Out of Sight, Out of Mind? Accuracy and Bias in Emotion Regulation Trait Judgments

Objective: The current study examined accuracy and bias in judging trait-level emotion regulation strategy use in romantic relationships and tested emotion-related and global predictors of these judgments. Method: Both members of 120 heterosexual couples (M_age = 20.39 years; 56.3% Caucasian) completed measures of emotion regulation (self-reported and perceived partner use of suppression and reappraisal), emotionality, emotional expressivity, and relationship quality. Results: Romantic partners were relatively accurate in judging suppression and reappraisal, although they had a tendency to underestimate use of both strategies. Reappraisal use was overestimated more among targets higher in positive expressivity, whereas suppression use was underestimated among targets higher in emotionality. In addition, women overestimated their partner's reappraisal use more than did men, and higher relationship quality predicted more positive biases in judging emotion regulation patterns. Conclusions: These findings suggest that romantic partners can judge each other's emotion regulation patterns with some degree of accuracy, but certain biases exist for specific strategies. The amount of accuracy and bias in emotion regulation judgments within romantic relationships may be influenced by both specific emotion-related characteristics of targets and global characteristics that broadly affect personality judgments.