The roles of age and attention in general emotion regulation, reappraisal, and expressive suppression.

ABSTRACT: Life span emotional development theories propose age differences in emotion regulation tendencies and abilities. Research on age-related positivity has identified age differences in attention to emotional content, which may support emotion regulation in older age. The current research examines the roles of age and attention under various emotion regulation instructions. We measured younger (N = 92) and older (N = 88) adults' fixation to negative emotional content and continuously rated affect during normal viewing and instructions to regulate. Those instructed to regulate first did so generally, then using detached or positive reappraisal and expressive suppression. Older adults (OAs) fixated less than younger adults (YAs) in negative areas regardless of instructions, suggesting broad age-

SUBMITTER: Livingstone KM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5951746 | biostudies-literature | 2018 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature