Emotional development across adulthood: differential age-related emotional reactivity and emotion regulation in a negative mood induction procedure

Abstract

The present study examines the hypothesis that older adults might differentially react to a negative versus neutral mood induction procedure than younger adults. The rationale for this expectation was derived from Socioemotional Selectivity Theory (SST), which postulates differential salience of emotional information and ability to regulate emotions across adulthood. The present data support a view of differential age-related effects of negative mood inductions with greater and more heterogeneous emotional reactivity among older adults, who showed a substantially greater decrease in self-rated pleasantness, calmness, and wakefulness than younger adults. Moreover, relative to the younger adults, emotion regulation in terms of mood repair was more effective among the older adults. The age-related mood effects are discussed in terms of SST and have practical implications for the study of emotion and cognition across adulthood.