The effects of a brief intervention workshop on emotional regulation and well-being : stress, happiness and depressive symptoms.

Emotional regulation skills have far-reaching implications for enhancing people’s well-being. This study developed a brief intervention workshop with the aim of enhancing emotional regulation skills and well-being (increasing happiness and ability to cope with daily hassles, as well as reducing stress and depressive symptoms). Twenty-four participants from an adult community and workforce population were recruited into three groups; an intervention group (IG), a waitlist control group (WCG) and an active control group (ACG). Participants were randomly assigned (RA) or self-selected (SS) to either the intervention group (IG: n = 11 (RA: n = 5, SS: n = 6)), or a waitlist control group (WCG all RA: n = 5). The third active control group (ACG: n = 8) consisted of participants attending other professional development courses. Participants completed questionnaires assessing emotional regulation (cognitive reappraisal, expressive suppression, acceptance, reappraisal, rumination, catastrophising and positive refocusing) and well-being (perceived stress, depressive symptoms subjective happiness, life satisfaction, positive and negative affect and daily hassles) at pre-test (Time 1) and post-test (Time 2: 2 weeks after the workshop) and follow-up (Time 3: 6 weeks after the workshop). The results indicate, that after the brief intervention workshop, the intervention participants experienced improvements in some emotional regulation skills and their well-being increased. Significant changes were found in the predicted direction, two to six weeks after the intervention, in the intervention group as compared with minimal change in the control groups for the following variables: cognitive appraisal, reappraisal, positive refocusing, stress, depressive symptoms, happiness, life satisfaction, positive affect and perceived ability to cope with daily hassles. However, further research is required to validate and generalise these findings, predominantly due to the small sample size. These results have valuable implications for New Zealand society due to the substantial impact and cost-effectiveness of this brief intervention