UCLA

Most studies on significant life events have examined deleterious mental health outcomes resulting from stressful or negative events. Recent work examining both negative and positive aspects of life events has found that positive aspects of significant life events protect against psychopathology. However, mechanisms by which positive aspects of events confer their beneficial effects are unclear. Clarifying mechanisms of protection may aid in the identification of novel intervention targets. The current studies examined affective states and cognitive reappraisal, an emotion regulation strategy, as possible explanatory factors. Study 1 tested longitudinal relationships between positive and negative aspects of life events, affective states, cognitive reappraisal, and transdiagnostic symptoms. Study 2 assessed whether experimental manipulation of affective states alters cognitive appraisals, represented by interpretive bias. Study 3 explored the role of positive affect and cognitive reappraisal as predictors of treatment response within a novel treatment aimed at promoting positive affect, compared to a treatment targeting reductions in negative affect. Study 1 found that positivity of interpersonal, but not non-interpersonal events promoted positive affect, and offered preliminary support for positive affect as a mediator of the relationship between positivity of events and symptomatology. Study 2 found that a positive mood induction produced more positive interpretive bias to non-social situations than a negative induction condition, whereas a negative induction condition demonstrated greater negative response bias for social scenarios and a greater positive response bias for non-social scenarios. Study 3 demonstrated that positive affect, but not cognitive reappraisal, predicted symptom reduction across treatment conditions, and higher average positive affect predicted higher average cognitive reappraisal and vice versa. The current studies examined affective states and emotion regulation as possible mechanisms of protection against psychopathology originating from positive aspects of life events. Findings suggest that interventions which seek to upregulate positive emotional states may facilitate emotion regulation and reduce risk for psychopathology.