1 - (SYM 86) the Impact of Emotion Regulation on the Relationship Between Momentary Negative Affect and End-of-day Worry and Rumination

Negative self-referential processing (NSRP), including worry and rumination, is a hallmark feature of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). Negative affect (NA) relates to NSRP, and emotion regulation skills (e.g., reappraisal and acceptance) may attenuate this relationship. Using ecological momentary assessment methodology, we explored whether increased emotion regulation skills use would alter associations between daily fluctuations of NA and end-of-day NSRP. Participants were 99 young adults (M_age = 19.94; SD = 1.81), diagnosed with GAD (n = 48) and healthy controls (n = 51). They provided twice daily ratings of NA, reappraisal, and acceptance over 14 days, and end-of-day ratings of NSRP. Mixed linear models adjusted for covariates, including state-level NSRP. Individuals with GAD reported higher levels of NA than controls (p < .001), and higher NA corresponded to greater end-of-day worry (b = .20, SE = .03, p < .001) and rumination (b = .27, SE = .02, p < .001) across all participants. Increased emotion regulation skills altered the relationship between increased NA and higher NSRP (ps < .05), though this did not differ by group. Bonferroni-corrected pairwise comparisons indicated that acceptance and reappraisal differentially affected associations between NA and NSRP. Specifically, greater use of acceptance was associated with lower worry in both high- (F(1, 546.65) = 6.58, p = .01) and low-intensity (F(1, 547.74) = 8.28, p < .01) NA contexts, while greater use of reappraisal corresponded to lower worry only when NA was low (F(1, 566.84) = 5.02, p = .03). Acceptance did not interact with NA in relation to rumination (p > .05), but higher use of reappraisal was associated with lower rumination in both high- (F(1, 568.31) = 6.07, p = .01) and low-intensity (F(1, 550.55) = 11.12, p < .001) NA contexts. Findings suggest that emotion regulation skills moderate the relationship between NA and end-of-day NSRP. This talk highlights the utility of using reappraisal and acceptance in daily life and presents negative emotionality as an important contextual factor impacting emotion regulation skills use, which could eventually lead to improvements in treating GAD.