Beyza Dinc

Presentation Title

Interpersonal Emotion Regulation in Close Relationships

Abstract

Interpersonal emotion regulation commonly occurs in the context of close relationships. The current study examined whether accurately knowing the emotions that one’s romantic partner would feel in a given situation is associated with the effectiveness of interpersonal emotion regulation attempts. One partner from 92 romantic dyads (N = 184) was randomly assigned to the role of the target and the other was assigned to the role of the regulator. Each participant read four vignettes depicting emotion-inducing scenarios. Targets rated the emotions they would feel in each situation, whereas regulators reported how they thought their partner would feel in each situation. Targets were then asked to describe what their partner could say to help them feel good or better in each situation using an open-ended response format. Regulators were asked to describe what they would say to their partners to help them feel good or better in each situation. Accuracy was defined as the mean difference in ratings between the regulator’s estimates of their partner’s emotions and their actual emotion ratings across scenarios. Effectiveness of regulation was defined as the mean score of similarity between the regulator’s open-ended responses and the target’s open-ended responses, as rated by independent coders. The results showed that empathic accuracy significantly predicted the regulation effectiveness. We also found that individual differences in regulators’ emotional clarity and attachment avoidance scores predicted empathic accuracy. This study sheds light on the importance of accurately perceiving a partner's emotions for effective regulation in romantic relationships.