Abstract
Self-acceptance is known as a strong indicator of positive mental health, and previous studies have identified the relationship between self-acceptance and emotion. However, there are still some research gaps in the relationship between self-acceptance and key emotional variables such as emotional awareness and emotional regulation strategies. The exploration of this part is also more conducive to the future design of effective ways to improve self-acceptance. Considering the Gross emotion regulation model, the present study aimed to examine the relationship between emotional awareness and self-acceptance, as well as the mediating effect of emotion regulation strategies. Data were collected from 419 college students in Zhejiang Province, China. Results showed that emotional awareness (IV) was positively associated with self-acceptance (DV), and both cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression partially mediated the influence of emotional awareness on self-acceptance. The results suggest an underlying mechanism between emotional awareness and self-acceptance with emotion regulation strategies as robust factors. Theoretically, all of the results had significant ramifications and supplemented the empirical findings in the area of emotional health and self-acceptance. The mediation model also offers emotion-based innovation for approaches to improve self-acceptance, which has practical implications.
Similar content being viewed by others
Data availability
The data of this paper is collected by the author on campus, and has a complete database. As the database is related to mental health variables and concerns personal privacy, it will not be made public. Relevant information can be obtained from the author of this article on request.
References
Allport, G. W. (1961). Pattern and growth in personality. Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Bagby, M., Taylor, G. J., & Ryan, D. (1986). Toronto alexithymia scale: relationship with personality and psychopathology measures. Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 45(4), 207–215.
Berger, E. M. (1952). The relation between expressed acceptance of self and expressed acceptance of others 1.
Chamberlain, J. M., & Haaga, D. A. (2001). Unconditional self-acceptance and psychological health. Journal of Rational-Emotive and Cognitive-Behavior Therapy, 19(3), 163–176.
Cong, Z., & Gao, W. (1999). Compilation of self-acceptance questionnaire and its reliability and validity test. Chinese Journal of Behavioral Medicine and Brain Sciences, 01, 20–22.
Cucu-Ciuhan, G., & Dumitru, I. E. (2017). Unconditional self-acceptance, functional and dysfunctional negative emotions, and self-esteem as predictors for depression in adolescents: A brief pilot study conducted in Romania. Journal of Experiential Psychotherapy/Revista de PSIHOterapie Experientiala, 20(4).
Di Maggio, R., Zappulla, C., & Pace, U. (2016). The relationship between emotion knowledge, emotion regulation and adjustment in preschoolers: A mediation model. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 25, 2626–2635.
Elliott, R., Watson, J. C., Goldman, R. N., & Greenberg, L. S. (2004). Learning emotion-focused therapy: The process-experiential approach to change. American Psychological Association.
Gross, J. J. (1998). The emerging field of emotion regulation: An integrative review. Review of General Psychology, 2(3), 271–299.
Gross, J. J. (2001). Emotion regulation in adulthood: Timing is everything. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 10(6), 214–219.
Gross, J. J. (2002). Emotion regulation: Affective, cognitive, and social consequences. Psychophysiology, 39(3), 281–291.
Hayes, S. C., Strosahl, K. D., & Wilson, K. G. (1999). Acceptance and commitment therapy: An experiential approach to behavior change. Encyclopedia of Psychotherapy, 9(1), 1–8.
Hill, C. E. (2009). Helping skills: Facilitating, exploration, insight, and action. American Psychological Association.
Lane, R. D. (2000). Levels of emotional awareness: Neurological, psychological, and social perspectives.
Lane, R. D., & Schwartz, G. E. (1987). Levels of emotional awareness: A cognitive-developmental theory and its application to psychopathology. The American Journal of Psychiatry.
Lane, R. D., Quinlan, D. M., Schwartz, G. E., Walker, P. A., & Zeitlin, S. B. (1990). The levels of emotional awareness scale: A cognitive-developmental measure of emotion. Journal of Personality Assessment, 55(1–2), 124–134.
Lei, X. Y., Xiao, L. M., Liu, Y. N., & Li, Y. M. (2016). Prevalence of depression among Chinese University students: A meta-analysis. PloS One, 11(4), e0153454.
Li, H. (2021). College students’ perfectionism on the influence of negative emotions (a master’s degree thesis, sichuan normal university).
Li, J. (2022). The status and influencing factors of self-acceptance in vocational college students. Monthly Journal of Psychology, 17, 17–19. https://doi.org/10.19738/j.cnki.psy.2022.17.005
Lundh, L. G., Johnsson, A., Sundqvist, K., & Olsson, H. (2002). Alexithymia, memory of emotion, emotional awareness, and perfectionism. Emotion, 2(4), 361.
MacInnes, D. L. (2006). Self-esteem and self‐acceptance: An examination into their relationship and their effect on psychological health. Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing, 13(5), 483–489.
McRae, K., Misra, S., Prasad, A. K., Pereira, S. C., & Gross, J. J. (2012). Bottom-up and top-down emotion generation: Implications for emotion regulation. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 7(3), 253–262.
Pasaribu, P. E., & Zarfiel, M. D. (2019, August). Cognitive behavioral therapy treatment for reducing stress: A case study of self-acceptance in an early adult college student. In 2nd International Conference on Intervention and Applied Psychology (ICIAP 2018) (pp. 631–644). Atlantis Press.
Schoenleber, M., & Gratz, K. L. (2018). Self-acceptance group therapy: A transdiagnostic, cognitive-behavioral treatment for shame. Cognitive and Behavioral Practice, 25(1), 75–86.
Stanković, S., Matić, M., Vukosavljević-Gvozden, T., & Opačić, G. (2015). Frustration intolerance and unconditional self-acceptance as mediators of the relationship between perfectionism and depression. Psihologija, 48(2), 101–117.
Wang, H. (2013). Characteristics and optimization of preservice teachers’ emotional awareness. (Doctoral dissertation, Shanghai Normal University).
Wang, X. (2018). Effects of emotional awareness group counseling on emotional awareness and mental health of junior high school students. (Doctoral dissertation, Hunan Normal University).
Wang, Z. (2021). Social adjustment and anxiety of middle school students under the epidemic situation (Master’s Thesis, Central China Normal University).
Wang, L., Liu, H., & Li, Z., Du Wei (2007). Reliability and validity of the Chinese version of the emotional regulation questionnaire. Chinese Journal of Health Psychology, 15(6), 3.
Wang, H., Cheng, J., & Huang Fei. (2016). Emotional awareness of college students and its relationship with emotion regulation. Journal of Huangshan University, 18(2), 3.
Wang, J., Dai, W., & Jia, N. (2020). The influence of paternal parenting style on test anxiety and social anxiety in senior high school students: The mediating role of self-acceptance. Journal of School Psychology, 18(6), 5.
Wu, X., Wang, J., Zhou, M., Tang, R., Chen, C., Wang, Y., & Zhang, X. (2021). Current status and influencing factors of self-acceptance among medical college students. Chinese Higher Medical Education, 10, 45–46.
Xu, J., Zhou, Q., Li, J., Wang, H., & Yao, B. (2018). The relationship between emotional intelligence and learning burnout in vocational nursing students: The mediating role of self-acceptance. Chinese Journal of Health Management, 35(7), 4.
Yao, K. (2014). A study on the intervention of restrictive group sand table on college students’ self-acceptance. (Doctoral dissertation, Yangzhou University).
Zhang, X., Baikti, A., & Zhang, X. (2012). Emotional regulation and self-acceptance in patients with cervical cancer. Nursing Practice and Research, 9(22), 2.
Zhang, M., Zhang, J., Zhang, F., Zhang, L., & Feng, D. (2018). Prevalence of psychological distress and the effects of resilience and perceived social support among Chinese college students: Does gender make a difference? Psychiatry Research, 267, 409–413.
Acknowledgements
We thank all the participants in the study. We thank LetPub (www.letpub.com) for its linguistic assistance during the preparation of this manuscript.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding authors
Ethics declarations
Ethical approval and consent to participate
The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) of the Department of psychology and behavioral science, Zhejiang University (IRB approval code: [2021]069). Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
Conflict of interest
The authors have no relevant financial or non-financial interests to disclose.
Additional information
Publisher’s Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
About this article
Cite this article
Huang, Z., Chen, S. & Chen, H. Relationship between emotional awareness and self-acceptance: the mediating role of emotion regulation strategies. Curr Psychol (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-024-05945-2
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-024-05945-2