Regulating responses to anger: Effects of rumination and distraction on angry mood.

“…1 None R1 Cont1 140 162 0.20 Rusting & DeHart (2000) 2 Negative affect R2 Cont1 20 20 0.00 Rusting & DeHart (2000) 2 Negative affect C1 Cont1 20 20 0.00 Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema (1998) 3 Anger D4 Cont1 20 20 0.95 Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema (1998) 3 Anger C2 Cont1 20 20 1.18 Santos (2008) 1 Negative…”

“Indeed, studies have shown that distraction with neutral materials can reduce depression (Morrow & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1990; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1993), and anger (Gerin, Davidson, Goyal, Christenfeld, & Schwartz, 2006; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“In two studies using different mood inductions, Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema (1998) found that women induced into an angry mood were subsequently more likely to choose a nonemotionfocusing task than an emotion-focusing task, whereas men were more likely to choose to focus on their angry emotions (see…”

“…has focused on its effects on individuals with an elevated depressed mood, rumination appears to exacerbate whatever mood or theme is currently active in the individual (Blagden & Craske, 1996; Bushman, 2002; Bushman, Bonacci, Pedersen, Vasquez, & Miller, 2005; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Improvements in mood would be of particular interest given that MDD is characterized by low levels of positive affect (Watson and NaragonGainey, 2010).”

“[43] These individuals are more likely to experience an increase in physiological arousal[49, 50] and tend to ruminate over negative emotional events,[51, 52]) whereas an accepting stance toward emotions has been linked to increased persistence in challenging situations and reductions in subjective distress.”

“…observed in this study were comparable to those observed in prior research using similar recall tasks (e.g., Richards, Beal, Seagal, & Pennebaker, 2000; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998), the results of which have been shown to predict important real-world mental and physical health outcomes…”

“For example, Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema (1998) demonstrated that rumination on anger increased feelings of anger following an experimental angry mood induction, whereas participants who were distracted following the angry mood induction showed significantly lower levels of anger.”

“Hoeksema, 2000; Schwartz & Koenig, 1996), whereas laboratory studies have found that rumination inductions exacerbate anxiety (Blagden & Craske, 1996) and anger ( Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998 ).”

“Two studies report positive findings with anger (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Thomsen, Jørgensen, Mehlsen, & Zachariae, 2004a).”

“In previous research, judges rated both types of phrases as affectively neutral (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Such a proposal is quite consistent with the existing literature on rumination (e.g., Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Research suggesting that anger has a strong cognitive component (e.g., Ayduk et al., 2002; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998) makes it plausible that this cognitive strategy would be successful in the context of anger.”

“It has been shown to enhance anger and aggression (e.g., Bushman, 2002; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998), lead to higher levels of depressive symptoms over time (e.g., Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991; Nolen-Hoeksema, Morrow, & Fredrickson, 1993), impair problem-solving ability (Lyubomirsky &…”

“A recent addition is a six-item subscale for measuring benevolence motivation (e.g., “Even though his/her actions hurt me, I have goodwill for him/her”) that also has good reliability (McCullough et al., 2003; McCullough & Hoyt, 2002 ).”

“For example, ruminating about the causes of one’s depressive symptoms appears to prolong depressed moods and negative affect (Mor & Winquist, 2002), ruminating about the causes of one’s anger appears to prolong anger ( Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998 ), and ruminating about an insult while hitting a punching bag appear…”

“…related to other negative emotions, e.g. anxiety (Blagden & Craske, 1996; Davey, 1995; Mellings & Alden, 2000; Nolen-Hoeksema, 2000; Roger & Najarian, 1989) and anger (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998) or aggression (Caprara, Gargaro, Pastorelli, Prezza, Renzi, & Zelli, 1987; Roger & Najarian, 1989).”

“2009) are similarly unproductive, and ruminating about unpleasant events prolongs both angry and depressed moods (Nolen-Hoeksema and Morrow 1993; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema 1998).”

“After a stressful event, people may ruminate about the causes and consequences of their distress (79, 80).”

“Angered participants made to ruminate became angrier and exhibited more aggressive responses following a minor trigger than did participants who distracted themselves [Bushman et al., 2005; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998].”

“Also consistent with the GAM, laboratory manipulations of rumination increased cardiovascular arousal, as well as aggressive affect and cognition (Pedersen, Denson, Goss, Vasquez, & Miller, 2005; see also Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“For example, angry people may ruminate on the eliciting event ( Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998 ) or seek out the antagonist (reviewed in Kring, 2000), behaviors that likely prolong rather than shorten this negative affect.”

“Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema found that distraction reduced angry mood after a personally relevant anger-induction task, whereas rumination increased feelings of anger (38).”

“Rumination has been examined in the context of depression, anxiety, and anger, among others (Denson, Fabiansson, Creswell, & Pedersen, 2009; Denson, Pedersen, & Miller, 2006; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1993; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Following a provocation, both types of rumination increase anger and aggression (Denson, Pedersen, & Miller, 2006; Bushman et al., 2005, Experiment 2; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998 ).”

“As such, the concept of distraction plays an important role in leading theories of emotion regulation (Bishop, Duncan, & Lawrence, 2004; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Trask & Sigmon, 1999).”

“... depressed mood, anxiety, or anger with self-focused rumination experience greater negative moods, as well as negatively biased thinking, problem-solving deficits, and impaired attention and concentration (Ingram, 1990; Lyubomirsky, Caldwell, & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Lyubomirsky, Kasri, & Zehm, in press; Lyubomirsky…”

“For example, rumination on sad or angry thoughts and feelings about one’s self or others maintains or increases the sad or angry feelings (Bushman, 2002; Morrow & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1990; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1993; Ray, Wilhelm, & Gross, 2005; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Trask & Sigmon, 1999; Vickers & Vogeltanz-…”

“…between rumination and negative mood has been focused on dysphoric or depressed affect, similar findings have been reported for other negative moods, such as anxiety (Fritz, 1999; Schwartz & Koenig, 1996; Segerstrom et al., 2000) and anger (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998, Studies 1 and 3).”

“…thought is more likely when one is alone; not engaged in another cognitively demanding activity; facing a mirror; or explicitly performing a self-referring task, such as writing an essay about one’s current mood (Baumeister, 1991; Pyszczynski & Greenberg, 1987; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“…people report less anger rumination may have important emotional consequences since ruminating increases the level of anger experienced over time (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998) delays cardiovascular recovery after an angering experience (Suchday, Carter, Ewart, Larkin, & Desiderato, 2004) and…”

“People vary in the extent to which they experience angry rumination (e.g., Caprara, 1986; Sukhodolsky et al., 2001), but this state can also be manipulated in experimental settings (e.g., Bushman, 2002; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Different mood regulation strategies (such as rumination or distraction) may be used to either enhance or reduce negative moods, such as depression, anxiety, and anger (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Thayer, Newman, & McClain, 1994).”

“Also, Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema (1998) found that rumination can increase angry mood, which we expect might increase aggression.”

“…that focus the individual’s attention on the negative mood, the causes and consequences of this mood, and self-evaluations related to the mood” (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998, p. 790), exacerbates negative thinking and depression while obstructing problem solving and goal-directed…”

“For example, attempts to suppress emotions increase physiological arousal (Gross and Levenson 1997), and rumination over negative emotional events prolongs angry and depressed affective states (Nolen-Hoeksema and Morrow 1993; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema 1998).”

“, Llera and Newman, 2014; Peasley-Miklus and Vrana, 2000), rumination (Morrow and NolenHoeksema, 1990; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998), and suppression (Ehring et al.”

“Based on prior rumination research (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998), we created a control condition whereby participants were asked to think of and write about a situation where “nothing out of the ordinary happened.””

“Girls and boys were expected to engage in equivalent levels of anger rumination, based on previous findings for adults (Maxwell, 2004; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Sukhodolsky et al., 2001), and no sex differences were expected in the relations among anger rumination, anger, and aggression.”

“Rumination has emerged as an important cognitive process for explaining depression and alcohol use (Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Nolen-Hoeksema & Harrell, 2002) anxiety disorders (Clark, 2001), and, more to the point of the present article, anger (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Distraction provides a particularly attractive strategy to compare self-distancing against because like self-distancing, we expected cueing a person to distract themselves immediately after recalling a negative experience would reduce their negative feelings (e.g., Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Findings were consistent with the hypotheses and with previous research demonstrating a link between anger rumination and anger (Bushman 2002; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema 1998), and anger rumination and aggression (e.g., Maxwell 2004).”

“... suppression and self-distraction have been treated as distinctly diVerent processes in the emotion regulation literature, as reXected by the fact that they are deWned diVerently, assessed with diVerent individual diVerence scales (e.g., suppression: Gross & John, 2003; distraction: Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991),…”

“These scales have been used extensively in previous research as measures of state-like mood (e.g., Lyubomirsky, Caldwell, & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Traditionally, rumination research has focused on understanding psychopathology and how it contributes to the development and maintenance of depression, anger, and anxiety disorders (18,19).”

“In everyday situations that elicit anger, higher levels of this emotion are associated with higher levels of rumination (Balsamo 2010; Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema 1998).”

“…that we were not inappropriately activating confounding constructs, we pretested this measure along with two other standard, well-validated measures of anger and happiness that are considered distinct from trust manipulations (Keltner, Ellsworth, & Edwards, 1993; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“In contrast, distracting activities are known to speed recovery from subjective experiences of anger ( Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998 ), and distractions that evoke positive emotions are known to speed recovery from negative emotional arousal (Fredrickson and Levenson, 1998; Fredrickson et al., 2000).”

“For example, anger rumination, or the tendency to dwell on experiences of anger, intensifies angry feelings (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998), increases aggressive behavior (Bushman, Bonacci, Pederson, Vasquesz, & Miller, 2005), and is uniquely related to symptoms of borderline personality disorder…”

“Furthermore, some challenging responses may facilitate individuals’ ability to gain emotional distance from the event, which has been found to have some beneficial effects on emotional adjustment (Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“Rusting and Nolen-Hoeksema (1998) found that ruminating about an anger-inducing event exacerbated anger, whereas distraction decreased it.”

“Thus, rumination can increase depressive affect (cf. Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991) but also angry affect (Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998).”

“In order to collect baseline biophysical data for calm and aroused states, we used an emotional induction method, popularized by Rusting and Holen-Hoeksema [19].”

“The effects of rumination on emotion, social behavior, and health are quite undesirable (Bushman, 2002; Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Rusting & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Thomsen, Mehlsen, 130”