Cognitive emotion regulation, anxiety, and depression in infertile women: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

Background: Cognitive strategies play an important role in the prevention of psychological disorders. The aim of this study was to examine the relationships of cognitive emotion regulation with anxiety and depression symptoms in a sample of infertile women in Iran. Results: According to correlation analysis, all adaptive strategies (i.e., acceptance, positive refocusing, refocus on planning, positive reappraisal, and putting into perspective), except for Acceptance strategy, were indirectly related to both anxiety and depression symptoms. Conversely, four maladaptive strategies (i.e., self-blame, rumination, catastrophizing, and other-blame) were positively related to anxiety and depression symptoms. After controlling for demographic/infertility information, hierarchical regression analyses indicated that acceptance, rumination, and positive refocusing subscales were significantly associated with anxiety; and refocus of planning was related to depression. Conclusion: In sum, cognitive emotion regulation strategies appeared to be related to anxiety and depression symptoms in women suffering from infertility. These results suggest the use of cognitive therapy to reduce the anxiety and depression in these women.

Differential Associations of Cognitive Emotion Regulation Strategies with Depression, Anxiety, and Insomnia in Adolescence and Early Adulthood

“…The results from the correlation analyses concurred with previous evidence [5] suggesting that all the maladaptive CERQ strategies correlated with greater psychopathological symptoms, as suggested by the small to moderate associations with depression and anxiety symptoms and the small correlation coefficients observed for sleep symptoms. Moreover, negative small to moderate associations were observed for the adaptive strategies, as expected [57], with the exception of acceptance, which demonstrated no significant correlations with psychopathology, supporting previous works [58,59].…”

The Role of Emotion Regulation, Family Function, and Sex Differences in Early Adulthood Anxiety

“…How does a child recall their perception of parental behavior contributes to the effects (Meyer & Kroner-Herwig, 2017). Other factors such as genetics, neurotransmitters abnormalities, maladaptive and irrational thoughts, having unpleasant or traumatic experiences, chronic illnesses or recent diagnoses of disease, daily stress, consumption of alcohol and illegal drugs, and lack of ability and inexact emotion regulation strategies, contribute to the appearance of anxiety disorders (Foroudifard et al, 2020;Halgin & Whitbourne, 2012;Huffstutler, 2021;Loevaas et al, 2018;Mahardika & Ediati, 2019;Narmandakh, Roest, de Jonge, & Oldehinkel, 2020;Nevid, Rathus, & Greene, 2018;Quiñones-Camacho & Davis, 2019;Sackl-Pammer et al, 2019). Other things such as female, family dysfunction, lack of social support, low economic status, and history of psychopathology in parents indicate links to increased anxiety risk (Mondin et al, 2013;Öztürk, Özyurt, & Akay, 2018;Shao et al, 2020;Wang, Chen, Tan, & Zhao, 2016).…”