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Emotions signal threats and rewards. Much like a compass that guides us in the right direction, emotions have the power to guide us to the right actions.

For example, when a child commits a mistake, they might get scared and lie to their parents about it, or avoid confronting them for fear of punishment.

Their parents may eventually discover what they did and the child, in all probability will end up facing the same consequences that they were trying to avoid. In this instance, listening and responding to the ‘fear’ emotion proved futile to the child.

However, the same emotion (fear) would have proven helpful for someone being chased by a wild animal in the forest. In that situation, running to avoid confronting the savage beast would have been the correct decision.

It is therefore crucial to judge when to trust emotional triggers and act on them, and when not to; in other words, it is essential for us to understand how to regulate or control our emotions so we could use them optimally.

In this article, we will discuss the psychology of emotional regulation – what it means, how we can cultivate it, and what methods we can choose to implement emotional management in real life.

Before you read on, we thought you might like to download our three Emotional Intelligence Exercises for free. These science-based exercises will not only enhance your ability to understand and regulate your emotions but will also give you the tools to foster the emotional intelligence of your clients, students or employees.

This Article Contains:

• What is Emotional Regulation? A Definition

• 6 Most Useful Emotional Regulation Skills for Adults

• Science-Based Emotion Regulation Strategies

• What is Emotional Regulation Disorder?

• 5 Tips for Fostering Emotional Regulation in Children

• What is DBT and How Does it Relate?

• 4 Emotional Regulation Activities & Exercises

• Useful Therapy Modalities

• Techniques for Working with Autism

• 3 Worksheets to Implement the Theory

• Examples of Emotional Self-Regulation

• Games for Group Therapy Settings

• Best Books on Emotional Regulation

• A Take-Home Message

• References

What is Emotional Regulation? A Definition

“Emotional regulation refers to the process by which individuals influence which emotions they have, when they have them, and how they experience and express their feelings. Emotional regulation can be automatic or controlled, conscious or unconscious, and may have effects at one or more points in the emotion producing process.”

(Gross, 1998, p. 275).

The definition of emotional regulation encompasses both positive and negative feelings, along with how we can strengthen them, use them, and control them.

Emotional regulation involves three components:

• Initiating actions triggered by emotions.

• Inhibiting actions triggered by emotions.

• Modulating responses triggered by emotions.

Ideally, the third component is the best way to make the most of the regulatory processes.

Every day, we face hundreds of emotion-provoking stimuli, and most of them require some action or response from our end. It is only natural for the mind to get hooked into some negative contemplation or unmindfully ignore emotions after getting bombarded with so many stimuli every day (Davidson, 1998).

Emotional regulation acts as a modifier; it helps us filter the most important pieces of information and motivates us to attend to it in a way that wouldn’t evoke stress or fear.

Studies on emotional regulation indicate that there is a significant positive correlation between emotion regulation and depression management. People with lower levels of anxiety show higher emotional control and social-emotional intelligence.

Research indicates that emotions are adaptive responses that have a deep-rooted basis in evolutionary biology (Levenson, 1999). The way we feel and interpret them affects how we think, how we decide, and how we coordinate our actions in day-to-day lives.

For example, a person who has poor emotion regulation strategies is more likely to fall prey to mood polarities; their actions and behavioral patterns would always be at the mercy of their emotions.

Quite the contrary, a well-regulated person, will have a better balance and judgment of their feelings and actions. Emotional regulation allows us to carefully judge which affective outcomes to embrace and which ones to avoid (Wegner, Erber, & Zanakos, 1993).

When we confront a provoking stimulus, the natural reaction of the brain is to activate the amygdala, a brain site that regulates the fight-or-flight responses (Lee, 2018; Van der Kolk, 1994). Emotional regulation processes allow us to buy time before we act on the fight or flight triggers.

Kris Lee, a Professor and the author of the book Mentalligence: A New Psychology of Thinking–Learn What It Takes to be More Agile, Mindful, and Connected in Today’s World says that with emotional regulation, we can allow the initial upsurge of emotions to settle down and zoom out of the situation before reacting to it.

The increased time gap between stimulus and response restores the mental faculties that involve rational thinking and reasoning. As a result, we can save ourselves from sudden emotional breakdowns or burnout.

6 Most Useful Emotional Regulation Skills for Adults

Self-regulation is all about pausing between feeling and reactions – it encourages us to slow down for a bit and act after objectively evaluating a situation. For example, a student who yells at others and hits their friends for petty reasons surely has less emotional control than a child who, before hitting or yelling, tells the teacher about their problems.

Another huge aspect of emotional regulation is value engagement. When we react impulsively without paying much attention to what is going on inside, we might often deviate from our core values and act in a way that is opposite to them. With proper regulation and self-control, we gain the power to stay calm under pressure and prevent ourselves from acting against our core values and ethics.

Here are some skills that can help in cultivating emotional regulation and sustaining it during challenging times in life.