Tammy English

Emotion regulation (ER) is thought to rely on cognitive resources, with prior work identifying positive associations between both fluid and crystallized cognitive ability and successful ER. While emotional well-being tends to improve with age throughout adulthood, it is less clear whether ER improves, particularly in contexts involving unavoidable negative stimuli. In the present study, age-diverse community participants (N = 286, age 25-85) completed the National Institutes of Health Toolbox Cognitive Battery to assess their fluid and crystallized cognitive ability. They completed an ER task involving prohedonic regulation with instructions to regulate using any strategy while viewing film clips eliciting target emotions varying by valence and arousal: disgust, sadness, amusement, and contentment. ER success was assessed both through self-reports of experience of the target emotion and automated coding of facial expression of the target emotion. We examined associations among age, cognitive performance, and ER success. Individuals who scored higher on crystallized cognition showed greater ER success regardless of emotion type, and this effect was robust across both success indices (emotional experience and expression). Age was associated with reduced ability to decrease negative emotional experience, while fluid cognition was associated with heightened ability to decrease negative emotional experience. Both age and fluid cognition were unassociated with the ability to increase positive emotional experience. Findings suggest that older individuals and those with limited fluid cognitive resources may experience ER difficulties specifically when encountering negative situations. Findings also provide additional evidence supporting the potential role of crystallized cognitive ability or life experience in successfully regulating emotions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Objectives: Intergenerational engagement—here referring to time spent with younger family members—can promote health and happiness. Across adulthood, and particularly in later life, intergenerational engagement represents a potentially meaningful form of social involvement. Using intensive longitudinal methods, we investigated how intergenerational engagement is associated with daily emotional experience and physical activity. Methods: In this study, 265 participants aged 23–92 completed a 9-day daily diary protocol assessing their intergenerational engagement and emotional experiences; objective physical activity during this period was assessed via tracking steps taken and sedentary minutes. Results: Multilevel models revealed significant within-person associations between intergenerational engagement and both emotional experience and physical activity. On days older adult participants spent more time with younger family members, they reported greater high-arousal positive emotion (happiness, enthusiasm, excitement) during the day. Across the age span of the sample, on days participants spent more time with younger family members, they reported greater low-arousal positive emotion (contentment, relaxation, calm) before bed. Finally, both objective metrics revealed greater physical activity on days with greater intergenerational engagement, whereas other social engagement was unassociated with steps taken or sedentary minutes. Discussion: These findings highlight intergenerational engagement as a meaningful daily-life context for both positive emotional experiences and physical activity. For older adults in particular, intergenerational engagement may represent a naturally occurring pathway through which emotionally meaningful social ties support both emotional well-being and opportunities for everyday movement.

In close relationships, individuals manage each other’s emotions (interpersonal emotion regulation [IER]). Emotional clarity of oneself (EC-self) is a key individual difference in the management of emotions and maintenance of well-being. Recent work has examined the relational benefits of emotional clarity of others (EC-others). However, less is known as to whether EC-self or EC-others have unique associations with relational behaviors, as well as intrapersonal ER (i.e., regulation of one’s own emotions) and extrinsic IER (i.e., regulation of other’s emotions). We leveraged two studies of friendship in emerging adults (Study 1 [S1] N = 674; Study 2 [S2] N = 374). In S1, EC-others was related to more positive and less negative friendship behaviors. Further, EC-others but not EC-self was associated with more emotionally supportive and less dismissive IER strategies (e.g., receptive listening, valuing, distraction, suppression). In S2, EC-self was associated with intrapersonal ER (less difficulty and greater perceived success in regulating one’s own emotions), while EC-others was associated with both intrapersonal ER (greater frequency, effort, and difficulty in regulating one’s own emotions) and IER (less perceived difficulty in helping a friend feel better). Findings suggest EC-self’s relevance for intrapersonal processes and EC-others’ importance for both intrapersonal and interpersonal processes.

Cognitive control is central to decision-making and goal-directed behavior, but the mental effort it requires is often perceived as costly, especially in the context of aging. Although age-related differences in cognitive effort discounting have primarily been studied in healthy adults, major depressive disorder (MDD), which is associated with altered reward valuation, may modify these patterns. In this preregistered study, we examined whether age was differentially associated with cognitive effort discounting in adults with and without MDD (N=134, ages 35-74). We first estimated subjective value (SV), indexing cognitive effort costs, then assessed choices between options that varied in SV. Replicating prior work, SV declined as cognitive load increased, suggesting less willingness to engage in more effortful tasks. Age-related differences in this discounting pattern were only evident among individuals with MDD but not among healthy controls. Specifically, among individuals with MDD, older age was associated with lower SV at low loads, but a shallower decline in SV as difficulty increased. Across diagnostic groups, the positive association between task accuracy and SV weakened with older age. Finally, the relative SV of the more cognitively demanding task (compared to the less demanding task) predicted the willingness to engage with it. This association was also weakened with age across diagnostic groups, suggesting that as individuals get older, their decisions may be less guided by the SV difference between high- and low-effort options. Together, these findings showcase the combined and distinct effects of aging and MDD in altering the mechanisms of cognitive effort evaluation and decision-making.

Situational and individual differences shape how and why people regulate emotions, but whether emotion regulation is initiated remains understudied. We hypothesize that, for example, less familiar situations might be associated with more regulation initiation, and people who believe emotions are controllable initiate regulation more frequently. Using experience sampling ( N = 216; 7x/14 days), we found that participants initiated regulation 60% of the time over the past 2 hr. As predicted, people initiated regulation in less familiar, less pleasant contexts, and with more dominant, less warm social partners. Unexpectedly, individuals who believe emotions are uncontrollable were more likely to initiate regulation, even after accounting for affect. These findings highlight that while attention has mostly focused on strategy selection or efficacy, meaningful situational and individual differences also exist at the emotion regulation initiation stage when individuals determine whether to expend regulatory resources to maintain well-being.

Feeling lonely is a common experience across the lifespan and people's feelings of loneliness often do not correspond with their levels of social interaction in expected ways (i.e., social asymmetry). It is unclear, however, whether loneliness in daily life differs by age or cognitive status and how loneliness varies as a function of social interaction across age and cognitive status. The present research used experience sampling to investigate group differences in loneliness and social interaction in the daily lives of individuals (N = 219; Rangeage = 21-84; 57% women; 67% White), including younger adults (Mage = 27), cognitively unimpaired older adults (Mage = 75), and older adults with mild cognitive impairment (MCI; Mage = 77). Compared with older adults, younger adults reported being lonelier and their loneliness was more strongly tied to recent social interactions (i.e., greater reductions in loneliness vs. when no recent interaction). In contrast, relative to younger adults, cognitively unimpaired older adults demonstrated an attenuated negative relation between their social interactions and loneliness levels and no such association was present for older adults with MCI. Across groups loneliness was lower after social interactions that occurred face-to-face, but partner closeness primarily mattered for reduced loneliness in older adults with MCI. The findings suggest younger adults are particularly vulnerable to experiencing loneliness in their daily lives, and frequent face-to-face social interactions may serve as a buffer against loneliness. Although older adults may feel less lonely on average, older adults with MCI may be especially likely to experience social asymmetries. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Objectives: Habitual and momentary emotion regulation (ER) affect social outcomes across the lifespan. Strategies that inhibit the expression of emotion often have negative consequences. We examined the roles of trait and state expressive suppression (i.e., inhibition of emotion expression) in predicting conflict outcomes in couples. We hypothesized that expressive suppression would predict worse outcomes among younger adults than relatively older adults and investigated trait by state suppression interactions. Methods: A sample of 132 couples (N = 264) aged 23–85 (M = 53, SD = 18) completed a trait survey of ER, discussed an area of conflict in their relationship, then reported on state ER during the discussion and conversation outcomes (productivity and emotional gratification). Results: Actor-partner interdependence modeling revealed that, regardless of age, state suppression during the conversation predicted lower productivity (actor effect b = −0.19, SE = 0.09, p = .04). State suppression was less strongly tied to lower emotional gratification in relatively older adults (age × suppression, b = 0.01, SE = 0.004, p = .013). Finally, a three-way interaction emerged such that state suppression predicted the lowest emotional gratification for younger adults who more habitually used suppression, whereas state suppression was not associated with emotional gratification for older adults who more habitually used suppression (age × state × trait suppression, b = 0.01, SE = 0.004, p = .03). Discussion: Emotion regulation may differentially predict conflict outcomes depending on the regulator’s trait ER and age. Flexibility is key to successful ER, and older adults may be at an advantage in knowing how to suppress their emotional expressions more effectively during interactions with close others.

Situational and individual differences shape how and why people regulate emotions but whether emotion regulation is initiated remains understudied. We hypothesize that, for example, less familiar situations might be associated with more regulation initiation and people who believe emotions are controllable initiate regulation more frequently. Using experience sampling (N = 216; 7x/14 days), we found participants initiated regulation 60% of the time over the past two hours. As predicted, people initiated regulation in less familiar, less pleasant contexts, and with more dominant, less warm social partners. Unexpectedly, individuals who believe emotions are uncontrollable were more likely to initiate regulation, even after accounting for affect. These findings highlight that while attention has mostly focused on strategy selection or efficacy, meaningful situational and individual differences also exist at the emotion regulation initiation stage when individuals determine whether to expend regulatory resources to maintain well-being.

People with major depressive disorder (MDD) experience difficulties in emotion regulation (ER). Most ER research has examined overall strategy use using global self-reports in MDD, but this approach does not capture people's ER strategy use in daily life in the context of continuously changing ER demands, such as momentary affect. Taking a naturalistic approach, we investigated whether the associations between the use of six ER strategies (social sharing, acceptance, savoring, reappraisal, expressive suppression, and distraction) and momentary affect differed by MDD status. Data collection took place between 2017 and 2019. Adults with MDD and a healthy control group (N = 135) completed 2 weeks of experience sampling (five surveys a day), in which they reported on their momentary negative affect, positive affect (PA), and the extent to which they used the six ER strategies. Analyses were conducted using multilevel modeling. Both momentary negative affect and PA were associated with use of most ER strategies. MDD status did not moderate the association between negative affect and any strategy but significantly moderated the association between PA and two strategies. Specifically, PA was positively associated with the use of reappraisal and distraction for those with MDD only (associations were nonsignificant for healthy controls). Findings suggest that ER difficulties in MDD may be partially attributed to overusing certain strategies or ineffectiveness in using certain strategies during ER episodes. It is important for future research to clarify the directionality of these findings. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Polyregulation refers to the simultaneous or sequential use of emotion regulation (ER) approaches. Although research has documented that polyregulation is common, more research is needed to clarify when it occurs and how it relates to ER processes. A total of 179 adults reported on a recent event 5×/day for 14 days between 2022 and 2023. For each event, participants reported on momentary contextual factors, including positive affect and negative affect, social context (presence of others), and event appraisals (pleasantness, importance), along with whether they engaged in ER. When ER was reported, participants indicated whether they used single-strategy ER or various types of polyregulation and their perceived ER effort, difficulty, and success. Polyregulation was common (53%) and endorsed more frequently than single-strategy ER (47%), though the magnitude of this effect was small (p = .046, Wilcoxon effect size r = .16). Single-strategy ER use was more frequent than any one type of polyregulation approach. The likelihood of polyregulation was higher when individuals felt more negative affect, perceived events as more important, and were with others (vs. alone). Positive affect and pleasantness were not robust predictors of polyregulation. Compared to single-strategy ER, polyregulation was associated with greater ER effort and difficulty, but not success. The polyregulation approach "redo" (i.e., switching strategies after the first way did not work) was, however, associated with less ER success compared to other forms of ER, including single-strategy ER. Altogether, polyregulation was frequent in daily life and varied based on contextual factors. Engaging in polyregulation may be more demanding than using a single strategy. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).