From surviving to thriving in the face of threats: the emerging science of emotion regulation training

Abstract

A key survival skill is the ability to regulate your emotions so as to respond adaptively to life's challenges. As such, it is essential to understand how we can improve this ability through training. While this is still a new area of research, to date, behavioral and brain studies have taken one of two approaches: either training individuals to implement strategies that directly impact current emotional responses, or training a cognitive control ability (like working memory, selective attention, response inhibition) to strengthen or tune control processes that can support regulation to subsequently encountered events. Behavioral data highlight the importance of tailoring training to an individual and their emotional situation. Brain data suggest that training impacts domain general cognitive control systems and their interaction with subcortical regions (mainly the amygdala). Future progress will depend on systematic examination of the mechanisms involved in training effectiveness and the populations that may benefit from training.