EPA-0314 – Effects of Suppression of Positive and Negative Emotions on Depression

Abstract

Objectives:

We need to consider both suppression of positive and negative emotions (PE and NE) in examining the effects of emotional suppression (ES) on health and adjustment. The purpose of study was to develop a new emotional suppression scale to measure suppression of PE and NE, and to examine the effects of emotional suppression of PE and NE on depression and short-term life satisfaction (LS).

Method:

Participants were 496 undergraduate and graduate students (240 men and 256 women). They completed three questionnaires for assessing ES, depression, and short-term LS, along with a questionnaire to test the validity of the Emotional Suppression Scale for Positive and Negative Emotions (ESS) that was developed in this study.

Results:

First, we confirmed two factors in the ESS, named as ‘suppression of PE’ and ‘suppression of NE.’ The alphas were .69 and .73 for men and .69 and .76 for women, respectively. and it was revealed that each subscale of the ESS has concurrent validity. Thereafter, hierarchical regression analyses showed that higher suppression of PE was associated with lower LS and higher depression. Meanwhile, suppression of NE did not show any significant associations with health and adjustment, which was inconsistent with previous findings. Moreover, no significant interactions between suppression of PE and NE were found.

Conclusion:

In this study, the ESS was developed with factorial and concurrent validities. Moreover, this study suggests that the effects of emotional suppression on health and adjustment would be different depending on what type of emotions is suppressed.