Why and How Romantic Partners Make Each Other Feel Bad: A Dyadic Study of Goals, Strategies, and Outcomes of Extrinsic Emotion Regulation Over Three Weeks

Emotion regulation research has focused on how we improve our own emotions, with little research on how we improve others’ emotions and almost nothing on how or why we try to make others feel worse (extrinsic affect-worsening). The current study addresses this research gap by examining several regulation goals (worsen other’s affect, improve own affect, gain power), strategies (criticising, pressuring, withdrawing), and outcomes (positive affect, negative affect, perceived power) when opposite-sex romantic couples try to make each other feel worse. We aimed to examine: 1) which goals predict which strategies and 2) which strategies predict which outcomes. Participants (N = 167 dyads) completed six end-of-day surveys online over three consecutive weekends (n = 898 surveys). Within-person effects were analysed using longitudinal actor-partner interdependence models. Aim 1 results found mostly significant actor effects of goals on strategies. Effect sizes were largest for the goal ‘worsen other’s affect’. Aim 2 hypotheses (that all strategies would worsen a partner’s affect) were not supported. In addition, no strategy predicted a decrease in a partner’s perceived power or increase in one’s own. This study is the first to examine extrinsic affect worsening with improve own affect goals, and with power as a regulation goal and outcome. This links intimate partner violence to emotion regulation theory, producing new insights. Future research could explore the antecedents and processes of affect-worsening to establish a more holistic understanding of extrinsic emotion regulation, and to inform interventions for abuse.