The effect of age on emotion regulation patterns in daily life: Findings from an experience sampling study.

The present experience sampling study investigated the effect of age on emotion regulation patterns (i.e., emotion regulation strategy effectiveness, variability, and differentiation) in daily life. The study further explored the implications of potential age differences in emotion regulation patterns for well-being. A sample of 406 adults (age range: 18-81, 62.8% female) were prompted five times a day for seven days to rate momentary emotions, emotion regulation strategy use, and emotion regulation strategy effectiveness. Based on these ratings, indicators of emotion regulation variability and differentiation were calculated. Well-being outcomes included daily positive and negative emotions, and symptoms of depression and anxiety assessed at baseline. The findings revealed reduced emotion regulation variability with age and a negative association between emotion regulation variability and well-being. There were no associations between age and emotion regulation effectiveness or differentiation. Emotion regulation effectiveness was associated with more positive and less negative daily emotions, and these associations were stronger for younger adults compared to older adults. Drawing on prominent lifespan theories, the findings may indicate that as people age, they select and apply a few strategies that they know will be effective given the context and their resources which leads to reduced emotion regulation variability but ultimately more well-being. Concerning emotion regulation effectiveness, the findings suggest that effectiveness is less important for emotional well-being in daily life in older adulthood possibly because well-being is determined by other factors (e.g., less frequent and more predictable stressors) with age.

Comparing negative emotion differentiation in young and older individuals: A picture-based study.

Life span theories suggest that emotional experiences become more complex (i.e., nuanced and differentiated) with age. Theoretically, the cause of this increased complexity has been proposed to be age-related changes in life contexts such as goals and daily stressors. Consequently, age may not affect emotional complexity in settings where the influence of age-specific life contexts is reduced. However, this hypothesis has yet to be explored. In the present study, we investigated one aspect of emotional complexity, namely emotion differentiation. Extending previous research, we assessed age-group differences in negative emotion differentiation between young and older adults in a controlled experimental setting. A sample of 114 young and 132 older adults rated their emotional response to 34 negative pictures according to intensity of four negative emotions. Based on these ratings, two indicators of emotion differentiation were calculated. The results revealed no significant age-group differences in negative emotion differentiation. The findings indicate stability in negative emotion differentiation with increasing age when the influence of life context is reduced. The findings are consistent with life span theories suggesting that developmental changes in emotional complexity occur largely as a result of age-related changes in life contexts rather than more stable age-related changes in individual characteristics.

Does Aging and Disease Increase the Importance of Cognitive Strategies? Social and Temporal Comparisons in Healthy Younger and Older Adults and in Younger and Older Cancer Patients.

Social and temporal comparisons may help the individual anchor his or her self-image in a social and temporal context. In the Life-Span Theory of Control, comparisons are included in the repertoire of secondary control strategies individuals may apply when primary control strategies are obstructed, for example, by age-related losses or physical decline. The aim of this study was to explore differences in prevalence and effects of social and temporal comparisons in younger and older adults and healthy and diseased individuals ( n = 34). Semistructured interviews were conducted and analyzed using a mixed-methods approach combining qualitative and quantitative data analysis. The results revealed that older adults engaged in more comparisons than younger adults and that the outcomes of comparisons were more positive for older adults, particularly older cancer patients. The results indicate that comparisons may be applied more often by older and diseased individuals in the service of maintaining well-being.

Systematic review and meta-analysis of interventions aimed at enhancing return to work for sick-listed workers with common mental disorders, stress-related disorders, somatoform disorders and personality disorders.

OBJECTIVES: Mental disorders are associated with significant functional impairment, sickness absence and disability. The consequences of sickness absence warrant investigation into interventions aimed at enhancing return to work (RTW) for workers with mental disorders. The present systematic review and meta-analysis aim to synthesise evidence on the effectiveness of interventions aimed at enhancing RTW in sick-listed workers with mental disorders. METHODS: EconLit, Embase, PsychInfo, PubMed, Svemed+ and Web of Science were searched for peer-reviewed, randomised or controlled studies assessing employment-related outcomes of interventions. A meta-analysis was conducted and meta-regressions were performed to explore prespecified potential sources of heterogeneity between studies. RESULTS: The literature search yielded 3777 publications of which 42 (n=38 938) were included in the systematic review and 32 (n=9459) had appropriate data for the meta-analysis. The pooled effect size (95 % CI) was 0.14 (0.07 to 0.22). Meta-regressions revealed that the heterogeneity could not be attributed to study quality, timing of the intervention or length of the intervention. However, it could be partly explained by number of components included in the intervention, if the intervention included contact to the work place and by the disorder targeted by the intervention. CONCLUSIONS: The results reveal strong evidence for interventions including contact to the work place and multicomponent interventions and moderate evidence for interventions including graded RTW. In addition, the results provide strong evidence for interventions targeting stress compared with interventions targeting other mental disorders. The findings point to important implications for policy and design of future interventions.

Age-dependent Reactivity to Affective Images: Evidence for Variation Across Emotion Categories.

BACKGROUND: Research on the effect of age on affective reactivity continues to provide inconsistent findings. The present study addresses two potential explanations that may account for these inconsistencies. First, gender may moderate age differences in affective reactivity and second, age differences in affective reactivity may vary according to emotion category. The aim of the present study was therefore to examine age differences in reactions to emotion-inducing images when singling out the effect of gender and emotion category. METHODS: A sample of 396 young (mean age = 23.31, SD = 3.70; 66% female) and old (mean age = 66.09, SD = 4.31; 37.5% female) Danish adults rated 105 images from the Nencki Affective Picture System (NAPS) database according to valence and arousal. Images were divided into the three emotion categories of disgust, sadness, and happiness. RESULTS: The findings indicate that age-group influenced affective reactivity, but there was no indication of an an interaction between age-group and gender. Going beyond previous studies, the findings demonstrate that the effect of age-group on affective reactivity varies according to emotion category. CONCLUSION: The results highlight the importance of considering emotion category in studies of age differences in affective reactivity.

The effect of experimental emotion induction on experimental pain: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

ABSTRACT: The idea that emotions can influence pain is generally recognized. However, a synthesis of the numerous individual experimental studies on this subject is lacking. The aim of the present systematic review and meta-analysis was to synthesize the existing evidence on the effect of experimental emotion induction on experimental pain in nonclinical adults. PsycInfo and PubMed were searched up until April 10, 2023, for studies assessing differences in self-reported pain between emotion induction groups and/or control groups or between conditions within group. Risk of bias was assessed for the individual studies. The literature search yielded 78 relevant records of 71 independent studies. When compared with control conditions, the pooled results revealed a statistically significant pain-attenuating effect of positive emotion induction (between-group: Hedges g = -0.48, 95% CI: -0.72; -0.25, K = 9; within-group: g = -0.24, 95% CI: -0.32; -0.15, K = 40), and a statistically significant pain-exacerbating effect of negative emotion induction in within-group analyses but not between-group analyses (between-group: g = -0.29, 95% CI: -0.66; 0.07, K = 10; within-group: g = 0.14, 95% CI: 0.06; 0.23, K = 39). Bayesian meta-analysis provided strong support for an effect of positive emotion induction but weak support for an effect of negative emotion induction. Taken together, the findings indicate a pain-attenuating effect of positive emotion induction, while the findings for negative emotion induction are less clear. The findings are discussed with reference to theoretical work emphasizing the role of motivational systems and distraction for pain. Limitations include considerable heterogeneity across studies limiting the generalizability of the findings.

The Constructionist Approach to Emotional Aging: Theoretical Insights and Predictions.

In this article, we introduce a constructionist approach to understanding emotional aging in adulthood. The purpose of the paper is to show how constructionism offers a promising avenue for gaining new insights into age-related changes in emotional experiences. We begin by introducing the constructionist theoretical framework and illustrating how constructionism may shape conceptualizations of emotional aging in adulthood. We compare the constructionist conceptualization of emotional aging with existing conceptualizations of emotional aging derived from prominent theories of emotional aging, focusing on how such conceptualizations highlight different aspects of emotional aging (e.g., different mechanisms) and overlook or downplay other aspects. We conclude by explicating what constructionism may offer research on emotional aging, including considerations of research agendas, study designs, and method of measurement.

Age-group differences in instructed emotion regulation effectiveness: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

Several theories of emotional development in adulthood provide the rationale for anticipating enhanced emotion regulation effectiveness (i.e., successful, goal-consistent regulation of emotions) with age. However, the existing empirical evidence is ambiguous. The aims of the present systematic review and meta-analysis were to investigate age-group differences in instructed emotion regulation effectiveness, and to explore whether age-group differences in instructed emotion regulation effectiveness vary according to person factors (i.e., age gap between age groups, gender distribution), the specific strategy (i.e., type of emotion regulation strategy), and situational factors (i.e., intensity and type of emotion to-be-regulated, emotion regulation goal, experimental context). PsycINFO and PubMed were searched for studies assessing age-group differences in instructed emotion regulation effectiveness in physically healthy adults. The literature search yielded 18 relevant studies conducted in laboratories (n = 1,366) and no relevant studies conducted in naturalistic settings. The meta-analyses indicated no statistically significant overall age-group differences (g = -0.01, p = .878). A statistically significant small effect favoring older adults was identified in a subgroup meta-analysis of studies assessing attentional focusing (g = -0.22, p = .027), while no other statistically significant results were identified. Together, these findings, albeit limited to a laboratory setting, indicate that instructed emotion regulation effectiveness remains largely stable in adulthood. The findings are discussed with reference to theoretical work emphasizing age-related changes in motivation (e.g., Socioemotional Selectivity Theory) and resources (e.g., Strength and Vulnerability Integration model). Limitations include the small number of studies and the limited generalizability of the findings. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Bridging the gap from welfare to education: Propensity score matching evaluation of a bridging intervention.

We evaluate a bridging intervention for a group of young people aged 18-29, with no formal educational qualifications, who are not in employment, education or training. The bridging intervention consisted of classroom training, educational internships and mentoring. Based on Danish register data with a large number of control variables, a propensity score matching estimator was applied to assess the effectiveness of the bridging intervention. The results show that the bridging intervention was effective in increasing educational enrollment and completion for all participants. The effects of the intervention were particularly large for participants assessed to be 'not ready for education' and those diagnosed with psychiatric disorders suggesting that the bridging intervention may be especially beneficial for these subgroups.

Emotional reactivity and interoceptive sensitivity: Exploring the role of age.

Interoceptive sensitivity (IS) refers to the ability to accurately perceive visceral afferent information, and several prominent theories of emotions suggest that IS is associated with heightened emotional reactivity. Recent evidence has pointed to a decline in IS with age, but there is no consistent evidence of age-related decline in emotional reactivity. This may be because the relationship between IS and emotional reactivity changes with age. To address this hypothesis, we examined the moderating role of age in the association between IS and emotional responses to affect-inducing images. A sample of 65 young adults (mean age = 23.91 years, SD = 4.62) and 32 older adults (mean age = 61.78 years, SD = 8.76) was exposed to affect-inducing images from the Nencki Affective Picture System database and completed a heartbeat perception task. Participants' subjective emotional responses to the images were assessed with questionnaires, and their physiological reactivity was indicated by electrodermal activity, heart rate, and heart rate variability during image viewing. The results revealed that age moderated the association between IS and emotional reactivity, while no significant age differences were found in IS, change in affect, or physiological reactivity. The findings demonstrated that IS was associated with emotional reactivity for young adults but not for older adults, suggesting that young and older adults may differ in their use of internal bodily signals to obtain information about their emotional experience. Consistent with contemporary developments within the affective sciences, the results emphasize the importance of individual differences in emotional experiences.

[Functional neurological symptoms and the positive diagnostic process].

Functional neurological symptoms are common in neurology and general medical practice. Functional neurological symptoms refer to neurological symptoms, which are not explained by a defined disease. The most common are functional weakness and non-epileptic seizures. Psychiatric models have dominated the classification, aetiology and treatment, limiting the neurologist's role to making the diagnosis by excluding disease and pronouncing the symptoms to be psychogenic. In this review, we outline the possibility of a positive diagnostic process, which can be the first step of treatment.

Your move: The effect of chess on mathematics test scores.

We analyse the effect of substituting a weekly mathematics lesson in primary school grades 1-3 with a lesson in mathematics based on chess instruction. We use data from the City of Aarhus in Denmark, combining test score data with a comprehensive data set obtained from administrative registers. We use two different methodological approaches to identify and estimate treatment effects and we tend to find positive effects, indicating that knowledge acquired through chess play can be transferred to the domain of mathematics. We also find larger impacts for unhappy children and children who are bored in school, perhaps because chess instruction facilitates learning by providing an alternative approach to mathematics for these children. The results are encouraging and suggest that chess may be an important and effective tool for improving mathematical capacity in young students.