Electrophysiological investigations of emotion regulation

Interest in emotion regulation (ER) has existed for numerous years, however, only recently have researchers asked participants to voluntarily manipulate their affective states in response to specific ER instructions. Although prior findings indicate that different ER strategies result in distinct behavioral, affective, neural, and cognitive consequences, previous studies are generally limited by indirect measures of affect change, the emphasis on cognitive processing during an ER period, and a lack of focus on comparing different measures of ER ability. The overarching goal of the present work was to investigate changes in affective states and the cognitive consequences of cognitive reappraisal strategies using an integration of behavioral and electrophysiological measures collected while control, currently depressed (MDD), and remitted depressed (RD) participants were engaged in an ER task. Results from these studies replicate prior findings of intact up- and down-regulation ability among healthy controls (Studies 1 and 2). Contrary to expectations. MDD and RD participants exhibited impaired ability to increase unpleasant emotions and intact ability to decrease unpleasant emotions (Study 2). Healthy controls exhibited smallest N400 and smallest P300 amplitudes in response to words following the down- and up-regulation of unpleasant emotions, respectively, suggesting that manipulations of affective states influenced participants' expectancies for and resources available to process subsequently presented words. Results from Study 2 replicated the findings of smaller P300 amplitudes to words presented after increasing unpleasant emotions in all three populations and no group differences were observed. Finally, in Study 3, I tested whether a purported measure of ER ability (resting anterior electroencephalographic [EEG] activity) correlated with an objective measure of affect change in an ER task. Traditional EEG asymmetry measures did not correlate with ER ability, however, sources localization analyses indicated that resting activity in frontocingulate and paralimbic regions was correlated with improved ability to up-regulate unpleasant emotions. Activity in these regions predicted ER ability above and beyond self-report measures of ER ability. Together these findings replicate and extend prior research on ER, and emphasize the importance of objective measures of affect change, document the temporal influence of ER strategies upon cognitive processing, and integrate different measures of ER ability.