Empathy and inhibitory control in emotional regulation in response to affective distractors.

Empathy and emotional regulation play a central role in the socio-affective adaptation of young adults. However, their interactions remain insufficiently documented, particularly when emotional stimuli are task-irrelevant. The present study aimed to examine the extent to which the cognitive and affective dimensions of empathy modulate emotional regulation mechanisms within a motor inhibition paradigm. Thirty-one young adults completed the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI) and subsequently performed a modified Go/NoGo task in which negative, neutral, or positive images were presented as affective distractors preceding a Go or NoGo signal. Following each trial, participants rated the subjective valence of the image on a Likert scale. Results first indicated that negative images slowed response times in the Go condition, whereas positive images were associated with a reduction in error rates relative to neutral images. Furthermore, activation of inhibitory control influenced subjective emotional experience, with overall more negative valence ratings following a NoGo signal than a Go signal, particularly for positive images. Finally, analyses revealed that specific empathy dimensions, notably perspective-taking and empathic concern, were associated with more negative ratings of negative images, without exerting a robust effect on inhibitory performance. These findings suggest that inhibition is not limited to behavioral adjustment but also contributes to the implicit modulation of emotional experience, whereas empathy appears to influence subjective sensitivity to negative stimuli more than the efficiency of inhibitory control.