actual experiment. It was decided to set the experiment up in this way so that each participant would have met the experimenter the day prior to the main experiment session, and would therefore be regulating the emotions of someone with whom they had a standardised level of familiarity with, but no close relationship. In experiments investigating interpersonal interactions such as interpersonal emotion regulation, it is important to establish that the participants are meaningfully engaging with each other. To this end, within this study, the person in the video had met with the participant on the day prior to the scan and conducted the practice session with them. This ensured that each of the participants had the same level of interaction and familiarity with the other person, and also increased the likelihood that participants would be motivated to regulate that person’s emotion. 2.2.3 Regulation instructions: Manipulation of inter- versus intra-personal emotion regulation The key manipulation of this current study was to vary the target of the emotion regulation process from the ‘self’ (intrapersonal) to the ‘other’ (interpersonal). The interpersonal emotion regulation condition therefore required an interaction to be made between the participant and the experimenter on the video link in order to constitute a valid form of interpersonal regulation (Totterdell, personal communication). The way in which this interaction occurred was for the participant to speak aloud to the other person, instructing them as to how they should regulate their emotional state. To ensure that the two versions of the paradigm (intra- and interpersonal) were matched (which was of paramount importance for the fMRI phase of the study in order to permit a direct comparison) the intrapersonal version also required participants to speak aloud a regulation strategy; participants were therefore required to say a short phrase that corresponded to how they were regulating their emotion according to the task instructions (e.g. it’s just a film). In the interpersonal version of the paradigm participants were required to speak during the same timeframe as the intrapersonal condition, but this time had to direct the other person as to how they should regulate their emotions according to the
actual experiment. It was decided to set the experiment up in this way so that each participant would have met the experimenter the day prior to the main experiment session, and would therefore be regulating the emotions of someone with whom they had a standardised level of familiarity with, but no close relationship. In experiments investigating interpersonal interactions such as interpersonal emotion regulation, it is important to establish that the participants are meaningfully engaging with each other. To this end, within this study, the person in the video had met with the participant on the day prior to the scan and conducted the practice session with them. This ensured that each of the participants had the same level of interaction and familiarity with the other person, and also increased the likelihood that participants would be motivated to regulate that person’s emotion. 2.2.3 Regulation instructions: Manipulation of inter- versus intra-personal emotion regulation The key manipulation of this current study was to vary the target of the emotion regulation process from the ‘self’ (intrapersonal) to the ‘other’ (interpersonal). The interpersonal emotion regulation condition therefore required an interaction to be made between the participant and the experimenter on the video link in order to constitute a valid form of interpersonal regulation (Totterdell, personal communication). The way in which this interaction occurred was for the participant to speak aloud to the other person, instructing them as to how they should regulate their emotional state. To ensure that the two versions of the paradigm (intra- and interpersonal) were matched (which was of paramount importance for the fMRI phase of the study in order to permit a direct comparison) the intrapersonal version also required participants to speak aloud a regulation strategy; participants were therefore required to say a short phrase that corresponded to how they were regulating their emotion according to the task instructions (e.g. it’s just a film). In the interpersonal version of the paradigm participants were required to speak during the same timeframe as the intrapersonal condition, but this time had to direct the other person as to how they should regulate their emotions according to the
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