Emotion regulation in acceptance and commitment therapy

Abstract

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) offers an alternative to traditional psychotherapies designed to regulate affect. ACT is based on the premise that normal cognitive processes distort and enhance the experience of unpleasant emotion, leading clients to engage in problematic behaviors designed to avoid or attenuate those unpleasant emotions. Such avoidant behavior patterns can hinder and prevent client movement toward valued goals and place the client in harmful situations. Rather than working to change cognitions or decrease levels of emotion, the ACT approach involves the client directly experiencing problematic emotions in a context in which the literal functions of language enhancing the negative implications of those emotions are stripped away. The focus throughout the treatment is facilitating the client's movement toward a more valued and personally fulfilling life, in a context in which previously obstructive unpleasant emotions no longer serve as obstructions. A case study is provided to illustrate some of ACT's core techniques.

The Longitudinal Effect of Emotion Regulation Strategies on Anxiety Levels in Children and Adolescents

“…After controlling for depression, age, and gender, all three forms of emotion dysregulation concurrently were associated with physical and social anxiety symptoms, supporting previous cross-sectional research on the relationship between anxiety symptoms and difficulties with emotion awareness (Mennin, Heimberg, Turk, & Fresco, 2002; Novick-Kline, Turk, Mennin, Hoyt, & Gallagher, 2005; Roemer et al, 2009) and acceptance (Eifert & Heffner, 2003; Forsyth, Eifert, & Barrios, 2006), and adding to the literature on goal-directed behavior (Blackledge & Hayes, 2001; Gratz & Roemer, 2004). However, at present, only emotion non-awareness and difficulties with goal-directed behavior were related to separation anxiety symptoms.…”

“…Specifically, committed action teaches clients to continue moving in valued life directions even in the face of challenging situations and emotions (Blackledge & Hayes, 2001), whereas opposite action teaches the similar ability to “do the opposite” of what strong negative emotions would dictate (e.g., to approach a feared situation rather than to avoid it, to respond directly and respectfully to a perceived insult rather than ignore it and later blow up, etc.). Although the negative effects of avoidance have been studied extensively (Chawla & Ostafin, 2007; Kashdan, Barrios, Forsyth, & Steger, 2006), to our knowledge there has been no study that specifically explores the connection between the capacity to pursue goal-directed behavior in the face of strong emotion and anxiety levels.…”

The role of psychological interventions in the management of patients with chronic pain

“…Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is the most common of the acceptance-based psychotherapies. ACT emphasizes the importance of facilitating the client’s progress toward attaining a more valued and fulfilling life by increasing psychological flexibility rather than strictly focusing on restructuring cognitions 44. In the context of chronic pain, ACT targets ineffective control strategies and experiential avoidance by fostering techniques that establish psychological flexibility.…”

Emotion regulation and coping motives serially affect cannabis cessation problems among dually diagnosed outpatients.

“…Given that the data suggest that patients with more severe anxiety suffer from more problems with emotion regulation which may increase their reliance on cannabis to cope with negative affectivity (leading to greater cessation problems and withdrawal symptoms), clinicians may consider explicitly teaching these patients more adaptive ways to manage negative affect to reduce their reliance on cannabis. Both adaptive and maladaptive emotion regulation strategies have been found to change during cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) and acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) (Aldao, Jazaieri, Goldin, & Gross, 2014; Blackledge & Hayes, 2001; Forkmann et al, 2014; Gratz & Roemer, 2004; Moscovitch et al, 2012). Importantly, targeting emotional regulation skills during psychotherapy leads to enhancement in emotion regulation skills (Berking, Meier, & Wupperman, 2010) and better treatment outcomes (Berking et al, 2008).…”