Disentangling cognition and emotion in older adults: the role of cognitive control and mental health in emotional conflict adaptation

OBJECTIVE

Recent research suggests cognition has a bidirectional relationship with emotional processing in older adults, yet the relationship is still poorly understood. We aimed to examine a potential relationship between late-life cognitive function, mental health symptoms, and emotional conflict adaptation. We hypothesized that worse cognitive control abilities would be associated with poorer emotional conflict adaptation. We further hypothesized that a higher severity of mental health symptoms would be associated with poorer emotional conflict adaptation.

METHODS

Participants included 83 cognitively normal community-dwelling older adults who completed a targeted mental health and cognitive battery, and emotion and gender conflict-adaptation tasks.

RESULTS

Consistent with our hypothesis, poorer performance on components of cognitive control, specifically attention and working memory, was associated with poorer emotional conflict adaptation. This association with attention and working memory was not observed in the non-affective-based gender conflict adaptation task. Mental health symptoms did not predict emotional conflict adaptation, nor did performance on other cognitive measures.

CONCLUSION

Our findings suggest that emotion conflict adaptation is disrupted in older individuals who have poorer attention and working memory. Components of cognitive control may therefore be an important potential source of inter-individual differences in late-life emotion regulation and cognitive affective deficits. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Limbic Activity Modulation Guided by Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging-Inspired Electroencephalography Improves Implicit Emotion Regulation

The amygdala has a pivotal role in processing traumatic stress; hence, gaining control over its activity could facilitate adaptive mechanism and recovery. To date, amygdala volitional regulation could be obtained only via real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a highly inaccessible procedure. The current article presents high-impact neurobehavioral implications of a novel imaging approach that enables bedside monitoring of amygdala activity using fMRI-inspired electroencephalography (EEG), hereafter termed amygdala-electrical fingerprint (amyg-EFP). Simultaneous EEG/fMRI indicated that the amyg-EFP reliably predicts amygdala-blood oxygen level-dependent activity. Implementing the amyg-EFP in neurofeedback demonstrated that learned downregulation of the amyg-EFP facilitated volitional downregulation of amygdala-blood oxygen level-dependent activity via real-time fMRI and manifested as reduced amygdala reactivity to visual stimuli. Behavioral evidence further emphasized the therapeutic potential of this approach by showing improved implicit emotion regulation following amyg-EFP neurofeedback. Additional EFP models denoting different brain regions could provide a library of localized activity for low-cost and highly accessible brain-based diagnosis and treatment.

Frontoparietal Activation During Response Inhibition Predicts Remission to Antidepressants in Patients With Major Depression

BACKGROUND

Despite cognitive function impairment in depression, its relationship to treatment outcome is not well understood. Here, we examined whether pretreatment activation of cortical circuitry during test of cognitive functions predicts outcomes for three commonly used antidepressants.

METHODS

Eighty medication-free outpatients with major depression and 34 matched healthy controls were included as participants in the International Study to Predict Optimized Treatment in Depression (iSPOT-D) trial. During functional magnetic resonance imaging, participants completed three tasks that assessed core domains of cognitive functions: response inhibition (Go/NoGo), selective attention (oddball), and selective working memory updating (1-back). Participants were randomized to 1 of 3 arms: escitalopram, sertraline (serotonin-specific reuptake inhibitors [SSRI]), or venlafaxine-extended release (serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor [SNRI]) therapy. Functional magnetic resonance imaging scans were repeated after 8 weeks of treatment, and remission was assessed using the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression.

RESULTS

Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex activation during inhibitory "no go" responses was a general predictor of remission, with remitters having the same pretreatment activation as control participants and nonremitters hypoactivating relative to controls. Posttreatment dorsolateral prefrontal cortex activation was reduced in both remitters and controls but not in nonremitters. By contrast, inferior parietal activation differentially predicted remission between SSRI and SNRI medications, with SSRI remitters showing greater pretreatment activation than SSRI nonremitters and the SNRI group showing the opposite pattern.

CONCLUSIONS

Intact activation in the frontoparietal network during response inhibition, a core cognitive function, predicts remission with antidepressant treatment, particularly for SSRIs, and may be a potential substrate of the clinical effect of treatment.

Delay of gratification in childhood linked to cortical interactions with the nucleus accumbens

Delay of gratification (DG) is the ability to forego immediate temptations in the service of obtaining larger, delayed rewards. An extensive body of behavioral research has revealed that DG ability in childhood is associated with a host of important outcomes throughout development, and that attentional focus away from temptations underlies this ability. In this study, we conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging study to identify the neural underpinnings of individual differences in DG among children. We observed a relationship between behavior during the classic DG task, a well-studied and ecologically valid measure, and functional connectivity during a modified version of this task in the scanner. Specifically, greater attentional focus away from temptations was associated with stronger functional coupling between the nucleus accumbens, a brain region that supports approach behavior, and several regions within prefrontal and parietal cortex that support self-control. These results shed light on the network interactions that contribute to DG and that account for individual differences in this capacity.

COGNITION-CHILDHOOD MALTREATMENT INTERACTIONS IN THE PREDICTION OF ANTIDEPRESSANT OUTCOMES IN MAJOR DEPRESSIVE DISORDER PATIENTS: RESULTS FROM THE iSPOT-D TRIAL

BACKGROUND

Childhood maltreatment (CM) history has been associated with poor treatment response in major depressive disorder (MDD), but the mechanisms underlying this relationship remain opaque. Dysfunction in the neural circuits for executive cognition is a putative neurobiological consequence of CM that may contribute importantly to adverse clinical outcomes. We used behavioral and neuroimaging measures of executive functioning to assess their contribution to the relationship between CM and antidepressant response in MDD patients.

METHODS

Ninety eight medication-free MDD outpatients participating in the International Study to Predict Optimized Treatment in Depression were assessed at baseline on behavioral neurocognitive measures and functional magnetic resonance imaging during tasks probing working memory (continuous performance task, CPT) and inhibition (Go/No-go). Seventy seven patients completed 8 weeks of antidepressant treatment. Baseline behavioral and neuroimaging measures were assessed in relation to CM (history of childhood physical, sexual, and/or emotional abuse) and posttreatment depression outcomes.

RESULTS

Patients with maltreatment exhibited decreased modulation of right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) activity during working memory updating on the CPT, and a corresponding impairment in CPT behavioral performance outside the scanner. No between-group differences were found for imaging or behavior on the Go/No-go test of inhibition. Greater DLPFC activity during CPT significantly predicted posttreatment symptom improvement in patients without maltreatment, whereas the relationship between DLPFC activity and symptom change was nonsignificant, and in the opposite direction, in patients with maltreatment.

CONCLUSIONS

The effect of CM on prefrontal circuitry involved in executive function is a potential predictor of antidepressant outcomes.

Neural activity to positive expressions predicts daily experience of schizophrenia-spectrum symptoms in adults with high social anhedonia

Social anhedonia (SA), the diminished pleasure from social relationships, is a prominent characteristic of the vulnerability and manifestation of schizophrenia disorder. However, SA can develop for multiple reasons and little is known about its neural basis; these 2 issues hinder the utility and sensitivity of SA as a marker of schizophrenia pathology. This study investigated whether lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) deficits in social reward processing are associated with both SA and other schizophrenia-spectrum symptoms. During functional MRI (fMRI), a community sample of healthy adults (N = 30) with high and low SA viewed positive, negative, and neutral facial expressions. Afterward, participants completed an online daily diary in which they rated schizophrenia-spectrum symptoms and occurrence of interpersonal conflict each day for 21 days. Compared with low SA, high SA participants had less ventral (V)LPFC activity to positive versus neutral expressions. In addition, participants with a combination of high SA and low VLPFC activity to positive versus neutral expressions had worse daily diary ratings of schizophrenia-spectrum symptoms, including worse cognition, paranoia, motivation/productivity, and vigor/positive affect (i.e., psychomotor activation). Finally, among high SA participants, VLPFC activity predicted the daily relationship between distress from interpersonal conflict and symptom-severity; specifically, high SA participants with low VLPFC activity had worse paranoia on days of high conflict distress. These findings indicate that VLPFC deficits in positive emotion are associated with both SA and other schizophrenia-spectrum symptoms and that understanding the interaction of SA, VLPFC function, and social stress could facilitate the use of SA in the prevention and treatment of schizophrenia.

Associations Between Childhood Abuse, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, and implicit Emotion Regulation Deficits: Evidence From a Low-Income Inner City Population

OBJECTIVE

Childhood abuse is associated with a wide range of negative outcomes, including increased risk for development of emotion dysregulation and psychopathology, such as posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The goal of the present study was to examine associations between child abuse, PTSD symptoms, and performance on an emotional conflict regulation task that assesses implicit emotion regulation abilities.

METHOD

The sample consisted of 67 (94% African American) females recruited from a public, urban hospital. Childhood abuse was measured using the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, and PTSD was measured using the modified PTSD Symptom Scale. Task accuracy and implicit emotion regulation were measured through an emotional conflict regulation behavioral task.

RESULTS

A multivariate analysis of covariance showed that exposure to moderate to severe childhood abuse was significantly related to worse emotional conflict regulation scores independent of current PTSD symptoms, depressive symptoms, and adult trauma exposure, suggesting a deficit in implicit emotion regulation. We also found an interaction between PTSD symptoms and abuse exposure in predicting accuracy on the behavioral task; high levels of PTSD symptoms were associated with poorer task accuracy among individuals who reported moderate to severe exposure to childhood abuse. However, no relationship between implicit emotion regulation abilities and overall PTSD symptom severity was found.

CONCLUSIONS

This study provides preliminary evidence of an implicit emotion regulation deficit for individuals exposed to significant childhood abuse and further supports the growing evidence that addressing various aspects of emotion dysregulation, such as awareness of emotions and strategies to manage strong emotions, in the context of treatment would be valuable.

A neurobiological approach to the cognitive deficits of psychiatric disorders

Deficits in brain networks that support cognitive regulatory functions are prevalent in many psychiatric disorders. Findings across neuropsychology and neuroimaging point to broad-based impairments that cross traditional diagnostic boundaries. These dysfunctions are largely separate from the classical symptoms of the disorders, and manifest in regulatory problems in both traditional cognitive and emotional domains. As such, they relate to the capacity of patients to engage effectively in their daily lives and activity, often persist even in the face of symptomatically effective treatment, and are poorly targeted by current treatments. Advances in cognitive neuroscience now allow us to ground an understanding of these cognitive regulatory deficits in the function and interaction of key brain networks. This emerging neurobiological understanding furthermore points to several promising routes for novel neuroscience-informed treatments targeted more specifically at improving cognitive function in a range of psychiatric disorders.

Consistency Over Flattery

Negative social feedback is often a source of distress. However, self-verification theory provides the counterintuitive explanation that negative feedback leads to less distress when it is consistent with chronic self-views. Drawing from this work, the present study examined the impact of receiving self-verifying feedback on outcomes largely neglected in prior research: implicit responses (i.e., physiological reactivity, facial expressions) that are difficult to consciously regulate and downstream behavioral outcomes. In two experiments, participants received either positive or negative feedback from interviewers during a speech task. Regardless of self-views, positive compared to negative feedback elicited lower self-reported negative affect. Implicit responses to negative feedback, however, depended on chronic self-views with more negative self-views associated with lower blood pressure reactivity, lower facial negativity, and enhanced creativity. These findings point at the role self-verification may play in long-term coping and stress regulation.

Aging and emotion recognition: not just a losing matter

Past studies on emotion recognition and aging have found evidence of age-related decline when emotion recognition was assessed by having participants detect single emotions depicted in static images of full or partial (e.g., eye region) faces. These tests afford good experimental control but do not capture the dynamic nature of real-world emotion recognition, which is often characterized by continuous emotional judgments and dynamic multimodal stimuli. Research suggests that older adults often perform better under conditions that better mimic real-world social contexts. We assessed emotion recognition in young, middle-aged, and older adults using two traditional methods (single emotion judgments of static images of faces and eyes) and an additional method in which participants made continuous emotion judgments of dynamic, multimodal stimuli (videotaped interactions between young, middle-aged, and older couples). Results revealed an Age × Test interaction. Largely consistent with prior research, we found some evidence that older adults performed worse than young adults when judging single emotions from images of faces (for sad and disgust faces only) and eyes (for older eyes only), with middle-aged adults falling in between. In contrast, older adults did better than young adults on the test involving continuous emotion judgments of dyadic interactions, with middle-aged adults falling in between. In tests in which target stimuli differed in age, emotion recognition was not facilitated by an age match between participant and target. These findings are discussed in terms of theoretical and methodological implications for the study of aging and emotional processing.

The effect of the serotonin transporter polymorphism (5-HTTLPR) on empathic and self-conscious emotional reactivity

We examined the relationship between a functional polymorphism of the serotonin transporter gene (5-HTTLPR) and individual differences in emotional reactivity in two laboratory studies. In Study 1, empathic responding and physiological reactivity to viewing films of others in distress were assessed in healthy adults in three age groups. In Study 2, emotional responding to watching oneself in an embarrassing situation was assessed in healthy adults and in patients with neurodegenerative diseases. In Study 1, participants with two short alleles of 5-HTTLPR reported more personal distress and showed higher levels of physiological responses in response to the films than participants with long alleles. In Study 2, participants with two short alleles reported more anger and amusement and displayed more emotional expressive behaviors in response to the embarrassing situation than participants with long alleles. These two findings from diverse samples of participants converge to indicate that individuals who are homozygous for the short allele variant of 5-HTTLPR have greater levels of emotional reactivity in two quite different socially embedded contexts.

Greater emotional empathy and prosocial behavior in late life

Emotional empathy and prosocial behavior were assessed in older, middle-aged, and young adults. Participants watched two films depicting individuals in need, one uplifting and the other distressing. Physiological responses were monitored during the films, and participants rated their levels of emotional empathy following each film. As a measure of prosocial behavior, participants were given an additional payment they could contribute to charities supporting the individuals in the films. Age-related linear increases were found for both emotional empathy (self-reported empathic concern and cardiac and electrodermal responding) and prosocial behavior (size of contribution) across both films and in self-reported personal distress to the distressing film. Empathic concern and cardiac reactivity to both films, along with personal distress to the distressing film only, were associated with greater prosocial behavior. Empathic concern partially mediated the age-related differences in prosocial behavior. Results are discussed in terms of our understanding both of adult development and of the nature of these vital aspects of human emotion.

Explicit and implicit emotion regulation: a dual-process framework

It is widely acknowledged that emotions can be regulated in an astonishing variety of ways. Most research to date has focused on explicit (effortful) forms of emotion regulation. However, there is growing research interest in implicit (automatic) forms of emotion regulation. To organise emerging findings, we present a dual-process framework that integrates explicit and implicit forms of emotion regulation, and argue that both forms of regulation are necessary for well-being. In the first section of this review, we provide a broad overview of the construct of emotion regulation, with an emphasis on explicit and implicit processes. In the second section, we focus on explicit emotion regulation, considering both neural mechanisms that are associated with these processes and their experiential and physiological consequences. In the third section, we turn to several forms of implicit emotion regulation, and integrate the burgeoning literature in this area. We conclude by outlining open questions and areas for future research.

Executive functions and the down-regulation and up-regulation of emotion

This study examined the relationship between individual differences in executive functions (EF; assessed by measures of working memory, Stroop, trail making, and verbal fluency) and ability to down-regulate and up-regulate responses to emotionally evocative film clips. To ensure a wide range of EF, 48 participants with diverse neurodegenerative disorders and 21 older neurologically normal ageing participants were included. Participants were exposed to three different movie clips that were designed to elicit a mix of disgust and amusement. While watching the films they were either instructed to watch, down-regulate, and up-regulate their visible emotional responses. Heart rate and facial behaviours were monitored throughout. Emotion regulatory ability was operationalised as changes in heart rate and facial behaviour in the down- and up-regulation conditions, controlling for responses in the watch condition. Results indicated that higher verbal fluency scores were related to greater ability to regulate emotion in both the down-regulation and up-regulation conditions. This finding remained significant even after controlling for age and general cognitive functioning. No relationships were found between emotion regulation and the other EF measures. We believe these results derive from differences among EF measures, with verbal-fluency performance best capturing the complex sequence of controlled planning, activation, and monitoring required for successful emotion regulation. These findings contribute to our understanding of emotion-cognition interaction, suggesting a link between emotion-regulatory abilities and individual differences in complex executive functions.

Individual differences in neural responses to social rejection: the joint effect of self-esteem and attentional control

Individuals with low self-esteem have been found to react more negatively to signs of interpersonal rejection than those with high self-esteem. However, previous research has found that individual differences in attentional control can attenuate negative reactions to social rejection among vulnerable, low self-esteem individuals. The current fMRI study sought to elucidate the neurobiological substrate of this buffering effect. We hypothesized and found that while looking at scenes of social rejection (vs negative scenes) low self-esteem high attentional control individuals engaged the rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rACC), an area of the brain associated with emotional control, more than their low self-esteem low attentional control peers. Furthermore, we found that low self-esteem high attentional control individuals evaluated social rejection as less arousing and less rejecting in a separate behavioral task. Importantly, activation in the rACC fully mediated the relationship between the interaction of self-esteem and attentional control and emotional evaluations, suggesting that the rACC activation underlies the buffering effects of attentional control. Results are discussed in terms of individual differences in emotional vulnerability and protection and by highlighting the role of rACC in emotion regulation.

Coherence between emotional experience and physiology: does body awareness training have an impact?

Two fundamental issues in emotion theory and research concern: (a) the role of emotion in promoting response coherence across different emotion systems; and (b) the role of awareness of bodily sensations in the experience of emotion. The present study poses a question bridging the two domains; namely, whether training in Vipassana meditation or dance, both of which promote attention to certain kinds of bodily sensations, is associated with greater coherence between the subjective and physiological aspects of emotion. We used lag correlations to examine second-by-second coherence between subjective emotional experience and heart period within individuals across four different films. Participants were either: (a) experienced Vipassana meditators (attention to visceral sensations), (b) experienced dancers (attention to somatic sensations), and (c) controls with no meditation or dance experience. Results indicated a linear relationship in coherence, with meditators having highest levels, dancers having intermediary levels, and controls having lowest levels. We conclude that the coherence between subjective and cardiac aspects of emotion is greater in those who have specialized training that promotes greater body awareness.

The ability to regulate emotion is associated with greater well-being, income, and socioeconomic status

Are people who are best able to implement strategies to regulate their emotional expressive behavior happier and more successful than their counterparts? Although past research has examined individual variation in knowledge of the most effective emotion regulation strategies, little is known about how individual differences in the ability to actually implement these strategies, as assessed objectively in the laboratory, are associated with external criteria. In two studies, we examined how individual variation in the ability to modify emotional expressive behavior in response to evocative stimuli is related to well-being and financial success. Study 1 showed that individuals who can best suppress their emotional reaction to an acoustic startle are happiest with their lives. Study 2 showed that individuals who can best amplify their emotional reaction to a disgust-eliciting movie are happiest with their lives and have the highest disposable income and socioeconomic status. Thus, being able to implement emotion regulation strategies in the laboratory is closely linked to well-being and financial success.

Tracking emotional valence: the role of the orbitofrontal cortex

Successful navigation of the social world requires the ability to recognize and track emotions as they unfold and change dynamically. Neuroimaging and neurological studies of emotion recognition have primarily focused on the ability to identify the emotion shown in static photographs of facial expressions, showing correlations with the amygdala as well as temporal and frontal brain regions. In this study, we examined the neural correlates of continuously tracking dynamically changing emotions. Fifty-nine patients with diverse neurodegenerative diseases used a rating dial to track continuously how positive or how negative the character in a film clip felt. Tracking accuracy was determined by comparing participants' ratings with the ratings of 10 normal control participants. The relationship between tracking accuracy and regional brain tissue content was examined using voxel-based morphometry. Low tracking accuracy was primarily associated with gray matter loss in the right lateral orbitofrontal cortex (OFC). Our finding that the right OFC is critical to the ability to track dynamically changing emotions is consistent with previous research showing right OFC involvement in both socioemotional understanding and modifying responding in changing situations.

Emotion regulation deficits in frontotemporal lobar degeneration and Alzheimer's disease

We examined instructed and spontaneous emotion regulation in patients with frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD, N = 32), which presents with profound emotional and personality changes; patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD, N = 17), which presents with profound memory impairment; and neurologically normal controls (N = 25). Participants were exposed to an aversive acoustic startle stimulus (115 dB) under 3 different conditions: (a) unwarned without instructions to down-regulate, (b) warned without instructions to down-regulate, and (c) warned with instructions to down-regulate. In the last 2 conditions, the warning took the form of a 20-s countdown. In all conditions, visible aspects of the startle response were assessed by measuring overall somatic activity and coding emotional facial expressions. FTLD patients, AD patients, and control participants showed similar patterns of down-regulation in somatic activity across the 3 startle trials. However, differences between the 3 groups emerged in the amount of emotional facial behavior expressed in the startle trials. There were no group differences in response in the unwarned condition, indicating that the startle response was intact in the patients. In the warned with instructions condition, both FTLD and AD patients were moderately impaired in down-regulatory ability compared with controls. In the warned without instructions condition, AD patients and normal controls spontaneously down-regulated their emotional responses, but FTLD patients did not. These findings illuminate specific problems that these patients have in the emotional realm.

Rejection sensitivity moderates the impact of rejection on self-concept clarity

Self-concept clarity (SCC) refers to the extent to which self-knowledge is clearly and confidently defined, internally consistent, and temporally stable. Research shows that SCC can be undermined by failures in valued goal domains. Because preventing rejection is an important self-relevant goal for people high in rejection sensitivity (RS), it is hypothesized here that failures to attain this goal would cause them to experience diminished SCC. Study 1, an experimental study, showed that high-RS people's SCC was undermined following rejection but not following an aversive experience unrelated to rejection. Study 2, a daily diary study of couples in relationships, used occurrence of partner conflicts to operationalize rejection. Replicating the findings in Study 1, having a conflict on any given diary day predicted a greater reduction in the SCC of high- compared to low-RS people on the following day. The implications for understanding the conditions under which rejection negatively affects the self-concept are discussed.

Do tests of executive functioning predict ability to downregulate emotions spontaneously and when instructed to suppress?

Behavioral regulation is a hallmark feature of executive functioning (EF). The present study investigated whether commonly used neuropsychological test measures of EF (i.e., working memory, Stroop, trail making, and verbal fluency) were related to ability to downregulate emotion both spontaneously and when instructed to suppress emotional expressions. To ensure a wide range of EF, 24 frontotemporal lobar degeneration patients, 7 Alzheimer's patients, and 17 neurologically normal controls participated. Participants were exposed to an acoustic startle stimulus (single aversive noise burst) under three conditions: (1) unwarned, (2) warned with no instructions (to measure spontaneous emotion downregulation), and (3) warned with instructions to suppress (to measure instructed emotion downregulation). Results indicated that higher verbal fluency scores were related to greater emotion regulation (operationalized as reduction in body movement and emotional facial behavior when warned of the impending startle) in both regulation conditions. No relationships were found between emotion regulation in these conditions and the other EF measures. We conclude that, of four commonly used measures of EF, verbal fluency best indexes the complex processes of monitoring, evaluation, and control necessary for successful emotion regulation, both spontaneously and following instructions to suppress.

Resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia buffers against rejection sensitivity via emotion control

Emerging evidence suggests that high resting heart rate variability in the respiratory frequency band, or respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) may capture individual differences in the capacity to engage in situationally appropriate regulation of affect and behavior. The authors therefore hypothesized that high RSA may act as a protective factor against difficulties controlling negative affect and hostile behaviors in conflicts with romantic partners in highly rejection-sensitive individuals--a population otherwise vulnerable to these responses. Results were consistent with this hypothesis such that highly rejection-sensitive participants reported less emotion control and more hostility in conflicts only if they were also low in RSA. Furthermore, emotion control mediated the joint effect of rejection-sensitivity and RSA on hostile conflict behavior. These results are consistent with the argument that resting RSA is a marker of flexible responding in the context of highly emotional situations, and further suggest that it may serve as a protective factor particularly in vulnerable populations.

Applying the Cognitive-Affective Processing Systems Approach to Conceptualizing Rejection Sensitivity

The Cognitive-Affective Processing Systems or CAPS theory (Mischel & Shoda, 1995) was proposed to account for the processes that explain why and how people's behavior varies stably across situations. Research on Rejection Sensitivity is reviewed as a programmatic attempt to illustrate how personality dispositions can be studied within the CAPS framework. This research reveals an if … then … (e.g., if situation X, he does A, but if situation Y, he does B) pattern of rejection sensitivity such that high rejection sensitive people's goal to prevent rejection can lead to accommodating behavior; yet, the failure to achieve this goal can lead to aggression, reactivity, and lack of self-concept clarity. These situation-behavior relations or personality signatures reflect a stable activation network of distinctive personality processing dynamics. These dynamics link fears and expectations of rejection, perceptions/attributions of rejection, and affective/behavioral overreactions to perceived rejection. Self-regulatory and attentional mechanisms may interact with these dynamics as buffers against high rejection sensitivity, illustrating how multiple processes within a CAPS network play out in behavior.

Individual differences in the rejection-aggression link in the hot sauce paradigm: The case of Rejection Sensitivity

Prior research shows that social rejection elicits aggression. In this study, we investigated whether this is moderated by individual differences in Rejection Sensitivity (RS) - a processing disposition to anxiously expect, readily perceive and overreact to rejection. Participants (N = 129) took part in a purported web-based social interaction in which they were either rejected or not by a potential partner. Subsequently, they were given the opportunity to allocate hot sauce to the perpetrator, knowing that he/she disliked spicy food. Amount of hot sauce was used as a behavioral index of aggression. Participants in the rejection condition allocated more hot sauce to the perpetrator than those in the control condition. However, RS moderated this effect such that rejection elicited aggression in high but not in low RS people. These results held after controlling for trait neuroticism. Implications of these findings for understanding how and why rejection elicits aggression are discussed.

Defensive physiological reactions to rejection: the effect of self-esteem and attentional control on startle responses

We examined the hypothesis that rejection automatically elicits defensive physiological reactions in people with low self-esteem (SE) but that attentional control moderates this effect. Undergraduates (N= 67) completed questionnaire measures of SE and attentional control. Their eye-blink responses to startle probes were measured while they viewed paintings related to rejection and acceptance themes. The stimuli also included positive-, negative-, and neutral-valence control paintings unrelated to rejection. As predicted, compared with people high in SE, those low in SE showed stronger startle eye-blink responses to paintings related to rejection, but not to negative paintings. Paintings related to acceptance did not attenuate their physiological reactivity. Furthermore, attentional control moderated their sensitivity to rejection, such that low SE was related to greater eye-blink responses to rejection only among individuals who were low in attentional control. Implications of the role of attentional control as a top-down process regulating emotional reactivity in people with low SE are discussed.