Over the past several decades, researchers have made tremendous progress in understanding human emotion regulation. Some of the most notable advances have emanated from the collection of cognitive, affective, and physiological data from individuals while using a """"""""response-focused"""""""" emotion modulation technique, namely """"""""suppression"""""""" (trying to decrease emotional expression after the onset of the affective experience). From these data it has been suggested that response-focused strategies are associated with increased sympathetic arousal and, in the case of suppression, decreased behavioral output and self-reported positive affect (when trying to suppress a positive feeling-state). The true effects of response-focused strategies are unknown, however, because other such techniques (like emotional exaggeration) have been very rarely studied. The proposed research is designed to replicate and extend the research on """"""""response-focused"""""""" affect modulation by assessing the impact of both suppression and exaggeration (relative to natural-viewing conditions) across positive, negative, and neutral emotional states. In the autonomic domain, significant research advances will be made by using very discrete measures of sympathetic and parasympathetic arousal at the myocardium (pre-ejection period and respiratory sinus arrhythmia, respectively). Previous researchers have used such measures as finger pulse amplitude and skin temperature to measure sympathetic arousal (and no parasympathetic indices have ever been collected!). By assessing autonomic arousal at the heart, the present research may have tremendous value in understanding why persons with affect dysregulation problems (e.g., Major Depressive Disorder, Bipolar Disorder) are significantly more likely to experience cardiovascular disease. Moreover, the proposed research will assess the impact of response-focused strategies on behavioral output, cognitive functioning (left- and right-frontal neuropsychological tasks), and self-reported mood.
