Emotion suppression on relationship and life satisfaction: Taking culture and emotional valence into account

Abstract

Despite a general consensus on the negative consequences of emotion suppression in Western cultures, cross-cultural explorations to date have yielded many inconsistencies on whether such phenomena can be generalized to Eastern cultures. A set of two studies were conducted to examine the role of emotional valence in resolving such inconsistencies on both relationship satisfaction and subjective well-being. In accordance with our hypotheses, our results consistently revealed that the habitual suppression of emotions was associated with lower relationship satisfaction and subjective well-being, regardless of valence, for American participants. However, the effects of emotion suppression significantly varied by valence for Korean participants, such that suppressing negative emotions was less detrimental than suppressing positive emotions. Overall, the present study highlights the importance of considering the nature of different emotions and cultural contexts when examining the adaptiveness of emotion regulation strategies on individuals’ interpersonal and intrapersonal well-being.

Keywords

Emotion suppression marital satisfaction life satisfaction emotional valence

Emotion suppression, culture, and valence: Differential effects of emotion suppression

Emotions are not just passively experienced and expressed by people but are actively monitored and regulated through a wide range of strategies. Among the various emotion regulation strategies is the conscious inhibition of outward expressions of inner feelings, termed “emotion suppression” (Gross & Levenson, 1993), which has often been identified as a type of “unhealthy emotion regulation” in existing literature (English & John, 2013; John & Gross, 2007). For instance, several studies over the recent decades have demonstrated that suppressing one’s emotions yields detrimental effects across several domains of intrapersonal and interpersonal well-being (Cote, 2005; Srivastava et al., 2009).

However, cross-cultural explorations of these phenomena have yielded many inconsistencies, with some studies supporting the universality of the deleterious effects of emotion suppression (English & John, 2013; Matsumoto et al., 2008; Roberts et al., 2008), and others reporting weak to null effects of emotion suppression among East Asian populations (Butler et al., 2007; Soto et al., 2011; Wei et al., 2013). For instance, while some studies have found that habitual tendencies to suppress general emotions are associated with lower life satisfaction, lower happiness, and greater maladjustments across both Western and Eastern samples (English & John, 2013; Matsumoto et al., 2008), other studies have shown that habitual suppression yields less costs on life satisfaction and well-being for East Asian individuals (Butler et al., 2007; Soto et al., 2011), and may even have benefits for interpersonal harmony in an Eastern cultural context (Wei et al., 2013). Hence, although the adverse effects of emotion suppression have been well-established in Western cultures, it remains unclear whether emotion suppression would be similarly deleterious in Eastern cultures.

With the aim of resolving such inconsistencies, the present research takes into account the valence of the suppressed emotions when examining its impact on individuals’ relationship and subjective well-being. In fact, much of the existing research has operationalized and assessed emotion suppression as the combined suppression of both positive and negative emotions (e.g., Butler et al., 2007; English & John, 2013), thus failing to capture the nuanced effects of suppressing emotions with different valences. However, based on the theoretical underpinnings of distinct cultural norms and values, the present research postulates that inhibition of negative emotions would be less detrimental, compared to inhibition of positive emotions, particularly within an Eastern cultural context, in which past findings on the effects of emotion suppression remain inconclusive.

Suppression of positive and negative emotions under different cultural norms

Understanding how inhibition of positive and negative emotions functions in different cultures requires close examination of the cultural norms that guide the adaptiveness of particular emotion regulation strategies (Chentsova-Dutton et al., 2007; Matsumoto et al., 2008). Under the cultural framework of individualistic (independent) and collectivistic (interdependent) cultures, a long history of cross-cultural research has demonstrated fundamental differences between Western and Eastern cultures in their norms, values, and expectations, which reflect the ways in which individuals are socialized to cope with the self and others (Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Oyserman et al., 2002). Based on these differences, each culture rewards or reinforces emotion regulation strategies that align with its cultural values, while discouraging those that undermine it, thereby yielding differences in the emotions that are deemed appropriate to be either expressed or suppressed (Butler et al., 2007; Mesquita & Albert, 2007; van Kleef et al., 2016).

Specifically, the individualistic cultures of Western societies value the cultural ideals of personal autonomy, self-assertion, and authenticity (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). With greater emphasis on independence over relatedness, the assertion of true inner attributes is often valued over adjusting oneself to better fit in with others. From this perspective, the open expression of one’s emotions—whether positive or negative—is encouraged over suppression, as making one’s inner attributes socially recognizable “symbolizes one’s ultimate freedom to be oneself” (Kim & Sherman, 2007). Demonstrating the prevalence of such norms from an early environment, several studies have shown that parents and families from Western cultures are more likely to encourage their children to overtly express their emotions (Miller et al., 1996; Saw & Okazaki, 2010). Therefore, in the Western cultural context, it could be expected that inhibiting the expression of one’s true inner feelings would be maladaptive, regardless of whether the emotion is positive or negative, as it is counter to the cultural ideal of being authentic and self-expressive (Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Oyserman et al., 2002).

Conversely, the collectivistic cultures of East Asian societies put greater emphasis on the cultural ideals of relatedness, embeddedness, and interpersonal harmony (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). With the focal value placed on interdependence, individuals are encouraged to uphold their social obligations of adjusting their behaviors to fit the interpersonal context (Kirkbride et al., 1991). Hence, overt emotional expressions in general may have greater negative implications in Eastern cultures as they could disrupt social cohesion and the stability of social order (Chen & Chung, 1994). However, based on the notion that showing negative emotions may impose greater threats to social harmony than displays of positive emotions, the present study proposes that the suppression of negative emotions can be better tolerated than that of positive emotions in Eastern cultures for the sake of sustaining interpersonal harmony.

On the one hand, substantial literature has generally described the crucial role of the expression of positive emotions in promoting social relatedness (Michalik et al., 2007; Mauss et al., 2011). For instance, while positive expressivity is considered to promote interpersonal functioning by signaling affiliation motives (Gable et al., 2004; Harker & Keltner, 2001), its absence is suggested to hinder interpersonal quality by signaling indifference or the desire to withdraw (Laurenceau et al., 1998; Reis & Shaver, 1988). Although some studies note that individuals from Eastern cultures may be more inclined to recognize that positive expressions could also endanger interpersonal harmony (Uchida et al., 2004), research has shown that the prosocial implications of positive expressions continue to be prevalent in Eastern cultures (Tsai et al., 2006).

On the other hand, negative expressivity generally imposes critical disruptions to interpersonal relatedness by eroding social support and relationship functioning (Kashdan et al., 2007; Rauer & Volling, 2005). Accordingly, several findings focusing on specific typesof emotion suppression provide indirect evidence that the suppression of negative emotions may be better tolerated within the Eastern cultural context, where interdependent values are prominent. For instance, in their research on anger suppression, Cheung and Park (2010) have shown that the association between anger suppression and depressive symptoms was significantly attenuated for individuals from Eastern cultural backgrounds compared to their Western counterparts. In a similar vein, Le and Impett (2013) also found a potential link between withholding negative emotions during sacrifice and better well-being among individuals with higher interdependence.

In summary, the present research posits that taking the valence of emotions into account may help clarify the inconsistent findings on the effects of emotion suppression in East Asian cultures. Specifically, while we expect that emotion suppression would be associated with adverse outcomes regardless of the emotion’s valence in a Western culture, we predict that the effects of emotion suppression would vary by valence in an East Asian culture. Given the prominent norms of interpersonal harmony in Eastern cultures, we expect suppression of negative emotions to be better tolerated and less costly to one’s social and personal well-being than suppressing positive emotions.

Overview of the present research

A set of two studies was conducted across samples from both North American and East Asian cultures. Study 1 examined the social outcomes of suppressing positive and negative emotions by specifically assessing the level of suppression for 20 discrete emotions from married couples in South Korea and the United States. Study 2 aimed to extend the findings of Study 1 to the more personal outcome of life satisfaction by using more general samples from both cultures. In addition, Study 2 adopted a more widely used measurement scale from the literature to test the robustness of the findings.

Study 1

Study 1 examined whether the social outcomes of positive and negative emotion suppression vary depending on culture. Previous literature has indicated that emotion suppression mostly occurs during the emotional ebb and flow of social interactions and thus has significant social consequences (Butler et al., 2007). Therefore, Study 1 specifically investigated the effects of emotion suppression within the context of a marital relationship, wherein the target of suppression (i.e., spouse) could be specified, and a specific factor of the particular relationship (i.e., marital satisfaction) could be directly assessed.

Method

Participants and procedure

Given the effect sizes of emotion suppression in East Asian (d = .27) and North American (d = .40) samples from previous research (Nam et al., 2018), a priori sample size calculations using G*Power (Faul et al., 2007) showed that a sample of 193 East Asian individuals would be required to detect a small-to-medium effect size of r = .2, and a sample of 84 North American individuals would be required to detect a medium effect size of r = .3, with 80% statistical power. Based on this analysis, we aimed to collect as many participants as possible within our resources for Study 1 to ensure adequate power to detect these effect sizes. Accordingly, 197 Korean participants (117 women and 80 men) and 152 European American participants (85 women, 66 men, and 1 unidentified) were recruited from the online survey platforms of dataSpring and Amazon Mechanical Turk (Mturk), respectively. Eligible participants were limited to those aged over 18 who were currently married (mean age = 42.50 years, SD = 8.54, median = 32.00, range = 25−59 for Koreans; mean age = 40.68, SD = 10.81, median = 39.00, range = 23−72 for Americans). After providing informed consent, participants completed several self-report measures on a secure website via QualtricsTM. For the Korean participants, all measures in the present study were translated from English to Korean using a back-translation procedure. All procedures were approved by the university’s institutional review boards.

Measures

Positive and Negative Emotion Suppression: The items from the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; Watson et al., 1988) were used to assess the extent to which participants suppressed positive and negative emotions within their marriages. Although the few studies that have separately examined the suppression of positive or negative emotions (Le & Impett, 2013; Su et al., 2015) have mostly relied on single-item measures adapted from the suppression subscale of the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ; Gross & John, 2003), others have also recognized the need to capture the broader range of discrete emotions (Cheung & Park, 2010; Perry-Parrish & Zeman, 2011). Therefore, this study used a more comprehensive measure of emotion suppression by utilizing the PANAS, which has been well validated and widely known as a useful metric for differentiating emotions according to valence (Crawford & Henry, 2004; Weidong et al., 2004).

The PANAS comprises a list of 20 discrete emotions, wherein 10 items pertain to positive emotions (e.g., excitement, interestedness, and attentiveness) and 10 items pertain to negative emotions (e.g., anger, hostility, and irritation). For each emotion, participants were asked to report the extent to which they suppressed that emotion when interacting with their spouse in general, using a seven-point scale (i.e., “How often do you suppress expressing the below emotions to your spouse?”; 1 = never suppress to 7 = always suppress). Separate composite scores were calculated for positive emotion suppression (Cronbach’s α = .97 for Americans and α = .91 for Koreans) and negative emotion suppression (Cronbach’s α = .92 for Americans and α = .91 for Koreans), wherein higher scores indicate higher levels of emotion suppression.

Marital Satisfaction: Marital satisfaction was assessed using four items developed by Kelly and Conley (1987; e.g., “I am satisfied with my marriage,” “I have regretted my marriage”), rated on a seven-point scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree). The items were reverse scored when appropriate and combined into a single index, with higher scores indicating greater marital satisfaction (Cronbach’s α = .88 for Americans and α = .90 for Koreans).

Results

Prior to testing our hypotheses on the differential effects of emotion suppression by valence, the differences in the degrees to which Koreans and Americans suppressed their positive and negative emotions were examined by conducting a mixed two-way ANOVA with the valence (positive and negative) as a within-subject variable and culture (America and Korea) as a between-subject variable. The results revealed that there was a significant interaction effect between culture and the valence of emotion on emotion suppression, F (1, 347) = 3.94, p = .048. While the Korean participants were found to suppress both positive (M = 3.03, SD = 1.00) and negative emotions (M = 4.20, SD = 1.12) more than the American participants (M = 2.71, SD = 1.54 for positive emotions; M = 3.57, SD = 1.36 for negative emotions), the cross-cultural difference was larger for negative emotions (Cohen’s d = .51, t (289.33) = 4.70, p < .001) than for positive emotions (Cohen’s d = .25, t (245.50) = 2.18, p = .03).

To test our main hypotheses, analyses were performed at both within- and between-culture levels. At the within-culture level, we tested whether the effects of emotion suppression on marital satisfaction differed by emotional valence (positive vs. negative) within each culture. At the between-culture level, we tested whether the effects of suppressing positive or negative emotions differed across cultures by evaluating the cultural moderation of the links between marital satisfaction and positive or negative emotion suppression. All the findings reported below were not qualified by gender (all ps > .10), indicating that there were no gender differences across the results.

At the within-cultural level, a T² test that compares two dependent correlations (Steiger, 1980) showed that emotion suppression effects significantly varied according to valence among Korean participants, z = −2.21, p = .014 (see Figure 1). Specifically, positive emotion suppression was revealed to be associated with lower marital satisfaction, β = −.27, t (195) = −4.00, p < .001, 95% CI = [−.67, −.22], whereas negative emotion suppression was not found to be associated with marital satisfaction, β = −.08, t (195) = −1.14, p = .256, 95% CI = [−.33, .09]. Conversely, the effects of emotion suppression on marital satisfaction did not significantly vary by valence for American participants, z = 1.15, p = .13, in which suppression of both positive (β = −.29, t (150) = −3.76, p < .001, 95% CI = [−.45, −.14]) and negative (β = −.40, t (150) = −5.27, p < .001, 95% CI = [−.63, −.28]) emotions was found to be significantly associated with lower marital satisfaction.

Figure 1.

The effects of emotion suppression on marital satisfaction among American and Korean participants by the valence of emotions.

Meanwhile, at the between-cultural level, the results showed that culture significantly moderated the association between negative emotion suppression and marital satisfaction, b = −.34, F (1, 345) = 6.06, p = .01, 95% CI = [−.60, −.07] but did not significantly moderate the relation between positive emotion suppression and marital satisfaction, b = .15, F (1, 345) = 1.19, p = .28, 95% CI = [−.12, .42]. These results indicate that previous findings on cross-cultural differences in the effects of emotion suppression may have only pertained to the suppression of negative emotions, thus explaining the inconsistent findings.

Study 1 discussion

In Study 1, a cross-cultural sample of married individuals from the United States and South Korea was analyzed to examine the differential effects of suppressing positive and negative emotions on their marital satisfaction. As predicted, the patterns wherein the suppression of positive and negative emotions was associated with individuals’ marital satisfaction were found to vary by culture. Specifically, while greater suppression of either valence of emotions predicted lower marital satisfaction among individuals from Western cultures, only suppression of positive emotion revealed a negative association with marital satisfaction for those from Eastern cultures. In other words, while the negative association between positive suppression and marital satisfaction did not vary by culture, the association between negative suppression and marital satisfaction was mitigated for those from an Eastern culture.

Given that the results of Study 1 mostly supported our predictions, Study 2 was conducted with the aim of enhancing the generalizability and robustness of the findings. Specifically, Study 2 employed samples and measurements that closely replicated the contexts of previous cross-cultural studies on emotion suppression to further verify the assumption that emotion suppression may have different implications for adaptation depending on culture and emotional valence. First, while Study 1 focused on the social consequences of emotion suppression within a specific relationship context, studies have indicated that personal well-being indices, such as life satisfaction, provide an “accurate assessment of the long-term ‘adaptiveness’ of suppression” and are “readily observable variables in clinical settings in which issues of emotion regulation are frequently discussed” (Soto et al., 2011, p. 1450). Hence, previous studies have often focused on individuals’ personal well-being in their investigation of the maladaptive consequences of emotion suppression under different cultural norms (e.g., English & John, 2013; Soto et al., 2011). Consequently, to extend our findings and afford a more enhanced connection with the larger body of literature, Study 2 utilized more general samples from both cultures and examined how their positive and negative suppression levels are associated with their life satisfaction. Second, while Study 1 utilized the PANAS to provide a more comprehensive assessment of individuals’ suppression of different emotions, previous literature has mostly employed items from the ERQ to examine emotion suppression. Hence, with the aim of demonstrating that previous inconsistencies on the cross-cultural effects of emotion suppression could be explained by taking the valence into account, another aim of Study 2 was to replicate our findings by employing this more renowned measure.

Study 2

Method

Participants and procedure

Based on the results of a priori sample size calculation provided in Study 1, Study 2 recruited 220 Korean participants (103 men, 117 women) and 85 European American participants (36 men, 48 women, and 1 unidentified) from dataSpring and Mturk, respectively. All participants were over the age of 18 (mean age = 35.59 years, SD = 10.78, median = 35.00, range = 19−72 for Koreans; mean age = 39.78, SD = 13.05, median = 36.00, range = 22−74 for Americans). After providing informed consent, participants completed several self-report measures on a secure website via QualtricsTM. As in Study 1, all measures were translated from English to Korean using a back-translation procedure for the Korean participants. All procedures were approved by the university’s institutional review board.

Measures

Positive and Negative Emotion Suppression: Participants reported their general tendencies to suppress emotions using the suppression subscale of the ERQ (Gross & John, 2003). Following the methods of relevant studies (Le & Impett, 2013; Su et al., 2015), the current study decomposed the items in the subscale to analyze positive and negative suppressions separately. Specifically, one item measured the suppression of positive emotions (“When I am feeling positive emotions, I am careful not to express them”), and another item assessed the suppression of negative emotions (“When I am feeling negative emotions, I make sure not to express them”). The items were rated on a seven-point scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree), where higher scores indicate higher levels of emotion suppression.

Life Satisfaction: The Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS; Diener et al., 1985) was used to measure participants’ subjective well-being. The scale comprises five items (e.g., “In most ways my life is close to my ideal,” “The conditions of my life are excellent”) rated on a seven-point scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree). The items were combined into a single index, wherein higher scores indicate greater life satisfaction (Cronbach’s α = .93 for Koreans and α = .95 for Americans).

Results

Similar to Study 1, a mixed two-way ANOVA revealed a significant interaction effect between culture and the valence of emotion on emotion suppression, F (1, 303) = 7.63, p = .006. Decomposing the interaction effect, Koreans were found to suppress positive emotions (M = 3.72, SD = 1.31) significantly more than American (M = 2.80, SD = 1.53), Cohen’s d = .65, t (134.04) = −4.87, p < .001, whereas Koreans and Americans did not differ in the extent to which they suppressed negative emotions (M = 4.38, SD = 1.17 for Koreans, and M = 4.01, SD = 1.70 for Americans), Cohen’s d = .25, t (116.03) = −1.82, p = .071.

Similar to Study 1, within-cultural-level analyses were first performed to test whether the effects of emotion suppression on life satisfaction differed according to emotional valence within each culture (see Figure 2). For Korean participants, a T² test for comparing two dependent correlations showed that the effects of emotion suppression significantly varied by valence, z = −3.17, p = .001. Specifically, suppression of positive emotions was not found to be associated with lower life satisfaction, β = −.11, t (218) = −1.66, p = .098, 95% CI = [−.24, .02], whereas suppression of negative emotions was significantly associated with higher life satisfaction (β = .15, t (218) = 2.26, p = .025, 95% CI = [.02, .31]. In contrast, for American participants, the effects of emotion suppression did not significantly vary according to valence, z = −.71, p = .24, in which both positive and negative emotion suppression predicted lower life satisfaction (β = −.22, t (83) = −2.07, p = .042, for positive emotion suppression and β = −.14, t (83) = −1.30, p = .198, for negative emotion suppression).

Figure 2.

Effects of emotion suppression on life satisfaction among American and Korean participants by the valence of emotion.

Subsequently, between-cultural-level analyses were conducted to examine whether culture moderated the effects of positive and negative emotion suppression on life satisfaction. Similar to Study 1, the results revealed the significant moderating role of culture in the effects of negative emotion suppression on life satisfaction (b = .31, F (1, 301) = 6.49, p =.011, 95% CI = [.07, .56]) and the absence of a significant cross-cultural variation in the effects of positive emotion suppression (b = .15, F (1, 301) = 1.48, p = .22, 95% CI = [−.09, .40]). All the findings above were not qualified by gender (all ps > .10), indicating that there were no gender differences across the results.

General discussion

Summary of results

Based on the theoretical underpinnings of distinct cultural norms and values, the present study aimed to examine the hypothesis that the effects of emotion suppression would vary by valence in an East Asian culture, whereas the effects would be less contingent on the valence of emotions in a Western culture. In accordance with our predictions, Study 1 showed that for East Asian participants, the negative association between emotion suppression and marital satisfaction was significantly attenuated for suppressing negative emotions, as compared to suppressing positive emotions. In contrast, for North American participants, emotion suppression was found to be associated with lower marital satisfaction with less regard toward emotional valence. Similar to these results, Study 2 found that the effects of emotion suppression on the more personal outcome of life satisfaction also significantly varied by valence only in an Eastern cultural context.

Implications and future directions

The findings of the current study hold significant implications for several aspects of emotion regulation research. In recent decades, the theoretical model of emotion regulation has assumed that regulating one’s emotions through the use of suppression should yield negative consequences (Gross & Levenson, 1993; John & Gross, 2007). However, previous research has often conceptualized emotion suppression as the general tendency to suppress emotions overall, thus potentially overlooking the distinct effects of suppressing different types of emotions. Taking into account emotional valence as well as the cultural context in which emotions are regulated, the present study found that the social and personal consequences of suppressing either positive or negative emotions may vary, particularly within East Asian cultures. Thus, these findings underscore the need to examine the nuanced effects of suppressing different types of emotions more precisely and to further consider the context of emotion regulation, wherein the presumed effects of emotion regulation strategies may vary.

Based on these findings, we hope to discuss some alternative emotion types and emotion regulation contexts that might prove valuable for future research. First, while the present study mainly focused on differentiating between positive and negative emotion suppressions, other plausible conceptualizations of the types of emotions could have varying effects within the context of emotion regulation. For instance, given the assumed differences between “hard” emotions (i.e., anger, irritation, and hostility) and “soft” emotions (i.e., fear, scare, and distress), it may be argued that the effects of emotion suppression may vary, depending on one’s level of emotional awareness (Croyle & Waltz, 2002).¹ Concurrently, studies have suggested that the social orientation of emotions, which distinguishes socially engaging emotions from socially disengaging ones, may also help explain the nuanced effects of emotion suppression in particular cultures (Su et al., 2013). With the plausibility of these alternative categorizations of emotion types that were yet considered in the current research, future studies should continue to explore other characteristics of emotions that may help to explain the varying effects of emotion suppression.

Second, despite the current study’s focus on the cultural context of emotion suppression, future research may find it important to consider more immediate social contexts that possibly govern the adaptiveness of emotion regulation strategies. For instance, recent studies have suggested that the perceived appropriateness of emotion suppression may depend on how the suppressed emotion matches (vs. mismatches) the valence of the immediate context (Kalokerinos et al., 2017). Indeed, emotions shared by the majority of others in a social setting may have different implications from the suppression of emotions that misalign with the context, in which such patterns might also be more prevalent under specific cultural norms. Future studies must empirically explore these assumptions to extend the current study’s findings.

Lastly, despite the generally consistent results we found across two studies, the results of Studies 1 and 2 notably showed some subtle variations among East Asian participants in the patterns of differences between the effects of positive and negative emotion suppression. Specifically, whereas suppressing negative emotions in a marital relationship (i.e., Study 1) showed less unfavorable effects than suppressing positive emotions, suppressing negative emotions in a general context (i.e., Study 2) showed more favorable effects than suppressing positive emotions. Indeed, one plausible reason may be that Study 1 focused on relationship satisfaction as an outcome, whereas Study 2 examined the association between emotion suppression and individuals’ subjective well-being. Therefore, these results might indicate certain differences in the effects of emotion suppression on individuals’ social and personal well-being. However, another likely explanation may pertain to the varying degrees of social distance between the two contexts (Bogardus, 1925). According to social distance theory, the degree of social distance becomes much closer in marital relationships, as compared to general relationships (e.g., friends and coworkers). From such a perspective, expressions of negative emotions may be better tolerated, and even necessary to some extent, in order to build an honest, enduring relationship within the intimate bonds of marriage. Hence, whereas suppression of negative emotions could be considered favorable within general settings in East Asian cultures, it may not be as favorable within a marital relationship, although still less toxic than suppressing positive emotions. The plausibility of these explanations necessitates a more systematic investigation of these different outcomes and contexts to further expand the current study’s findings.

Limitations

Despite its contributions, the current study is not without limitations. First, although the causal association between emotion suppression and well-being has been well corroborated in previous research (Butler et al., 2003; Gross, 2002), the correlational nature of the present study still precludes us from making strong causal inferences on the cross-cultural effects of emotion suppression by valence. Hence, future studies would benefit from employing experimental or longitudinal designs to test the causal patterns of our findings robustly. Second, the current study heavily relied on self-report measures, which may undermine the validity of the responses. Although the participants’ self-assessments were assumed to capture the predicted effects based on the understanding of different norms of each culture, future studies should employ behavioral measures to further corroborate our findings. Third, despite our intention to demonstrate the robustness of our findings by employing different assessments for emotion suppression across the studies, we deemed that this might limit the degree to which the results of the two studies could be connected. Hence, building on our findings, future research should examine whether these patterns are consistently observed across a set of different tools of assessments for emotion suppression. Finally, some of our samples’ demographics are limited in the present studies, for example, social-economic status, sexual orientation, and disability. In line with our emphasis on the importance of considering one’s cultural background, future research could benefit from examining these other demographic factors more closely.

Conclusion

Despite the general consensus on the detrimental costs of emotion suppression in Western cultures, cross-cultural explorations have yielded many inconsistencies regarding whether the harmful effects of emotion suppression can be generalized to Eastern cultures. The present study sheds light on these inconsistencies by delving into the role of emotional valence in explaining the different patterns of effects for emotion suppression in different cultures. The findings of the present study highlight the importance of considering the nature of different emotions and cultural contexts when examining the patterns of the effects of emotion regulation strategies.

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF-2021S1A5A2A01069279). This research was also supported by the Yonsei Signature Research Cluster Program of 2021-22-0005.

Open research statement

As part of IARR’s encouragement of open research practices, the authors have provided the following information: This research was not pre-registered. The data used in the research cannot be publicly shared but are available upon request. The data can be obtained by emailing: younghoonkim@yonsei.ac.kr. The materials used in the research cannot be publicly shared but are available upon request. The materials can be obtained by emailing: younghoonkim@yonsei.ac.kr.

ORCID iD

Haeyoung Gideon Park

Note

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