The Three Components Of Negative Mood Regulation (NMRR)

Alexithymia. Some individuals cannot identify or describe how they feel. This condition is known as alexithymia, which represents difficulty identifying and describing feelings and externally oriented thinking, which is the tendency to focus on external rather than internal events and experiences (Thompson & Schoenbrun, 2013). Emotional awareness theory states that individuals with alexithymia are unable to cognitively identify feelings by recognizing physiological signs of emotions (Shishido, Gaher, & Simons, 2013). Bagby and colleagues developed the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) to assess the three components of alexithymia: difficulties identifying feelings, difficulties describing feelings, and externally oriented thinking (Nowakowski, …show more content…
Negative mood regulation expectancies (NMRE) are beliefs that one can alleviate their negative mood, either through positive thinking or behavior (Catanzaro & Mearns, 1999). Social learning theory and generalized expectancy for affective self-regulation, which is an expectancy that an overt behavior or thought will alleviate a negative mood or induce a positive mood, frame NMRE, which addresses why certain individuals can alleviate their negative mood and use adaptive coping mechanisms better than others. Catanzaro and Mearns (1990) created the Negative Mood Regulation (NMR) Scale to assess the strength of an individual’s belief in their use of successful cognitive and behavioral coping strategies to regulate negative emotions. There are three subscales in the NMR Scale: General mood improvement strategies, Cognitive mood improvement strategies, and Behavioral mood improvement strategies. Individuals with strong NMRE do not demonstrate a preference for immediate gratification, but, instead, use active coping mechanisms. In contrast, individuals with weak NMRE exhibit more impulsivity, because they desire immediate gratification (Catanzaro & Mearns, 1990; Catanzaro & Mearns, …show more content…
Spence and Courbasson (2012) explored the relationship between NMR and alexithymia on individuals with concurrent eating disorders (EDs) and substance use disorders (SUDs). They hypothesized that NMR would negatively correlate with emotional eating and that NMR and alexithymia would also be negatively correlated because individuals who have difficulty identifying and describing emotions should also have difficulty regulating emotions. As predicted, the TAS Difficulty Describing Feelings subscale negatively correlated with both the NMR General and Cognitive subscales. The TAS External-Oriented Thinking subscale positively correlated with both the NMR Cognitive and Behavior subscales. Moreover, the NMR Behavior subscale positively correlated with emotional eating when participants experienced anger, anxiety, and depression. This finding demonstrates that higher inability to describe and identify emotions leads to less capability in regulating negative affect (Spence & Courbasson,