Revictimization, Emotional Regulation and PTSD

描述（由申请人提供）：最近的理论著作表明，对负面情绪状态的无效调节可能会降低女性发现并有效应对增加性侵犯风险的情境和人际因素的能力。虽然研究发现了负面情绪和对紧张的人际关系的不适应反应之间的关系，但关于情绪和个人检测性侵犯风险的能力之间的关系的研究却很少。因此，该项目的一个目标是研究实验诱导的消极情绪对风险反应障碍的影响。此外，基于先前的性受害史会增加性侵犯风险的研究，本研究将探讨先前的性受害史是否与负面情绪相互作用，从而进一步增加风险反应的损伤。最后，研究发现，一些情绪调节策略的适应性较差。例如，抑制（隐藏情绪状态）的情绪调节策略需要大量的认知资源，并可能损害对情绪事件的记忆。因此，参与压制的个体可能不太擅长识别和反应表明攻击风险增加的情境线索。因此，本研究还将探讨性受害妇女是否更有可能在假设性侵犯小插曲中使用抑制，以及抑制的使用是否在性受害与风险认知缺陷之间的关系中起中介作用。本研究将招募大学生妇女作为样本，以确保性受害的基本比率。参与者将被随机分配到中性或消极情绪诱导过程中。之后，她们将听到一段描述强制性约会情景的性侵犯小插曲，在此期间，她们将被指示指出小插曲中的男性何时“走得太远”，并描述她们作为小插曲中的女性会如何回应。然后，参与者将完成自我报告测量，表明他们在对小插图做出判断时使用特定情绪调节策略的程度。最后，参与者将被要求尽可能多地回忆小插曲的细节，以检查在性侵犯小插曲中调节情绪体验的认知成本。性侵害是一个地方性的社会问题，它与无数的后遗症有关，如抑郁症、创伤后应激障碍、药物滥用、人际关系困难和严重的健康问题，如艾滋病毒。因此，了解受害的风险因素对于制定有效的性侵犯预防和治疗方案至关重要。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Recent theoretical writings suggest that the ineffective regulation of negative emotional states may reduce the ability of women to detect and respond effectively to situational and interpersonal factors that increase risk for sexual assault. Although studies have found relationships between negative emotions and maladaptive responses to stressful interpersonal situations, there is a paucity of research examining the relationship between emotions and individuals' abilities to detect risk for sexual assault. Therefore, one goal of the proposed project is to examine the impact of experimentally-induced negative mood on risk response impairments. Furthermore, based on research suggesting that prior sexual victimization increases risk for sexual assault, this study will investigate whether a history of prior sexual victimization interacts with negative mood to further increase impairments in risk responses. Finally, studies have found that some emotion regulation strategies are less adaptive than others. For example, the emotion regulation strategy of suppression (concealing emotional states) requires significant cognitive resources and can impair memory for emotional events. Thus, it is possible that individuals who engage in suppression may be less adept at identifying and responding to situational cues that signify increased risk of assault. As such, this study also will explore whether sexually victimized women are more likely to use suppression during a hypothetical sexual assault vignette, and whether the use of suppression mediates the relationship between sexual victimization and risk recognition deficits. The present study will recruit a sample of undergraduate women to ensure a substantial base rate of sexual victimization. Participants will be randomly assigned to either a neutral or negative mood induction procedure. After, they will hear a sexual assault vignette depicting a coercive dating situation, during which they will be instructed to indicate when the male in the vignette has "gone too far" and to describe how they would respond as the female in the vignette. Participants then will complete self-report measures indicating the degree to which they utilized particular emotion regulation strategies when making judgments about the vignette. Finally, participants will be instructed to recall as many details of the vignette as possible in order to examine the cognitive costs of regulating emotional experiences during the sexual assault vignette. Sexual victimization is an endemic societal problem that has been associated with myriad sequelae such as depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, substance abuse, interpersonal difficulties, and serious health problems such as HIV. Thus, understanding risk factors for victimization is critical to the development of effective sexual assault prevention and treatment programs.