Capturing Emotion Regulation Tendencies, Trends and Trajectories in Aotearoa Adolescents with the Process of Emotion Regulation Measure (PERM)

Abstract

Emotion regulation (ER) continuously emerges in research as an instrumental mechanism in adolescent mental health. Previous literature suggests that ER skills can be causative of positive outcomes, or protective against negative outcomes. It is vital to further our understanding of how ER develops and functions in Aotearoa adolescents, given this well-established link. A crucial part of this process is ensuring that we accurately and adequately measure adolescent ER. Existing measures share a series of common shortcomings such as an excessively narrow focus, limited psychometric support, or an imbalanced focus on dysregulation. Moreover, despite ER being widely recognised as a multi-stage process guided by an initial goal or motive (Gross, 2015), current measures typically capture only one stage of that process. To address these concerns, this thesis introduces and implements the Process of Emotion Regulation Measure (PERM) – a comprehensive measure of dispositional ER, encompassing ER goals, strategies, and perceived efficacies. Study 1 introduced the PERM and described the ways in which it was informed by Gross’ (2015) Extended Process Model of ER. Data were collected from 951 New Zealand adolescents across two timepoints, administering the PERM as well as several mental health measures. Robust psychometric evidence for the PERM was established, including excellent internal consistency and clear temporal invariance. Constructing the PERM on the basis of two valenced channels of adaptiveness and maladaptiveness (i.e., a ‘bivalenced approach’), we found the first known empirical evidence for the theorised sequence of ER in Gross’ Extended Process Model. Specifically, at the dispositional level of ER, hedonic ER goals significantly predicted strategy selections, which, in turn, predicted the perceived efficacies of those strategies. Study 1 also identified several novel longitudinal relationships between ER stages, and we suggested interpretations for these findings. Utilising the same longitudinal sample of adolescents, Study 2 adopted a person-centred (rather than variable-centred) analytical approach. Latent profile analysis (LPA) and random intercept-latent transition analysis (RI-LTA) both revealed five distinct styles of adolescent ER. We labelled these five profiles as ‘hypo-regulating’, ‘hyper-regulating’, ‘adaptive’, ‘maladaptive’, and ‘normative’. ER profile membership was highly related to mental health outcomes, both concurrently and longitudinally. Valenced ER groups showed the strongest relationships: adaptive ER styles were expectedly related to superior well-being outcomes, while maladaptive ER styles were expectedly related to poorer well-being outcomes. Using a hyper-regulating style was also related to poorer outcomes. RI-LTA demonstrated a general trend toward adaptiveness for the whole sample over a five-month period, with unhelpful ER styles proving more transient than helpful ER styles. Several implications of our findings are discussed. Study 3 combined timepoint 1 of the longitudinal adolescent sample with a concurrent emerging adult sample consisting of 753 Victoria University of Wellington undergraduate students. The study sought to test the PERM’s psychometric properties in a different demographic, while providing insight towards age-related changes in ER approaches. Psychometric properties of the PERM showed an overall slight improvement in the emerging adult sample, providing further psychometric support for the PERM and continued evidence for a bivalenced ER process. Age-related analyses of a combined sample showed a general trend toward ER adaptiveness across adolescence and into adulthood. However, some unexpected trends occurred, such as increased maladaptive strategy use and decreased adaptive strategy efficacies in emerging adults. Emerging adults appeared to conceptualise the ‘PERM-Efficacy’ section in a different manner to adolescents, contributing to group differences. We offered potential explanations for these results and provided several potential implications. Our research firmly establishes the PERM as a novel, reliable, and efficacious ER measurement tool for adolescents and young adults. Each study utilised a different set of analytic techniques to demonstrate some of the many aspects and applications of the PERM in adolescent ER research. Overall, this thesis offers advancements in our current understanding of how Aotearoa adolescents regulate their emotions, how these diverse ER styles relate to their mental health, and how we can continue to assess these individual differences moving forward.