(PS13-B36) Self-compassion, Emotion Regulation, and Stress Among College Students

College students experience a multitude of stressors in academic, social, familial, and economic domains (Neely et al., 2009). Students’ existing concerns have been exacerbated by the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, contributing to greater stress and anxiety (Lee et al., 2021) which may require the use of emotion regulation strategies like cognitive reappraisal and emotion suppression to manage their feelings. Reappraisal is a strategy to reframe an event or current stressor to reduce negative emotions, whereas suppression downplays a current emotion and lessens its display (Haga et al., 2007). Of these strategies, research suggests that cognitive reappraisal is a healthier way of modifying emotional reactions to stress, as it predicts greater wellbeing and more positive affect (Preece et al., 2021). Self-compassion, or turning acceptance towards oneself during periods of distress and hardship, has been linked to greater cognitive reappraisal, decreased emotion suppression, and decreased stress (Neff et al., 2005; Kroshus et al., 2021). The purpose of this study was to examine how college students’ self-compassion predicts emotion regulation and perceived stress. We also aimed to understand how an environmental stressor such as COVID may influence these relationships.

Method: Students from a university in the northeastern United States were sampled (N = 313; M_age = 19.5, SD_age= 2.1; M = 20.1%, F = 79.2%, Other=.6%; 56.5% White, 22.7% Hispanic/Latino, 6.7% Black, 14.7% Asian/Pacific Islander, 1.6% Native American, 4.5% Mixed, and 3.8% Other). Self-report measures were completed using the electronic platform, Qualtrics. Participants responding prior to the COVID pandemic (April 2018 to February 2020) were assigned to the “pre-COVID” group, and those responding after (March 2020 to November 2020) were the “post-COVID” group.

Results: Greater self-compassion predicted increased cognitive appraisal among pre- (R² = .02, F = 4.56, p = .03) but not post-COVID participants (R² = .00, p = N.S.). Self-compassion also predicted increased stress for pre-COVID (R² = .01, F = 3.88, p = .05) and post-COVID participants (R² = .26, F = 13.74, p < .001). There was a non-significant relationship between self-compassion and emotion suppression in pre- and post-COVID groups (R² = .00, p = N.S.; R² = .06, p = N.S.).

Discussion: Self-compassion was associated with an increased experience of stress. Previous research suggests that sensitivity is linked to self-compassion, meaning that those who are more self-compassionate demonstrate increased attention and willingness to engage with suffering (Gilbert et al, 2017). This engagement may result in increased self-reports of stress, consistent with the finding that self-compassion predicted stress more significantly in the post-COVID group. Greater stress may also hinder one’s ability to use higher order cognitive processes such as reappraisal (Sheppes et al., 2011; Miklósi et al., 2014). This is consistent with how self-compassion predicted reappraisal in the pre-COVID group, but not post-COVID. Self-compassion did not predict emotion suppression in either group, meaning that more work must be done to understand emotion regulation strategies otherwise used by those with greater self-compassion.