How does heart biology protect us from hiding our feelings?
People who frequently suppress their emotions suffer fewer depressive symptoms if they have higher resting heart rate variability.
Source
Emotion Regulation, Parasympathetic Function, and Psychological Well-Being
Study at a glance
- Design
- Cohort — Longitudinal observational study of bereaved spouses and matched controls across three visits
- N
- N=267 · 167 recently bereaved spouses and 100 matched controls over ~6 months
- Population
- Older adults after spousal bereavement and matched non-bereaved controls
- Outcome
- Depressive symptoms and stress as a function of ER strategies and resting HRV
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Inspect source passages
How does heart biology protect us from hiding our feelings?
These passages occur verbatim in the stored paper text. They support the points listed below; they do not verify every statement in the explanation.
267 participants in the study
As part of a larger longitudinal-observational study investigating the biological mechanisms underlying greater cardiovascular disease risk during bereavement, our sample includes 267 participants measured across three study visits.
167 spousally bereaved participants
The 267 total participants included 167 spousally bereaved participants and 100 control participants ( M = 68 years; 68% women; see for all sample characteristics).
What they did
Researchers tracked 267 older adults, including 167 recently bereaved spouses and 100 matched controls, over a 6-month period across 3 visits. At the first visit, they measured participants' resting heart rate variability for 5 continuous minutes and assessed their self-reported emotion regulation strategies. They then tracked participants' depressive symptoms and perceived stress levels across all three visits.
What they found
Expressive suppression was generally linked to higher depressive symptoms and more perceived stress, while cognitive reappraisal was tied to better well-being. However, having higher resting heart rate variability buffered the negative effects of expressive suppression on depressive symptoms. For individuals with low heart rate variability, suppressing emotions predicted higher depressive symptoms, whereas those with high heart rate variability showed no such negative association.
The limits
What it doesn't show
The study is purely correlational, meaning it cannot prove that high heart rate variability directly causes resilience against emotional suppression. It relied on self-reported questionnaires to measure the frequency of emotion regulation strategies rather than directly assessing how effectively participants applied them. Additionally, the sample consisted of older adults who were mostly non-Hispanic White, so the findings may not generalize to younger or more racially diverse populations. Lastly, heart rate variability was measured only once at baseline rather than tracking how it shifted over the course of the study.
Key terms
- Expressive suppression
- An emotion regulation strategy that involves consciously hiding outward signs of an emotion, such as facial expressions, after the feeling has already started.
- Cognitive reappraisal
- An emotion regulation strategy where a person reinterprets a situation to change its emotional impact before an emotional response fully develops.
- Heart rate variability
- The variation in time intervals between consecutive heartbeats, which serves as a physiological marker of parasympathetic nervous system functioning and self-regulation.
- Bereavement
- The period of grief and mourning following the death of a close loved one, such as a spouse.
- Parasympathetic nervous system
- The division of the autonomic nervous system responsible for restorative processes, helping the body calm down after experiencing stress.
- RMSSD
- A mathematical formula used to calculate heart rate variability by looking at the differences between successive heartbeats.
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Quiz yourself
During the first year of spousal bereavement, approximately what percentage of widowed spouses meet the clinical criteria for major depressive disorder?
Common questions
Does this mean keeping my feelings inside is always bad for my health?
Not necessarily. While suppressing emotions generally relates to higher stress and depressive symptoms, the study suggests that people with higher heart rate variability are physiologically protected from these negative psychological effects.
Did the death of a spouse change how these biological and emotional factors interacted?
Surprisingly, no. The protective buffering effect of high heart rate variability against emotional suppression was similar for both the recently widowed group and the control group.
How did cognitive reappraisal compare to suppressing emotions?
Reinterpreting situations (cognitive reappraisal) was consistently linked to lower stress and depression regardless of a person's heart rate variability, whereas suppression was only harmful for those with low heart rate variability.
Can someone improve their heart rate variability to become more resilient?
While this study did not test interventions, the authors suggest that therapies like cognitive behavioral therapy or biofeedback training could potentially increase heart rate variability and help cushion the effects of negative coping styles.
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