Coping with emotional distress: Effects of disclosure mode on cognitive, affective, and health outcomes

Adrianne Winifred Kunkel, Purdue University

Abstract

Scholarly research has shown that the discursive expression of emotional distress alleviates the negative consequences of trauma and distress and improves health (e.g., Pennebaker, 1997a; Pennebaker & Beall, 1986; Pennebaker et al., 1990; Smyth, 1998; Smyth & Pennebaker, 1999). This research does not, however, sufficiently investigate features of the emotional disclosure procedure that “activate” health-enhancing mechanisms. Further, most of the studies that examine structural features of the disclosure procedure are methodologically problematic. Accordingly, the current study aimed to discover the process by which the discursive expression of emotional distress might have beneficial cognitive, affective, and health outcomes. Specifically, this study intended to determine systematically whether, under what conditions, and how emotional disclosure about distressing events fosters emotional recovery. Three sets of hypotheses and research questions were evaluated. The first of these (hypotheses 1 through 4) addressed whether emotional disclosure is truly beneficial (i.e., for appraisal, sense making, affect, and health outcomes). Next, the research questions (research questions 1 through 4) asked how particular features of the disclosure process (i.e., addressed nature of disclosure, modality, and review/reflection) affected dependent variables. The final set of hypotheses (hypotheses 5 through 10) predicted associations among appraisal, sensemaking, affect, and health variables. This final set of hypotheses was supplemented by analyses examining the extent to which affect mediated the relationship between cognition and health. Participants were 206 undergraduate students assigned to one of eight experimental conditions (N = 180) or a control group ( N = 26). Measures assessing appraisal, sense making, affect and health were administered at a pretest, an immediate posttest, and a delayed posttest. For four days following the pretest, participants engaged in a twenty-minute disclosure task in which they focused on either a distressing event in their lives or the events of the current day. The benefits of disclosing, advantages of particular features of disclosure, and hypothesized mechanisms by which the disclosure procedure might be effective were not well supported throughout the study. Ten methodological issues that may have contributed to the unanticipated outcomes were discussed, evaluated for their likelihood, and interpreted into recommendations for the design of future research.

Degree

Ph.D.

Advisors

Burleson, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Communication|Clinical psychology

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