Dampening of Positive Affect Serves an Emotional Contrast Avoidance Function: Preliminary Evidence From an Adult Community Sample

Dampening of positive affect (PA) constitutes a transdiagnostic risk and maintenance factor for affective dysregulation in various psychopathologies, including depression. However, the motives underlying this PA downregulation strategy remain unclear, even though they may be highly relevant for improving traditional psychological treatments. This study examined whether avoidance of negative emotional contrasts (NECs) and diminished preference for positive emotions were predictive of dampening. The latter was operationalised as low pro- and high contra-hedonic emotion regulation (ER) goal endorsement. An adult community sample (N = 159) completed an online survey, and multiple linear regressions were conducted to examine the predictive validity of both factors, after controlling for age, gender, and repetitive negative thinking (RNT). Higher levels of NEC avoidance and higher contra-hedonic ER goal endorsement were consistently found to uniquely predict concurrent dampening levels, above and beyond age, gender and RNT. Crucially, inclusion of both factors in the same regression model still yielded evidence for the unique predictive validity of NEC avoidance. Findings support the possibility that dampening is motivated by NEC avoidance rather than solely by emotional preferences. Study limitations are noted, and implications for future research and clinical practice are discussed.