Self-Efficacy for Affect Regulation as a Predictor of Future Life Satisfaction and Moderator of the Negative Affect-Life Satisfaction Relationship

Abstract

Life satisfaction is an important index of mental health and also predicts other important outcomes such as longevity and decreased mortality. Negative affect has a unique inverse relationship with life satisfaction across the life span. Therefore, determining psychological factors that uniquely predict future life satisfaction and that reduce the trait negative affect-life satisfaction relationship is theoretically and clinically important. In light of recent evidence from long-term longitudinal studies that self-efficacy for regulation of negative emotions (SERN) predicts higher future life satisfaction, as well as evidence from a cross-sectional study that a subtype of SERN-self-efficacy for regulating anger-buffers the relationship between trait negative affect and life satisfaction, we tested whether SERN and subtypes of SERN predicted higher life satisfaction and buffered the negative affect-life satisfaction relationship longitudinally over short time periods. After controlling for time 1 life satisfaction, higher time 1 self-efficacy for regulating despondency and distress (SEDes) predicted higher future life satisfaction over average time periods of 17 days (N = 127), 32 days (N = 83), and 41 days (N = 65) among college students. However, in post hoc exploratory regressions that included self-efficacy for experience and expression of positive emotions (SEPos), SEDes predicted higher time 2 life satisfaction, but only SEPos uniquely predicted higher time 3 and time 4 life satisfaction. © 2012 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.

Publication Title

Journal of Happiness Studies

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