The Relationship between emotion regulation strategies and obsessive-compulsive disorder: An experimental study

Due to the limited number of studies in the literature conducted to examine the relationship be-tween emotion regulation strategies and the obsessive-compulsive disorder symptoms, the current study aimed at examining the role of emotion regulation strategies in obsessive compulsive disorder via an experimental design. The study consisted of two stages. In the first stage, the aim was to determine the participants' symptom severity of obsessive-compulsive disorder. In the second stage, the participants were presented with a scenario that triggered the feeling of disgust, and the “Emotion Regulation Scale” was given to the participants before and after the scenario. The sample consisted of 328 university students. Findings indicated that the group with severe symptoms used significantly more “the suppression strategies” compared to the group with less severe symptoms. The use of “the cognitive reappraisal strategy” was significantly low in the group with severe symptoms before the scenario was given. However, the difference between these groups after the scenario was not found to be significant. Furthermore, it was found that the participants with severe obsessive-compulsive symptoms experienced more difficulty in emotion regulation than the group with less severe symptoms in all the sub-dimensions of the “Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale.” On the other hand, according to the regression analysis, only the sub-dimensions concerning the impulse control and the ability to choose appropriate emotion regulation strategy predicted obsessive-compulsive disorder. As the symptom severity in obsessive-compulsive disorder intensified, more difficulties in emotion regulation were observed. Findings regarding the current study are presented in the discussion section.