Examining the stability of emotional regulation and psychological distress for low‐income individuals: A latent transition analysis

Abstract

Previous relationship education research has focused on investigating healthy relationships at the couple level, with limited research conducted on individual‐oriented relationship education programs for economically disadvantaged individuals. More specifically, there is a lack of research on how individual‐oriented relationship education programs contribute to changes in unique attributes of individuals who enroll in these programs and who would benefit most from relationship education programs. The primary aim of this study is to understand the stability of economically disadvantaged individuals' psychological distress and emotion regulation over two time points, comparing individuals randomly assigned to the relationship intervention using Prevention and Relationship Education's (PREP) Within My Reach (WMR) versus those assigned to a wait‐list control. Using a sample of 1129 economically disadvantaged individuals enrolled in the study, results indicated that the three‐class model for psychological distress and emotion regulation was the most appropriate for the latent transition analysis. Treatment group participants were more likely to transition to more adaptive models than their wait‐list control counterparts, although a small percentage of participants did transition to a less adaptive model. Implications, future directions, and limitations are discussed.

Different trajectories of relationship satisfaction among rural Black couples following preventive relationship intervention.

“…Le et al (2023) examined low-income couples receiving one of two online relationship interventions compared to a waitlist control and found that men and women in the intervention condition were more likely to be in a group that achieved large improvement over time relative to the control group. Taylor et al (2023) examined individuals participating in a relationship education program compared to a waitlist control and found that those in the intervention group were more likely to transition to a group with better individual functioning. Together, these studies offer important early evidence that change patterns among those receiving CRE can differ from controls.…”

Examining intervention hours attended for couples randomly assigned to receive relationship education

“…However, collectively, they represent one's ability for distress tolerance, or to stay regulated when stressed. Individuals who can regulate emotions during challenging conversations are able to maintain healthier psychological distress and consequently, more positive relationships (Dillman Taylor et al, 2022). Additionally, we chose to focus on these three constructs because we found positive intervention effects at 1‐month follow‐up postrandom asignment for individual distress, 6‐month follow‐up for emotion regulation and stress communication in the primary outcome analysis (see Barden et al, 2022).…”