Understanding the Role of Emotion Regulation in Dating Violence During Adolescence

The current study used cross-sectional and longitudinal designs to examine if emotion regulation strategies, cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression, while controlling for relationship quality, were associated with dating violence perpetration in current romantic relationships and eight months later. The sample consisted of 339 adolescents (112 boys, mean age 16.21) from Time 1 and 50 adolescents (9 boys, mean age 17.02) who were followed up with eight months later at Time 2. Results indicated that cognitive reappraisal was significantly associated with physical aggression perpetration in current romantic relationships (Time 1), whereas, expressive suppression was found to be predictive of changes in physical aggression perpetration from Time 1 to Time 2. These findings were not extended to emotional/verbal aggression. The current study lends support to the importance of emotion regulation strategies in romantic relationships, specifically in relation to physical violence perpetration.