A relational perspective on emotion regulation across adulthood

Theories of aging suggest that close social connections are key determinants of maintained emotional well-being across adulthood. However, most emotion regulation (ER) research has taken an intrapsychic perspective, focusing primarily on individuals' attempts to manage their own emotions in isolation from others. In this article, we present a relational perspective on ER and suggest that consideration of social factors can provide novel insight into how ER operates and changes throughout the adult lifespan. We describe theoretical perspectives of aging and ER, review the mixed evidence regarding the characterization of age-related shifts in ER, and highlight relational features of ER goals, strategy selection, and success of implementation. We conclude with a discussion of directions for future research examining ER throughout adulthood from a relational perspective, advocating for the comparison of intrapersonal and interpersonal ER in ecologically valid and longitudinal contexts.