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Adolescence is a vulnerable period in terms of the onset of anxiety disorders, and dyadic parent-adolescent interactions may play a key role in either increasing or reducing the risk of psychopathologies. This study examines the presence of physiological synchrony (specifically, linkage in interbeat interval series) and non-verbal synchrony in positive and negative interactions between adolescents (aged 13-16) and their fathers. Non-verbal synchrony was quantified through the coordination of the interactants' body movements, using an automated video-analysis algorithm (motion energy analysis). Participants were made up of 53 parent-adolescent dyads, the latter at either low (n = 28) or high (n = 25) risk of anxiety. Adolescents at low risk of anxiety displayed statistically significant levels of non-verbal synchrony with their fathers during positive interactions. Non-verbal synchrony was not found in the father-adolescent dyads featuring adolescents at high risk of anxiety. Physiological synchrony was not significantly present above chance level in either of the groups of adolescents. Overall, the results suggest that adolescents at high risk of anxiety may have difficulties in managing non-distressing interactions with their fathers. The results also suggest that physiological synchrony is not a straightforward phenomenon.

This study explored the association between temperament—i.e., positive affect (PA) and negative affect (NA)—and emotion regulation (ER), and what momentary factors influence the selection of rumination or reappraisal during adolescents’ daily life. The type of social situation in which negative events occurred, the self-rated degrees of discomfort, the types of predominant emotions experienced, and the use of reappraisal and rumination were assessed at 24 different times with an ecological momentary assessment approach given to 71 adolescents. PA, NA, and ER style were evaluated using self-reports. Bivariate Pearson correlations analysis revealed that NA and negative ER style correlated positively with the rumination use whereas PA correlated negatively with the rumination use. Negative ER style moderated the relationship between NA and the frequency with which rumination was used. The moderated function of positive ER style could not be tested due to its lack of association with the rumination use. Adolescents selected rumination more often during family-related events and when experiencing depression-like emotions. No interaction effects were shown between negative ER style and the momentary factors related with the type of social situation and the type of prevailing emotion during negative event. No associations between study variables and reappraisal were found. This study provides a better understanding of ER patterns in adolescence.

The present study aimed to provide further evidence on the usefulness of non-linear cardiac measures when examining the output of the cardiac system. Scale-invariant self-similarity and entropy, in addition to heart rate variability (HRV) given by time- and frequency-domain measures were calculated in a sample of N = 55 healthy adolescents (Mage = 14.122, SDage = 0.698) during 10-min positive (non-stressful) and negative (stressful) interactions with their mothers. We also explored sex influence in adolescents’ cardiac output using both HRV measures and non-linear cardiac measures. Repeated measures MANOVA revealed a marginal within-group effect for HRV measures, F(3,51) = 2.438, p = 0.075, η2p = 0.125), and a significant within-group effect for non-linear cardiac measures, F(6, 48) = 3.296, p = 0.009, η2p = 0.292, showing a significant decrement in adolescents’ cardiac complexity during the negative interaction. No significant effect for sex was found in either non-linear cardiac measures or HRV measures, but results suggest lower cardiac scaling in females than in males. These findings suggest a real-time scale predominance in heart rate output when adolescents face an aversive situation and support the importance of non-linear cardiac measures to gain insight into the cardiac system and its regulatory mechanisms. Further research is needed to examine sex-differences in cardiac complexity during aversive situations.

This paper aimed to (a) validate a novel technique that quantifies the length of the trajectories the cardiac system follows within a two-dimensional state-space, and (b) test its usefulness to better understand how cognitive emotion regulation (CER) style is associated with cardiac output. A positive CER style was assessed in a sample of healthy adolescents (n = 57), and mean and total distances, in addition to heart rate variability (HRV) measures and cardiac entropy (SampEn), were calculated during a conflict discussion with the adolescents' mothers. Associations between distances and HRV measures in time and frequency-domains and SampEn were examined to better understand the physiological meaning of distances; further, whether a positive CER style would predict distances, HRV, and SampEn. Correlation analysis revealed that associations of distances with time-domain HRV measures were stronger than associations with frequency-domain HRV measures, while correlations between distances and SampEn were moderate. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis revealed that a positive CER style predicted distances and SampEn, but not HRV measures. Distances are clearly time-domain measures of HRV, but only partly capture the complexity of the heart signal. The results highlight the importance of assessing heart rate dynamics beyond HRV in the study of CER.

Adolescence is a vulnerable period for depressive and anxious symptom development, and emotion regulation (ER) may be one mechanism linking temperament&mdash, i.e., positive affect (PA) and negative affect (NA)&mdash, with such symptomatology. Rumination is a common ER strategy that is traditionally assessed using self-reported questionnaires, but it would also be interesting to examine it with an Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) approach. Sixty-five adolescents (Mage = 14.69, SDage = 0.82, range = 14&ndash, 17 years old, 53.80% girls) completed self-report measures of temperament, ER style, depression and anxiety, and underwent an EMA to investigate rumination use. Results revealed that negative ER style and rumination use mediated the relationship between NA and depression, while only rumination use mediated the relationship between PA and depression. Moreover, NA contributed to increase anxiety, but negative ER style did not significantly mediate this relationship. Rumination use also had no effect on anxiety. This study provides further support for the relationship between temperament, ER, and internalizing problems. It seems that both a negative ER style and rumination use mediate the relationship between NA and depression whereas only NA had a significant direct effect on anxiety. Furthermore, PA buffered the effect of rumination use on depression in this study.