Abstract
Unlike the strategy of cognitive regulation that relies heavily on the top-down control function of the prefrontal cortex (PFC), which was recently found may be critically impaired in stressful situations, traditional Chinese philosophy and medicine views different types of emotionality as having mutual promotion and counteraction (MPMC) relationships, implying a novel approach that requires less cognition to emotional regulation. Actually, our previous studies have indicated that anger responses could be successfully regulated via the induction of sadness, and this efficiency could not be influenced by stress, thus providing evidences for the hypothesis of “sadness counteracts anger” (SCA) proposed by the MPMC theory of emotionality (Zhan et al., 2015, 2017). In this study, we experimentally examined the MPMC hypothesis that “anger counteracts rumination” (ACR) which postulates that rumination may be alleviated by the anger emotion. In Study 1, all participants were initially caused state rumination and then induced anger, joy or neutral mood, the results showed that the rumination-related affect was alleviated after anger induction relative to that after joy or neutral mood induction. In Study 2, female participants with high trait rumination were recruited and divided into two groups for exposure to an anger or neutral emotion intervention, the result indicated that the anger intervention group exhibited a greater decline in trait rumination than the neutral emotion intervention group. These findings provided preliminary evidence supporting the hypothesis of ACR, which suggested a new strategy that employs less cognitive resources to regulating state and trait rumination by inducing anger.
Highlights
As one of the most commonly adopted emotional regulation strategies, cognitive reappraisal has been proven to fail in the regulation of negative emotion under stress
Sadness emotion corresponds to the “metal” element, anger emotion corresponds to the “wood” element, and mutual promotion and counteraction (MPMC) relationship of “sadness counteract anger” were implied by the principle that wood can be cut by metal
A simple effect analysis focusing on the group differences found that the positive emotion level at baseline and that after rumination induction had no significant differences between any two groups; but after mood induction, the positive level of joy group was significantly or marginally higher than that of neutral mood group (p < 0.01) and anger group (p = 0.0084)
Summary
As one of the most commonly adopted emotional regulation strategies, cognitive reappraisal has been proven to fail in the regulation of negative emotion under stress. In contrast to the cognitive regulation that emphasizes the role of cognition in executing the top-down regulation of emotion, the MPMC theory of emotionality, which is derived from traditional Chinese medicine, proposes that there are mutual promotion and counteraction (allelopathy) relationships among different types of emotionality, including anger, joy, thinking (rumination), sadness, and fear. The promotion relationships include “joy promotes thinking,” “thinking (rumination) promotes sadness,” “sadness promotes fear,” “fear promotes anger,” and “anger promotes joy”; the restraint relationships include “joy counteracts sadness,” “sadness counteracts anger,” “anger counteracts thinking (rumination),” “thinking counteracts fear,” and “fear counteracts joy” (Figure 1) This theory was first recorded in the “Inner Canon of the Yellow Emperor,” which is the most important ancient text in Chinese medicine that has been treated as the fundamental doctrinal source for Chinese medicine for more than two millennia, basing on the long-term observation of life phenomenon in ancient China, extensive clinical practice and simple anatomical knowledge (Wang, 1999). Sadness emotion corresponds to the “metal” element, anger emotion corresponds to the “wood” element, and MPMC relationship of “sadness counteract anger” were implied by the principle that wood can be cut by metal (such as ax)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
