روابط بین صفات استقلال مالی فردی و راهبردهای تنظیم احساسات: مطالعه طولی

Although several cross-sectional surveys have shown that certain traits such as extraversion and neuroticism are related to emotion regulation, few studies have explored the nature of this relationship. The present study tried to explore the longitudinal relation between traits and emotion regulation strategies. The Interpersonal Self-Support Scale for Middle School Students (ISSS-MSS) and the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ) were administrated to 374 middle school students two times across a 6-month interval. A path analysis via structural equation modeling of the five interpersonal self-support traits and the two emotion regulation strategies was tested. The results showed that interpersonal independence predicted expressive suppression and cognitive reappraisal, and that interpersonal initiative also predicted reappraisal, while reappraisal predicted interpersonal flexibility and interpersonal openness 6 month later. These results support the hypotheses that some personality traits influence certain emotion regulation strategies, while other traits may be influenced by specific emotion regulation strategies.

The relationship between personality and emotion regulation (ER) has been focused on recently. For example, extraversion is thought to be related to adaptive emotion regulation strategies, while neuroticism is believed to be related to negative emotion regulation strategies (John and Gross, 2004 and Ng and Diener, 2009). Numerous studies have suggested that emotion regulation is influenced by temperament and personality (Cassidy, 1994, Jaffe et al., 2010, John and Gross, 2004 and Southam-Gerow and Kendall, 2002). Research on temperament has implied that genetic factors play an important role in emotional reactions and emotion regulation, and early temperamental characteristics may make it easy or difficult for children to learn and develop special kinds of emotion regulation skills and strategies (John & Gross, 2004). For example, temperamental variables were found to be associated with emotion regulation one year later among 8–11 years old preadolescents (Zalewski, Lengua, Wilson, Trancik, & Bazinet, 2011). With individual development, temperament becomes the core component of personality (Rothbart, Ahadi, & Evans, 2000). Thus, instead of temperament, personality begins to affect the features and development of emotion regulation strategies (John and Gross, 2004 and John and Srivastava, 1999). For example, a longitudinal investigation in adults (Kokkonen & Pulkkinen, 2001) revealed that neuroticism and extraversion (both estimated by two different measures at age 27 and at age 33, respectively) predicted the use of emotion regulation strategies such as repair and emotional ambivalence at age 36. In addition, emotion regulation was thought to impact the development of personality. For example, emotion regulation was believed to facilitate the flexibility, maintain the integrity of and increase the overall functioning of the personality system (Koole, 2009). Personality systems interactions theory (Kuhl, 2000) suggests that emotion regulation improves personality functioning. However, as far as we know, few empirical studies have supported the hypothesis that emotion regulation affects personality traits. Thus there may be three possible relations between personality and emotion regulation. First, personality influences emotion regulation, but emotion regulation does not influence personality. Second, some personality factors influence certain strategies of emotion regulation and some emotion regulation strategies influence other specific personality factors. Third, the relationship between personality and emotion regulation is mutual. However, to our knowledge, most current studies have used cross-sectional or experimental methods, which make it difficult test the three hypotheses with respect to the relationship between personality and emotion regulation. The primary purpose of the present study was to examine the three possible relations between personality and emotion regulation using longitudinal data. There are many strategies that people may use to regulate their emotions. Two common forms of emotion regulation defined by a general process model of emotion regulation (Gross, 2001, Gross, 2002, Gross and John, 2003 and John and Gross, 2004) were the focus of the present study. The process-oriented model (Gross, 2002, Gross and John, 2003 and John and Gross, 2004) defined emotion regulation as the processes through which people recognize and change their experience and expression of emotions (Gross, 1998). According to this framework, emotion may be regulated at each of the several stages during the emotion-generation process, and the emotion-generation process can be categorized as two basic stages of antecedent and response. The antecedent stage of emotion generation occurs relatively early in the emotion-generation process and refers to the cognitive processing of emotion-related information. The response stage occurs relatively late in the emotion-generation process and refers to the experiential, behavioral and physiological responses to emotional stimulators. Accordingly, emotion regulation strategies can be divided into antecedent-focused strategies (which adjust emotional responding before the emotional response tendencies have been wholly triggered) and response-focused strategies (which interfere with emotional behaviors after the emotional response tendencies have already been produced) or cognitive regulation (e.g., reappraisal) and behavioral regulation (e.g., suppression). Two commonly used emotion regulation strategies (Cognitive Reappraisal and Expressive Suppression) were the focus of the process model, numerous researchers and the current study. Cognitive Reappraisal is a typically antecedent-focused strategy and refers to changing emotional impact by redefining potentially emotion-eliciting events (Lazarus & Alfert, 1964). For example, one may view a final exam as a chance to find out that past study was insufficient rather than as a risk of failure and thereby decrease test anxiety. In contrast, Expressive Suppression is a typically response-focused strategy and involves suppressing the ongoing expressive behavior associated with emotional experience (Gross & Levenson, 1993). For example, although a salesman may feel angry with customers, he still retains a smile on his face. Several prior cross-sectional studies (Gresham and Gullone, 2012, Hasking et al., 2010 and Wang et al., 2009) have revealed that personality traits are associated with cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression even in a Chinese sample. For example, a study of adolescents between the ages of 10 and 18 found that extraversion and openness were associated with cognitive reappraisal, neuroticism was positively related to expressive suppression, and extraversion and agreeableness were inversely related to expressive suppression (Gresham & Gullone, 2012). However, to our knowledge, few studies have examined the longitudinal relations between personality traits and cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression. Consequently, the current study tried to explore the relations between personality and cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression using longitudinal data set in middle school students. An indigenous Chinese personality construct was used as the personality variable of interest in the present study because it was believed to be associated with cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression and may be more suitable for Chinese people. It may be beneficial to expand our knowledge with respect to the relationship between personality and emotion regulation beyond personality factors derived from Western culture. This personality construct is called interpersonal self-support (ISS). ISS is an integrated personality factor including a set of five traits that could help individuals solve interpersonal problems in daily life and facilitate their social development (Xia, 2010 and Xia, Shi, et al., 2013). The five ISS traits are interpersonal independence (the tendency and ability to deal with interpersonal activity or problems independently), interpersonal initiative (the tendency to initiate affiliations with other individuals), interpersonal responsibility (the tendency to be faithful and truthful to others), interpersonal flexibility (the tendency to deal with interpersonal events contingently and flexibly), and interpersonal openness (the tendency to accept other individuals positively). Personality development is dependent on the social environment in which people live. Social behavior, cognition, and emotion all are the important components of personality. Assessing personality traits within the context of interpersonal interaction could reveal the disposition and patterns of social behaviors and is useful for personality and social psychology research. In fact, some important traits such extraversion and agreeableness focus on social interaction and reflect adaptations of individual to social environment. Chinese culture emphasizes interpersonal relationships and interpersonal communication. Thus, the ISS focused on the dispositions and characters in interpersonal domain. The development of the five ISS traits was based on personality trait theory and derived from desired interpersonal tendencies described in Chinese culture. Some ISS traits are similar to Western traits. For example, low interpersonal independence is similar to the self-consciousness sub-dimension of neuroticism and interpersonal initiative is very similar to the warmth and gregariousness aspects of extraversion. In addition, interpersonal openness is similar to acceptance of others (Fey, 1955). However, ISS traits also bring some new interpersonal features that ignored by Western culture. For example, to our knowledge, no trait similar to interpersonal responsibility was specifically focused on in the Western literature. In addition, although interpersonal independence and interpersonal responsibility were both negatively associated with sociotropy (having a strong need for social acceptance and overemphasizing interpersonal relationships), they each predicted depression even after controlling for sociotropy (Xia, Wan, Song, & Yang, 2011). The main differences between ISS traits and Western traits may be that ISS emphasizes both solving interpersonal problems and maintaining harmonious interpersonal relationships. For example, interpersonal flexibility suggests that the individual cannot only solve interpersonal events but also can satisfy other people in interpersonal interactions, which is different from agreeableness. In sum, ISS may overlap in some respects with traditional Western personality traits, but it also brings some new constructs that go beyond Western traits. ISS is related to emotion. First, ISS is believed to be a protective personality factor with respect to emotional distress in China (Xia, 2010). For example, all the ISS traits were significantly negatively correlated with depression (Xia, 2010, Xia, Ding, et al., 2012 and Xia, Wan, et al., 2011) and anxiety (Xia, 2010). In addition, all the ISS traits with the exception of interpersonal flexibility were related to Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) (Xia & Ding, 2011). Second, individuals with high ISS are believed to have positive attitudes toward other people and to elicit more positive interpersonal responses from other people (Xia, 2010). For example, a recent study showed that people with high ISS preferred positive interpersonal information (Xia, Shi, et al., 2013) and all the ISS traits with the exception of interpersonal independence predicted perceived social support (Xia, Liu, et al., 2012). ISS traits may influence emotion experience through three pathways. First, ISS traits may indirectly influence emotional experience by virtue of affecting the life environment related to affective feeling. For example, interpersonal independence, interpersonal initiative, and interpersonal responsibility predicted psychological symptoms (including emotion symptoms) through the mediating effect of stress events or social support (Xia, 2011 and Xia, Ding, et al., 2013). Second, ISS traits may directly impact the level of emotional arousal or provocation. Extraversion and neuroticism represent an endogenous susceptibility to emotion-inducing stimuli that directly influence the emotion experience (Larsen and Ketelaar, 1991 and McCrae and Costa, 1991). As previously indicated, interpersonal initiative is similar to extraversion and low interpersonal independence is similar to neuroticism. Presumably, ISS traits, especially interpersonal initiative and interpersonal independence, may involve emotional dispositions. ISS may influence reactions to emotion stimuli, which determine emotion experience. Thirdly, ISS traits may affect the regulation of emotional processes, which in turn may influence the generation and change of feelings. The second purpose of the present study is to explore whether the emotion regulation is another emotion mechanism mobilized by ISS. There are several reasons why cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression are assumed to be the emotion regulation mechanisms of ISS. First, ISS traits are different from cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression. Cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression were shown to be specifically and narrowly defined in emotion-regulation processes and do not reflect intelligence, social desirability, or broad personality traits such as Big Five traits (John & Gross, 2004). ISS traits are broad interpersonal traits and do not refer directly to emotion-regulation processes. Thus, ISS traits and cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression should be different constructs and the relations between them modest. Second, numerous studies have indicated that lower rates of cognitive reappraisal and higher rates of expressive suppression were found to be associated with depression (Bonanno et al., 2004, Joormann and Gotlib, 2010, Moore et al., 2008 and Troy et al., 2010), anxiety (Carthy et al., 2010 and Werner et al., 2011) and PTSD (Boden et al., 2012 and Moore et al., 2008). In addition, suppression was linked to vulnerability to depression (Ehring, Tuschen-Caffier, Schnülle, Fischer, & Gross, 2010) and lower levels of reappraisal and higher levels of suppression were thought to be an important facet of depression (Joormann & Gotlib, 2010) and anxiety (Werner et al., 2011). Therefore, it is possible that ISS is associated with the two emotion regulation strategies. Third, prior findings revealed that ISS is linked to interpersonal problems solving (Xia, Huang, Wan, & Yang, 2011), interpersonal stress (Xia, 2011), and social support (Xia, Ding, et al., 2013 and Xia, Liu, et al., 2012). Reappraisal and suppression seems to be an important psychological factor for social adaption with respect to solving practical problems and dealing with the emotion reactions to stressful events (Bonanno et al., 2004, Gross and John, 2003, Moore et al., 2008 and Troy et al., 2010). Furthermore, reappraisers reported more close social relationships than suppressors (Gross & John, 2003). Presumably, ISS may be linked to these two emotion regulation strategies, too. Fourth, high ISS individuals preferred to pay attention to positive interpersonal information, while low ISS individuals were sensitive to negative interpersonal information (Xia, Shi, et al., 2013). Reappraisers were found to interpret stressful events in a more optimistic way than suppressors (Gross & John, 2003). Attentional regulation was regarded as a critical facet of the emotion regulation process (Wadlinger & Isaacowitz, 2011). An attentional bias toward interpersonal information may be one of the cognitive mechanisms underlying the relationship between ISS and cognitive reappraisal. Last but the most important, emotional traits such as neuroticism and extraversion were found to impact expressive suppression and cognitive reappraisal (Gresham and Gullone, 2012, Hasking et al., 2010 and Wang et al., 2009). As previously indicated, ISS may also include emotional dispositions. Thus, the emotional processes implied by the ISS may influence the choice and use of suppression and reappraisal strategies. In summary, it is reasonable to assume that all the ISS traits are positively associated with cognitive reappraisal and negatively related to expressive suppression. The current study tried to examine the three possible relations between ISS traits and emotion regulation: 1) ISS traits influences emotion regulation, but emotion regulation does not influence ISS traits; 2) some ISS traits influence certain strategies of emotion regulation and emotion regulation strategies influence other specific ISS traits; and, 3) the relations between ISS traits and emotion regulation are reciprocal in nature (each influences the other).