Emotion dysregulation: An explanatory construct in the relation between HIV-related stigma and hazardous drinking among persons living with HIV/AIDS.

Abstract

The prevalence of hazardous alcohol use among people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) is common and related to numerous health problems among individuals in this group. Stigma is associated with hazardous drinking among stigmatized groups, but this relationship has yet to be examined among PLHIV. Moreover, there is a lack of research in identifying the mechanisms underlying this association. Emotion dysregulation is one potential construct that may explain the association between stigma and hazardous alcohol use among PLHIV. The present study examined the indirect effect of HIV stigma and hazardous alcohol use via emotion dysregulation. The sample included 98 PLHIV (60.2% male, Mage = 48.40, SD = 7.75). Results indicated significant and medium-sized indirect effects of HIV stigma and its subfacets (enacted stigma and negative self-image) in terms of hazardous alcohol use via emotion dysregulation. Alternative models did not yield significant indirect effects. The results document an indirect association between HIV stigma and hazardous alcohol use via emotion dysregulation. These findings may provide novel, initial empirical insight into the nature of the stigma-hazardous drinking relation among PLHIV.

Psychological Distress and Physical Health Symptoms in the Latinx Population During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Exploring the Role of Anxiety Sensitivity

“…Thus, there is likely a high degree of clinical importance to the role of AS in terms of emotional stress related to COVID-19 and the severity of physical health symptoms. These results are in line with non-COVID-19 research among the Latinx population which has found that AS is related to poorer mental and physical health among this population (Zvolensky et al, 2015a , 2015b , 2019 ) and a previous longitudinal study among adults from Argentina (Rogers et al, in press).…”

Emotion dysregulation and smoking outcome expectancies among Spanish-speaking Latinx adult cigarette smokers in the United States.

“…Presently there are no treatments for emotion dysregulation–smoking cessation in general or for Latinx smokers specifically. Yet several psychosocial treatments have shown promise in reducing emotion dysregulation (Gratz, Bardeen, Levy, Dixon-Gordon, & Tull, 2015; Gratz, Weiss, & Tull, 2015), and a large literature has found that emotion dysregulation is a mediator of affective distress (Moriya & Takahashi, 2013) among non-Latinx Whites (Wong et al, 2018) and Latinx persons (Zvolensky et al, 2017). Building from such research, there could be utility in developing smoking cessation programs for that explicitly address the construct of emotion dysregulation for Latinx smokers.…”

Dispositional shame and guilt as predictors of depressive symptoms and anxiety among adults with lung cancer: The mediational role of internalized stigma.

“…To better understand the nature and impact of stigma, there have been calls for researchers to examine the psychosocial contributors to and correlates of internalized stigma broadly (Gilkes et al, 2019; Livingston & Boyd, 2010) and for stigmatized medical populations specifically (Earnshaw, Smith, Chaudoir, Amico, & Copenhaver, 2013). Recent research in this area has demonstrated that internalized stigma is associated significantly with psychosocial factors such as emotion dysregulation (Wong et al, 2019), a low sense of belonging (Hirsch et al, 2019), and causal beliefs about illness (Carter, Read, Pyle, & Morrison, 2019). Additionally, there is a growing body of empirical evidence suggesting that dispositional tendencies to experience feelings of shame and guilt (i.e., shame- and guilt-proneness) may contribute to internalized stigma (Bennett, Traub, Mace, Juarascio, & O’Hayer, 2016; Hasson-Ohayon et al, 2012).…”