Dampening in American and Korean young adults: a positive emotion regulation strategy linked to depressive symptoms in both countries

Shaped by culture, desirability of emotions influences their regulation. Considering the greater focus on positive emotions in American (vs. Korean) cultures and the known association between emotion regulation and depressive symptoms, a better understanding of cultural differences in positive emotion regulation may promote culturally sensitive interventions. We examined whether positive emotion regulation tendencies differed between American and Korean college students and whether the positive emotion regulation strategies (i.e. dampening and positive rumination) are associated with depressive symptoms differently in the two groups. To this end, 94 American participants and 102 South Korean participants completed questionnaires between June, 2019 and January, 2020 assessing their tendencies to engage in positive emotion regulation strategies and their depressive symptoms. We first established measurement invariance between the two groups on the Responses to Positive Affect scale, which assesses individuals' tendency to regulate positive emotions. Using the final model that maintained the original model's three-factor structure, albeit without seven items, we found a higher tendency to dampen positive emotions was related to greater severity of depressive symptoms in both groups. Addressing dampening may then be a promising target for depression treatment in both countries, and future studies should investigate its clinical utility across cultures.