Reassessing Emotion Regulation

Developmental research on emotion regulation is increasingly advancing toward a systems view that integrates behavioral and biological constituents of emotional self-control. However, this view poses fundamental challenges to prevailing conceptualizations of emotion regulation. In portraying emotion regulation as a network of multilevel processes characterized by feedback and interaction between higher and lower systems, it becomes increasingly apparent that emotion regulation is a component of (rather than a response to) emotional activation, that it derives from the mutual influence of multiple emotion-related systems (rather than the maturation of higher control processes alone), and that it sometimes contributes to maladaptive behavioral outcomes, especially in conditions of environmental adversity. The implications of this perspective for the developmental study of emotion regulation are discussed. KEYWORDS—emotion regulation; systems theory; brainbehavior relations REASSESSING EMOTION REGULATION Emotion regulation is a compelling but challenging issue in developmental science. It is compelling because the association of developing self-regulatory skills with social and emotional competence promises to enhance therapeutic approaches to emotion-related disorders of many kinds. It is challenging because emotion regulation is a broadly inclusive construct whose definition, empirical operationalization, development, and outcomes are complex and poorly defined (Cole, Martin, & Dennis, 2004). Although most conceptualizations of emotion regulation focus on the processes by which emotional responses are modified to accomplish individual goals, developmental researchers continue to disagree over core features of emotion regulation and its definition (cf. Bridges, Denham, & Ganiban, 2004; Campos, Frankel, & Camras, 2004; Cole et al., 2004; Gross & Thompson, 2007; Thompson, 1990, 1994). Much of this disagreement centers on the association of self-regulatory processes with other influences on emotion, and the implications of this association for the constructive, adaptive functions that emotion regulation may provide. Research efforts to incorporate developmental neuroscience and psychobiology into the study of emotion regulationmay help to resolve a number of these conceptual problems. Biological formulations favor a multidirectional systemic view that encourages researchers to understand, in concert, the component processes of emotion regulation at multiple levels. But the integration of behavioral and biological approaches is also likely to present further challenges for current conceptualizations of emotion regulation. In particular, it challenges the view that self-regulatory processes follow from (rather than being integrated with) activated emotion, that emotion self-regulation results in adaptive (rather than sometimes maladaptive) behavioral outcomes, and that it derives from the influence of higher levels of control over lower emotive processes (rather than from their mutual influence). Our purpose here is to profile these conceptual challenges and to suggest several ways they can be addressed in the next generation of research on the development of emotion regulation. DEVELOPING CONSTITUENTS OF EMOTION