Social Facilitation of Emotion Regulation in Adolescence

The goal of this project is to test whether regulating emotions with help from a friend is more effective and long-lasting in adolescents than regulating alone, and to characterize age-related differences in the neural mechanisms supporting social versus cognitive emotion regulation. Participants will complete a psychology experiment while undergoing fMRI scanning.

Study Overview

• Status: Recruiting
• Conditions: Emotion Regulation
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Social regulation; Behavioral: Cognitive regulation

Detailed Description

Participants will complete a novel paradigm during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine whether adolescents (N = 50) and adults (N = 50) are more effective at down-regulating negative affect when a friend provides them with reinterpretations of negative stimuli (i.e. social reappraisal), as compared to when they reinterpret stimuli alone (i.e., cognitive reappraisal). Specifically, participants will look at pictures of upsetting events while undergoing fMRI scanning. For some pictures, they will be instructed to just look at the image. For other pictures, they will be told to listen to their friend's voice as their friend helps them to regulate their emotions. For other pictures, they will be told to regulate their emotions on their own. The primary comparison of interest is how participants regulate emotion on their own versus when their friend helps them.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Estimated): 100
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • California
    • Los Angeles, California, United States, 90095
      • Recruiting
      • University of California, Los Angeles
      • Contact: Elizabeth Gaines, BA; Phone Number: (323) 989-2557; Email: egaines@psych.ucla.edu
      • Contact: Jennifer Silvers, PhD; Phone Number: 3102069024; Email: silvers@ucla.edu

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Child; Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Adolescent participants must be 13-15 year of age
• Adult participants must be 20-25 years of age
• Proficient in English

Exclusion Criteria:

• Auditory, visual or cognitive impairment
• Any health conditions that are contraindicated for MRI

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Basic Science
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Crossover Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Social regulation; Participants will regulate emotion with the help of a friend	Behavioral: Social regulation; Participants will regulate emotion with the help of a friend
Experimental: Cognitive regulation; Participants will regulate emotion on their own	Behavioral: Cognitive regulation; Participants will regulate emotion on their own

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Negative affect	Participant's self-reported negative affect on 1-4 scale (1=not bad at all, 4=very bad) during experiment	1 day

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: University of California, Los Angeles
• Collaborators: Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): October 5, 2022
• Primary Completion (Estimated): June 1, 2026
• Study Completion (Estimated): June 1, 2026

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: June 7, 2024
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: June 12, 2024
• First Posted (Actual): June 14, 2024

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): June 24, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: June 18, 2025
• Last Verified: June 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Other Study ID Numbers: 21-000929; R21HD108751 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: YES
• IPD Plan Description: Deidentified participant data including age, gender and negative affect
• IPD Sharing Time Frame: 12 months from study completion
• IPD Sharing Access Criteria: Deidentified data will be posted on Open Science Framework
• IPD Sharing Supporting Information Type: STUDY_PROTOCOL; SAP; ANALYTIC_CODE

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No
• product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.: No