Failure to Control Emotion

Question 1

What does it look like?

Answer 1

• consumatory behaviors
• panic attack
• lash out
• stay alone to reflect and meditate
• cry

Question 2

common attempt to control moods

Answer 2

• involves getting out of a bad mood
  1. Underregulation-failure to try to control emotions
  2. Misregulation- attenpt to elimiate anger or bad mood ineffectively; venting actually prolong the anger state

Question 3

Ventng

Answer 3

• unrestraining expression of emotions ranging from the mere disclosure of emotional states to outrageous or widely inappropriate behaivior stimulated by emotions
• can lead to prgression-you flip someone off then they do it back so you honk then they honk and it just gets more out of control

Question 4

Strength

Answer 4

• people do not want to bother exerting control over their emotions
  1. belief that people are unable to control their emotions- lighter sentences given for crimes of passion
  2. belief that it is psychologically damaging to alter emotions–distortion of Freud’s discarded “catharsis” theory

Question 5

Underregulation of Attention- Venting compoments incompatible with other self-regulatory responses

Answer 5

a. involves focusing on feelings of anger of sadness- attentional failure
b. prevents people from distracting themsleves
- if you would just do something else they would feel so much better but you won’t
c. venting directs attention to the wrong place
- focusing more on negative states

Question 6

Misregulation- Venting

Answer 6

• the mistaken belief that venting is an effective means of bringing feelings under control
• fails to address the root cause of the anger and work toward its resolution

Question 7

Venting increases arousal

Answer 7

• associated with increased heart rate and blood pressure

- long-term consequences include vulnerability to coronary heart disease

Question 8

emotional expressivity effect

Answer 8

1. patterns of expressive behavior can be used in the management of emotion
2. Darwin
3. James’ theory of emotion -if you smile when you dont want to it will make you feel better

Question 9

emotional expressivity effect

Answer 9

• when one expresses an emotion, one is likely to experience that emotion
  1. autonomic hormonal emotional system
• core psyiology
  2. attentional
• what we pay attention to
  3. arousal-brain
• can become hypervigulant to confirm a mood state

Question 10

Autonomic Sympathetic

Answer 10

fight or flight

• increased blood pressure
• increased heart rate
• increased bronchial dilation
• decreased G.I. motility

Question 11

Autonomic Parasympathetic

Answer 11

• opposite effects
• restoration of balanced emotion
• homeostasis

Question 12

Venting-Anger

Answer 12

-lapse activated causal pattern
ineffective at decreasing or elimination mood state- actually prolongs the mood state
-domestic violence-one partner vents, the other responds in angry fashion; escalating anger

Question 13

Silent Seething

Answer 13

refraining for expressing one’s anger can produce harmful effects

a. holding in anger-also increases arousal
b. associated with sympathetic response
- Really destructive to stay angry

Question 14

Venting- sadness and depression

Answer 14

• may parallel self-regulation failure proposed for anger
  1. venting may fail to eliminate bad mood/ negative affective state
  2. continuing to ruminate silently about the problem may be just as bad
  3. persistence of the bad mood is the problem

Question 15

Rumination

Answer 15

• perseveration
• concept of dwelling
• stuck in your head about some negative event
  a. reduces time and energy
  b. increases accessibility of negative cognitions
  c. thinking about bad mood does not result in mood change

Question 16

Evidence the crying does not reduce sadness

Answer 16

• increases heart rate
• lower level of autonomic arousal
• if we had the ability to hold back then we should exert the cognitive control and do so

Question 17

Beck’s Cognitive Triad of Depression

Answer 17

1. Negative thoughts about oneself
2. Negative thoughts about one’s experiences
3. Negative thoughts about the future

Question 18

Distractors that backfire

Answer 18

1. use of distractions appears to be useful in regulation cognitions and emotions
2. this is ineffective if the distractor is distressing
3. reckless, dangerous or violent activities are ineffective
4. psychological inertia- mood state creates conditions that make it more difficult to escape the mood

Question 19

Consuming Behavior-eating of favorite food

Answer 19

a. not effective

b. may backfire- misregulation

Question 20

Consuming Behavior- alcohol

Answer 20

a. may intensify depressive symptoms
b. sets up pattern- vicious cycle
c. attentional problem
- myopia- focusing on negative aspects
- transcendence failure
d. similar problems with anger and alcohol
e. disinhibitions

Question 21

How to control anger?

Answer 21

1. Cooling off period
   - no brooding
   - no escalation of anger
   - appropriate distractors
2. Rational discussion
3. Directly confront problem
4. Engage in instrumental progress at trying to change the state of affairs that led to the negative mood