526 v. AFFECTI vE PROCESSES
change strategies, or cease regulation alto -
gether. Monitoring is highly important given 
that situational features can change (Aldao, 
2013), and even a typically adaptive strat -
egy might not always be effective (e.g., Troy, 
Shallcross, & Mauss, 2013). For example, if 
one is finding it difficult to reappraise one’s 
anger toward a friend, it might be useful 
to distract oneself, at least until one cools 
down. Different types of trait-level emotion 
regulation are represented at each of these 
stages, as we describe in the next section.
Individual  Differences
Emotion regulation efforts vary based 
on characteristics of both the regulation 
context and the individual (Aldao, 2013; 
Sheppes et al., 2014). Systematic individual 
differences exist in various aspects of emo -
tion regulation, such as the frequency with 
which we regulate our emotions, the ways 
we regulate our emotions, and how success -
ful we are in our regulation attempts. In this 
section, we describe how emotion regulation 
can be evaluated at the trait level. Specially, 
we highlight important individual differ -
ences that are relevant for the identification, 
selection, implementation, and monitoring 
stages of emotion regulation. We also dis -cuss how other personality traits may be 
related to individual differences in emotion 
regulation across these different stages (see 
Figure 24.2).
Identification  Stage
The identification stage of emotion regu -
lation involves various processes, includ -
ing the detection of an emotion that could 
be targeted for regulation, judgment of the 
target emotion’s value, and activation of an 
emotion regulation goal. There are a number 
of traits relevant to these processes that can 
influence whether an individual ultimately 
will decide there is a need to regulate his or 
her emotions. We focus on three specific fac -
tors: perception, goals, and beliefs.
Perception of emotions is one key factor 
that can impact whether emotion regulation 
is deemed necessary. For instance, the likeli -
hood of initiating regulation attempts may 
depend on emotional awareness, the atten -
tion that individuals allocate toward their 
emotions and the clarity with which they 
experience their emotions (Salovey, Mayer, 
Goldman, Turvey, & Palfai, 1995). People 
may be more likely to detect a need for emo -
tion regulation if they are aware of their 
emotions and have a clear sense of what ex -
actly they are feeling. Some indirect evidence 
FIGURE 24.2. Examples of key individual differences in emotion regulation mapped onto the different 
stages of the extended process of emotion regulation (Gross, 2015).
A PIDENTIFICA TIONSELECTION
IMPLEMENT ATION
MONIT ORINGStrategy repertoire
Strategy self-ef ficacy
Appraisal of context
Perception
Goals
BeliefsTactic repertoire
Tactic capability
Flexibility
Rumination