We would like to ask you some questions about your emotional life Some of the following questions may seem similar to one another, but they differ in important ways Please read them and choose your answers carefully But not spend too much time on any questions Please circle the appropriate ratings using the 1-7 scale: strongly disagree neutral strongly agree ERQ Reappraisal Subscale: • • • • • • I control my emotions by changing the way I think about the situation I’m in When I want to feel less negative emotion, I change the way I’m thinking about the situation When I want to feel more positive emotion, I change the way I’m thinking about the situation When I want to feel more positive emotion, I change what I’m thinking about When I want to feel less negative emotion, I change what I’m thinking about When I’m faced with a stressful situation, I make myself think about it in a way that helps me stay calm ERQ Suppression Subscale: • • • • I control my emotions by not expressing them When I am feeling negative emotions, I make sure not to express them I keep my emotions to myself When I am feeling positive emotions, I am careful not to express them Life Satisfaction Scale (LS, Diener et al., 1985) Instruction: We would like you to evaluate your life conditions, using the 1-7 scale: strongly disagree • • • • • neutral In most ways my life is close to my ideal The conditions of my life are excellent I am satisfied with my life So far I have gotten the important things I want in life If I could live my life over, I would change almost nothing strongly agree 125 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH CES-D (Radloff, 1977) Instruction: Below is a list of ways you might have felt or behaved Please tell us how often you lave felt this way during THE PAST WEEK, using the 1-4 scale Rarely or none of the time Some or a little of the time (less than day) (1-2 days) • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • Occasionally or a moderate amount of time (3-4 days) Most or all of the time (5-7 days) I was bothered by things that usually don’t bother me I did not feel like eating; my appetite was poor I felt that I could not shake off the blues even with help from my family or friends I felt I was just as good as other people (Reversely coded) I had trouble keeping my mind on what I was doing I fel depressed I felt that everything I did was an effort I felt hopeful about the future (Reversely coded) I thought my life had been a failure I felt fearful My sleep was restless I was happy (Reversely coded) I talked less than usual I felt lonely People were unfriendly I enjoyed life (Reversely coded) I had crying spells I felt sad I felt that people dislike me I could not get “going” Feedback Form (in Study 2) Instruction: This questionnaire is designed to gain your feedback about the experiment Please read through the statements quickly and give the answer that comes first to your mind I think I did well in the cognitive task strongly disagree stongly agree I think the observer is: 126 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH Cold Unfriendly I tried not to show my emotions during the experiment strongly disagree Warm Friendly neutral stongly agree neutral stongly agree stongly agree stongly agree I was happy with the observer strongly disagree I controlled my emotions by concentrating on the counting task strongly disagree neutral The timely feedback system enhanced my performance strongly disagree neutral Did the positive feedback influence your performance and how? Did the negative feedback influence your performance and how? What you think this experiment was trying to study? 10 What you think the purpose of this experiment was? 127 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH Appendix B Study In Study 1, moderated regression analysis was conducted to examine whether gender and ethnicity moderate the relationship between ERQ.R, ERQ.S and SWB index scores Results showed no moderation effects The F-statistics and the estimated coefficients of all terms are summarized in the following table Table B Moderated Regression Analyses Predicting SWB From Gender, Ethnicity, ERQ.R and ERQ.S Constant Age Gender Ethnicity ERQ.R ERQ.S Gender x ERQ.R Gender x ERQ.S Ethnicity x ERQ.R Ethnicity x ERQ.S Gender x Ethnicity x ERQ.R Gender x Ethnicity x ERQ.S F Adjusted R2 Estimate 0.26 - 0.00 -0.12 -0.35 0.31 -0.04 -0.07 -0.02 0.10 -0.14 -0.27 -0.22 Self-reported SWB Index SE t [0.14] 0.51 [0.02] -0.00 [0.20] -0.58 [0.19] -1.89 [0.11] 2.81 [0.12] -0.31 [0.17] -0.43 [0.17] -0.12 [0.16] 0.59 [0.17] -0.85 [0.25] -1.09 [0.25] -0.88 p 609 996 561 062 006 754 669 908 552 398 277 383 3.05 *** 0.20 Note SE = standard error of the estimate ERQ.R = ERQ reappraisal score, ERQ.S = ERQ suppression score 128 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH Appendix C Study In Study 2, to examine whether ERQ.S explain additional variance of affective and physiological dependent variables beyond ERQ.R, full factorial regression models with and without ERQ.S were compared F-changes between the model (a) and model (b) were summarized in the following table Model (a): DV = Intercept + CVs + Ethnicity X Condition X ERQ.R X ERQ.S + Error Model (b): DV = Intercept + CVs + Ethnicity X Condition X ERQ.R + Error Table C Comparison of Models with and without ERQ.S Dependent Variables Model Comparison p Cardiovascular Reactivity Irritation ∆F(24, 65) = 1.18 0.268 Positive Affective Experience ∆F(24, 65) = 0.85 0.663 SBP ∆F(8, 59) = 0.43 0.898 DBP ∆F(8, 59) = 0.68 0.704 HR ∆F(8, 59) = 0.21 0.989 CO ∆F(8, 59) = 0.80 0.606 TPR ∆F(8, 59) = 0.98 0.460 PEP ∆F(8, 53) = 0.18 0.993 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 129 Appendix D Study In Study 3b, comparisons of the ratings for emotion expression behaviors among the three ethnic groups in each situation were conducted on all eight dimensions of Emotion Expression Assessment Inventory Only results for the confrontational expression and appreciation expression are included in the main text The results for the other dimensions are listed in Table D1 – D6 Comparisons between males and females in each situation were also conducted on all eight dimensions The results for the confrontational expression are included in the main text, with the other dimensions are listed here in Table D7-D13 Table D1 Estimation Marginal Means of NFS in Different Situations by Ethnicity Negative Feeling Suppression in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Caucasians 4.57 a 3.97 a 4.32 a 2.46 a 2.79 a Chinese 4.33 a 4.35 a 4.06 a 3.03 b 3.01 a Indians 4.52 a 4.62 a 4.07 a 3.36 b 3.20 a Note NFS = negative feeling suppression Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05, with Tukey HDS correction for post hoc comparison Table D2 Estimation Marginal Means of PFS in Different Situations by Ethnicity Positive Feeling Suppression in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Caucasians 2.87 a 2.22 a 2.46 a 1.71 a 1.94 a Chinese 3.41 b 3.01 b 2.69 a 2.30 b 2.53 b Indians 3.30 b 2.96 b 2.94 a 2.37 b 2.26 b Note PFS = positive feeling suppression Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05, with Tukey HDS correction for post hoc comparison Table D3 Estimation Marginal Means of SS in Different Situations by Ethnicity Sorrow Sharing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Caucasians 2.14 a 3.53 a 3.45 a 5.83 a 5.53 a Chinese 2.13 a 3.41 a 3.95 a 5.19 b 4.53 b Indians 1.91 a 3.17 a 3.80 a 5.03 b 4.60 b Note SS = sorrow sharing Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05, with Tukey HDS correction for post hoc comparison EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 130 Table D4 Estimation Marginal Means of HS in Different Situations by Ethnicity Happiness Sharing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Caucasians 3.38 a 4.43 a 4.98 a 6.33 a 6.22 a Chinese 2.65 b 4.26 a 5.13 a 5.53 b 5.29 b Indians 2.99 a b 4.49 a 5.07 a 5.59 b 5.49 b Note HS = happiness sharing Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05, with Tukey HDS correction for post hoc comparison Table D5 Estimation Marginal Means of NMR in Different Situations by Ethnicity Negative Mood Revealing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Caucasians 3.35 a 4.02 a 3.98 a 5.52 a 5.76 a Chinese 3.23 a 3.64 a 4.24 a 5.18 a 5.00 b Indians 3.17 a 3.90 a 4.46 a 5.13 a 5.19 b Note NFR = negative mood revealing Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05, with Tukey HDS correction for post hoc comparison Table D6 Estimation Marginal Means of PMR in Different Situations by Ethnicity Positive Mood Revealing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Caucasians 4.97 a 5.15 a 5.19 a 6.15 a 6.15 a Chinese 3.63 b 4.21 b 5.01 a 5.37 b 5.21 b Indians 4.01 b 4.33 b 5.12 a 5.50 b 5.74 a b Note PMR = positive mood revealing Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05, with Tukey HDS correction for post hoc comparison Table D7 Estimation Marginal Means of NFS in Different Situations by Gender Negative Feeling Suppression in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Male 4.51 a 4.43 a 4.33 a 3.34 a 3.24 a Female 4.44 a 4.19 a 3.97 a 2.55 b 2.76 b Note NFS = negative feeling suppression Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 131 Table D8 Estimation Marginal Means of PFS in Different Situations by Gender Positive Feeling Suppression in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Male 3.42 a 3.00 a 2.90 a 2.42 a 2.40 a Female 2.97 a 2.45 b 2.49 a 1.84 b 2.09 a Note PFS = positive feeling suppression Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05 Table D9 Estimation Marginal Means of SS in Different Situations by Gender Sorrow Sharing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Male 2.13 a 3.52 a 3.49 a 4.83 a 4.70 a Female 1.99 a 3.22 a 3.98 b 5.87 b 5.08 a Note SS = sorrow suppression Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05 Table D10 Estimation Marginal Means of HS in Different Situations by Gender Happiness Sharing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Male 3.16 a 4.40 a 4.90 a 5.60 a 5.61 a Female 2.86 a 4.38 a 5.22 b 6.03 b 5.73 a Note HS = happiness sharing Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05 Table D11 Estimation Marginal Means of AE in Different Situations by Gender Appreciation Expression in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Male 4.11 a 4.47 a 4.65 a 5.26 a 5.19 a Female 3.77 b 4.49 a 4.92 a 5.86 b 5.28 a Note AE = appreciation expression Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05 EMOTION REGULATION, CULTURE, AND HEALTH 132 Table D12 Estimation Marginal Means of NMR in Different Situations by Gender Negative Mood Revealing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Male 3.26 a 3.82 a 4.10 a 4.88 a 5.02 a Female 3.25 a 3.89 a 4.36 a 5.68 b 5.61 b Note NMR = negative mood revealing Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05 Table D13 Estimation Marginal Means of PMR in Different Situations by Gender Positive Mood Revealing in front of Different Audiences Stranger Acquaintance Colleague Friend Family Male 4.03 a 4.38 a 4.87 a 5.29 a 5.57 a Female 4.38 a 4.75 a 5.34 b 6.06 b 5.82 a Note PMR = positive mood revealing Means within columns that not share a common subscript differ at p < 05 ... CULTURE, AND HEALTH 37 CHAPTER III STUDY Individual and Ethnic Differences in Habitual Usage of Reappraisal and Suppression in Relationship to Cardiovascular Profile Overview Habitual Usage of Emotion... discussed, and the specific design and implications relative to this research will be emphasized Individual and Group Differences in Usage of Reappraisal and Suppression Individuals differ in their. .. examined individual differences in their natural usage of reappraisal in association with experiential and physiological responses to a negative mood induction procedure in the laboratory Their