Relationship between interoception and emotion regulation: New evidence from mixed methods.


Author: Zamariola G1, Frost N2, Van Oost A3, Corneille O3, Luminet O4

Affiliation: <sup>1</sup>Université Catholique de Louvain, 10 Place du Cardinal Mercier, bte L3.05.01, 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. Electronic address: giorgia.zamariola@uclouvain.be.

<sup>2</sup>School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork, Ireland.

<sup>3</sup>Université Catholique de Louvain, 10 Place du Cardinal Mercier, bte L3.05.01, 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium.

<sup>4</sup>Université Catholique de Louvain, 10 Place du Cardinal Mercier, bte L3.05.01, 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium; Fund for Scientific Research (FNRS), Belgium.
Conference/Journal: J Affect Disord.
Date published: 2018 Dec 26
Other:
 Volume ID: 246   ,  Pages: 480-485   ,  Special Notes: doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2018.12.101. [Epub ahead of print]   ,  Word Count: 248  
    BACKGROUND: Interoception is the ability to perceive one's inner bodily feelings and is thought to be associated with the capacity of recognising and experiencing emotions. Previous research on interoception and emotion regulation has presented limitations arising from the low reliability of the interoceptive measurement and provided inconsistent results. The current study used a mixed method approach to investigate this relationship from the individuals' perspective.



METHODS: In the first phase (quantitative), questionnaires assessing interoceptive sensibility, the subjective, self-reported ability to perceive internal states, were administered to 100 healthy participants. In the second phase (qualitative), individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine participants. The interviews were analysed using the Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Three main dimensions were explored with open questions: 1) Perception of internal bodily states; 2) Emotion regulation; 3) Potential relationship between bodily states perception and emotion recognition and regulation.



RESULTS: Findings revealed that people with low interoceptive abilities show more difficulties in verbalizing their feelings and in decreasing the impact of emotions generated by negative experiences in daily life LIMITATIONS: The generalization of the results is limited by the specific age and gender of the recruited sample.



CONCLUSIONS: Responses of the participants supported recent evidence regarding the lack of reliability of the heartbeat counting task as a measure of interoceptive accuracy, however interviews sustained the importance of recognising the bodily states in order to be able to understand and regulate emotions.



Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier B.V.



KEYWORDS: Alexithymia; Emotion regulation; Interoception; Interpretative phenomenological analysis; Mixed method design



PMID: 30599372  DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2018.12.101