Tan Jaron X Y, Liu Pan
Department of Psychology, University of Alberta, P217 Biological Sciences Building, 11455 Saskatchewan Drive, Edmonton, AB, T6G 2E9, Canada.
Res Child Adolesc Psychopathol. 2025 Feb;53(2):261-277. doi: 10.1007/s10802-024-01263-0. Epub 2024 Nov 25.
The increasing prevalence of anxiety problems during adolescence underscores the importance of a better understanding of the development of anxiety. Existing literature has documented a prospective association between error responsivity - characterized by the ERP component of error-related negativity (ERN) - and anxiety in youths. However, it remains unclear to what extent the ERN-anxiety relationship may be moderated by emotion regulation, another attribute critical to the development of anxiety. We collected two waves of data from 115 healthy early adolescents (66 girls; Mean age/SD at T1 = 11.00/1.16 years), approximately one year apart. Participants completed an EEG Go/No-Go task and reported on their anxiety symptoms at T1 and T2; they also reported on their emotion regulation tendencies (i.e., cognitive reappraisal [CR] and expressive suppression [ES]) at T2. The ERN was quantified via a principal component analysis. We found a moderating effect of ES on the ERN-anxiety association. Specifically, a larger T1 ERN predicted greater T2 anxiety symptoms for youths with higher, but not lower, ES. Interestingly, the moderating effect of CR on the ERN-symptom association was conditioned on age. Among older youths (upper age tercile) only, the association between T1 ERN and T2 symptoms was significant for those with lower, but not higher, CR. These findings contribute novel evidence on the moderating effect of emotion regulation on the prospective ERN-anxiety relationship in early adolescence. Our results elucidate age-specific patterns in the moderating effect of CR. Future studies can leverage these findings to tailor emotion regulation interventions for youths of different ages.
青少年期焦虑问题的日益普遍凸显了更好地理解焦虑发展过程的重要性。现有文献记载了错误反应性（以错误相关负波（ERN）的ERP成分来表征）与青少年焦虑之间的前瞻性关联。然而，情绪调节（焦虑发展的另一个关键属性）在多大程度上可能调节ERN与焦虑之间的关系仍不清楚。我们从115名健康的青少年早期个体（66名女孩；T1时的平均年龄/标准差 = 11.00/1.16岁）收集了两波数据，时间间隔约为一年。参与者完成了一项脑电图Go/No-Go任务，并在T1和T2时报告了他们的焦虑症状；他们还在T2时报告了自己的情绪调节倾向（即认知重评[CR]和表达抑制[ES]）。通过主成分分析对ERN进行量化。我们发现ES对ERN与焦虑的关联具有调节作用。具体而言，对于ES较高而非较低的青少年，较大的T1时ERN预示着T2时更严重的焦虑症状。有趣的是，CR对ERN与症状关联的调节作用取决于年龄。仅在年龄较大的青少年（年龄上三分位数）中，对于CR较低而非较高的个体，T1时ERN与T2时症状之间的关联才显著。这些发现为情绪调节对青少年早期前瞻性ERN与焦虑关系的调节作用提供了新的证据。我们的结果阐明了CR调节作用中特定年龄的模式。未来的研究可以利用这些发现为不同年龄的青少年量身定制情绪调节干预措施。
