Linking Insecure Attachment to Interpersonal Emotion Regulation Self-Efficacy in the Workplace: The Mediating Role of Ineffective Strategies

Dertinger, Jakob (2025) Linking Insecure Attachment to Interpersonal Emotion Regulation Self-Efficacy in the Workplace: The Mediating Role of Ineffective Strategies. Bachelor thesis, Psychology.

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Abstract

At work, people often experience negative emotions. Sometimes they can regulate these emotions themselves but sometimes they need others to help them regulate their emotions. Therefore, research needs to investigate what determines effective interpersonal emotion regulation. This study investigates whether attachment could be a determinant of emotion regulation self-efficacy in the workplace. Because of findings from research studying the regulation of individual’s own emotions, we hypothesized that people with insecure attachment use a pattern of ineffective strategies, namely more expressive suppression and less cognitive reframing, to regulate their colleague’s emotions. This pattern should mediate a negative relationship between insecure attachment and self-efficacy for interpersonal emotion regulation because of fewer mastery experiences. In an online survey with n = 251 participants we assessed participants’ attachment scores and then exposed them to two film clips in which someone talks about an emotional event that happened to them at work. The participants had to imagine that the person in the film would be one of their colleagues telling them about this event in their lunch break. We found a direct effect of insecure attachment on self-efficacy for interpersonal emotion regulation but no mediating role of strategy use. So, we could not replicate the pattern of intrapersonal emotion regulation strategy use for people with insecure attachment in an interpersonal context. Therefore, these findings deliver more evidence pointing towards a disconnect between intra- and interpersonal emotion regulation skills and tendencies.

Item Type:	Thesis (Bachelor)
Supervisor name:	Scheibe, S.
Degree programme:	Psychology
Differentiation route:	None [Bachelor Psychology]
Date Deposited:	14 Jul 2025 07:44
Last Modified:	14 Jul 2025 07:44
URI:	http://gmwpublic.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/5510

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