Emotion Regulation in Patients With a Depressive Episode

The aim of the present study is to examine whether the emotion regulation of patients and "healthy" people differs. The BDI-II, the FEEL-E, the SCL-90®-S and the EFK were used to test for group differences, the influence of gender, age and depression as well as the prediction of depression. As expected, patients (N=85) showed higher levels of depression and higher psychological stress than the comparison group (N=67), regardless of age and gender, although they rather tended to use maladaptive emotion regulation strategies. High levels of depression were associated with maladaptive emotion regulation and can be predicted by specific strategies. Thus, in contrast to “healthy” people, those suffering from depression exhibit a dysfunctional emotion regulation.