The use and consequences of expressive suppression in high-risk and low-risk relationship discussions.

Abstract

Expressive suppression, which involves hiding emotions, is a common emotion regulation behavior in relationships but interferes with perceived responsiveness and closeness. These relationship costs make it important to identify the contexts in which the use and harmful correlates of expressive suppression are more likely to occur. Building from theory positing that different contexts entail different risks of rejection, we investigated whether expressive suppression was (a) more intense and (b) associated with worse relational outcomes in high-risk than low-risk relationship interaction contexts. In two studies (conducted in 2016-2017 and 2022), Belgian couples engaged in separate discussions about each other's most annoying characteristics (high-risk context) and valuable characteristics (low-risk context). For each discussion, each couple member reported how much they had suppressed their emotions, felt their partner was responsive toward them, and felt close to their partner. In Study 1 (n = 101 couples), expressive suppression was assessed for emotions in general. In Study 2 (n = 130 couples), expressive suppression was assessed for negative and positive emotions separately. In both studies, participants reported suppressing emotions more intensely in high-risk than in low-risk contexts. Actors' (and sometimes partners') expressive suppression was also associated with lower perceived responsiveness and closeness. However, results regarding whether suppression was associated with worse relational outcomes in the high-risk versus low-risk context were inconsistent, depending on the specificity of emotions assessed with the suppression measure (general, negative, or positive) and the relational outcome. The findings suggest that expressive suppression might be harmful regardless of the risk of relationship interactions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).