title: Yes I can: Expected success promotes actual success in emotion regulation.
abstract: People who expect to be successful in regulating their emotions tend to experience less frequent negative emotions and are less likely to suffer from depression. It is not clear, however, whether beliefs about the likelihood of success in emotion regulation can shape actual emotion regulation success. To test this possibility, we manipulated participants' beliefs about the likelihood of success in emotion regulation and assessed their subsequent ability to regulate their emotions during a negative emotion induction. We found that participants who were led to expect emotion regulation to be more successful were subsequently more successful in regulating their emotional responses, compared to participants in the control condition. Our findings demonstrate that expected success can contribute to actual success in emotion regulation.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , The Hebrew University of Jerusalem , Jerusalem , Israel.
authors.forename: Yochanan E
authors.initials: YE
authors.lastname: Bigman
authors.affiliation: b Department of Psychology , University of California , Berkeley , CA , USA.
authors.forename: Iris B
authors.initials: IB
authors.lastname: Mauss
authors.affiliation: c Department of Psychology , Stanford University , Stanford , CA , USA.
authors.forename: James J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Gross
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , The Hebrew University of Jerusalem , Jerusalem , Israel.
authors.forename: Maya
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Tamir
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation; D000068356:Self-Control; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Emotion; beliefs; efficacy; emotion regulation; expectancies