Subjective and Autonomic Arousal toward Emotional Stimuli in Preadolescents with Externalizing Problems and the Role of Explicit and Implicit Emotion Regulation

Children and adolescents with externalizing problems show physiological hypo-reactivity toward affective stimuli, which may relate to their disruptive, antisocial, and thrill-seeking behaviors. This study examines differences in explicit and implicit emotion regulation between preadolescents with and without externalizing problems as well as the role of emotion regulation in subjective and autonomic responses to emotional stimuli. Preadolescents showing self- and other-reported externalizing psychopathology, and a control sample, without such difficulties, participated in a passive affective picture-viewing task with neutral, fearful, joyful, and sad images, while their heart rate and heart rate variability were measured. Participants also reported on their emotion regulation difficulties using the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale. Compared to controls, youths scoring high on externalizing problems (1) reported greater emotion regulation difficulties, especially a lack of emotional clarity and difficulty in controlling impulsive actions, (2) showed higher resting heart rate variability and a lower resting heart rate, suggestive of higher emotion/autonomic regulation ability, and (3) showed both subjective and physiological hypo-arousal to emotional pictures. Heart rate variability and, to a lesser degree difficulties in emotional clarity, modulated the effects of emotional pictures on subjective and physiological arousal. Findings suggest that interventions to improve emotion regulation and awareness may help to prevent externalizing problems.