Does resilience mediate the relationship between emotion dysregulation and Generalised Anxiety Disorder?

Webster, Rebecca (2016) Does resilience mediate the relationship between emotion dysregulation and Generalised Anxiety Disorder? Doctoral thesis, University of East Anglia.

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Abstract

The relationship between emotion dysregulation and Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD) has been demonstrated in research for the past ten years, with the positing of the Emotion Dysregulation Model of GAD (Mennin et al., 2005). The role of resilience in buffering against mood disorders has also been investigated and resilience training has been successfully utilised as an adjunct to therapy for GAD (Fava et al., 2004). This research considers whether resilience mediates between emotion dysregulation and GAD. One hundred and eighty seven participants were recruited from online social media platforms and self-help forums and completed online questionnaires. These questionnaires included a measure of resilience, two measures of emotion regulation, a measure of worry, a measure of GAD symptoms, a depression measure and brief demographic questions. Participants were split into high and low GAD symptoms groups dependent on their score on the Generalised Anxiety Disorder-7 item questionnaire using a cut-off of 10 (Spitzer, Kroenke, William & Lowe, 2006).
The results showed that participants in the high GAD symptoms group had significantly higher emotion dysregulation scores, lower resilience scores and were less likely to engage in adaptive emotion regulation strategies. Emotion dysregulation was also found to be a significant predictor of GAD symptoms. Resilience was not found to be a mediator between emotion dysregulation and GAD, however the relationship between emotion dysregulation and worry was partially mediated by resilience. This highlights potentially different mechanisms behind the pervasive worry experienced by those with GAD and GAD symptoms in general. This has important implications for future research and clinical interventions for GAD.

Item Type: Thesis (Doctoral)
Faculty \ School: Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences > Norwich Medical School
Depositing User: Users 4971 not found.
Date Deposited: 28 Mar 2017 14:39
Last Modified: 28 Mar 2017 14:39
URI: https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/63097
DOI:

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