We certainly can regulate our emotions. Mountains of research from the last 30 years finds that this is indeed possible. However, for some reason, we as humans cannot simply tell to ourselves feel less emotion when we feel distressed.
But why? If I am anxious, why can’t I just tell myself to feel less anxious and then it works? Human psychology composes an interaction of multiple “systems” directly tied to the brain and nervous system. That is, emotions, cognition, behavior, biology / physiology, and more. Direct attempts to manipulate the emotion “system” has little effect on our emotional experience. This may be because many emotions arise quickly and directly in response to what’s happening in the environment.
Emotions are meant to give us a strong internal signal to make us aware of the situation and respond effectively. In a way, many emotions are supposed to be distressing, even though they feel unpleasant. For example, they give us a strong feeling and activate our autonomic nervous system (e.g., fight or flight) when anxious to help us assess danger and react effectively. If emotions were easy to interrupt by our attempts to change them, they may not be effective for this purpose.
What research says about how to regulate emotion
So, simply telling ourselves, “Feel calmer” or “Don’t be so sad” does not change our emotional state. Research finds that attempting to suppress or not feel internal emotional experience proves ineffective. Instructing ourselves to simply feel less emotion never works.
However, we can directly influence other psychological processes, like thoughts or behaviors. For example, we humans can talk ourselves into thinking differently about a situation. Or we can decide to take a different course of action when others insult us (e.g., we might crack a joke).
The nice thing is that we humans evolved in a way that allows our thoughts and behaviors to have an effect on our emotions. Our emotion “system” is integrated with many other systems. This provides an option for how to feel less emotion indirectly: we can feel less when we modify beliefs, behaviors, and biology that correspond to emotions. So much about regulating emotion is about how we intentionally work with these other psychological systems.
For example, thinking objectively about something anxiety-provoking leads us to feel less negative (i.e., cognitive reappraisal). “This talk I am giving will give me a chance to get feedback on my clients” as opposed to “This will make others think I’m a bad therapist.” Or, deciding to simply allow our emotions to exist and not change them (i.e., emotional acceptance) can provide emotional relief.
Behaviors provide ourselves evidence that we may be effective. Behaving positively yields a good response from others, which makes us feel better emotionally. Other behaviors allow us to contact emotional situations to influence how they affect us. These behaviors include avoidance or exposure to a feared situation, and yield differences in our own long-term emotional responses.
The interaction of behavior and biology includes changing the muscles on our face in a situation to affect emotion (aka “facial feedback hypothesis”). Research finds that putting our lips and facial muscles into a genuine smile (not a fake one) actually leads to feeling happier. Interestingly, those reporting minimal or no depressive symptoms in another study experienced less anxiety when suppressing the expression of anxiety on their face. For some reason, this effect goes away for those who experience mild to severe depression.
Research is currently in the process of examining other processes that affect our emotional responses. For example, breathing strategies show short term benefits in some situations, but long-term benefits are unclear. On the other hand, bilateral stimulation appears to be ineffective above and beyond exposure and other memory processing.
What it means for therapy
How do therapists help people regulate emotion? Therapy provides an opportunity to help others learn specific methods to intentionally influence their emotions. This helps them react more adaptively and impact their lives in beneficial ways. Mental health therapy is often thought of as an emotion regulation tool. Multiple therapies help clients learn methods to regulate emotion (e.g., CBT, DBT, ACT, exposure, etc.).
Many emotions are difficult to experience and we cannot directly change them. Luckily, humans evolved in a way that allows them to modify emotions in indirect ways using other aspects of psychology. The ability for humans to learn these methods is a huge advantage for therapists who want to help.
