Date of Award

August 2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Counseling Psychology & Community Services

First Advisor

Kara Wettersten

Abstract

Internalizing symptoms, such as anxiety and depression, impact a substantial number of emerging adults each year. Previous literature has examined relationship quality’s impact on internalizing symptoms but has yet to include emotion regulation. Therefore, both intra- and interpersonal emotion regulation’s impact on the well-established association between relationship quality and internalizing symptoms was assessed. Two-hundred and fifty-nine emerging adults were surveyed on the factors of: Relationship Quality, Attachment Style, Relationship Maintenance Behaviors, Intrapersonal Emotion Regulation, Interpersonal Emotion Regulation, Depression and Anxiety symptoms. As hypothesized, results found a negative, moderate correlation between relationship quality and internalizing symptoms (r = -.54). Additionally, there was a negative, moderate correlation between intrapersonal emotion regulation and internalizing symptoms (r = -.65). Furthermore, both interpersonal and intrapersonal emotion regulation strategies mediated the association between relationship quality and internalizing symptoms. This study sheds light on future studies aiming to understand the theoretical and practical mechanism of different types of emotion regulation and its role in psychopathology, which may also help develop psychotherapy interventions.

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