Emotion regulation in socio-political movement: The importance of emotion regulation towards Hong Kong university students’ mental health during the pro-democracy movement

Objectives: This study aims to investigate the association between the pro-democracy movement and the young generation’s mental well-being, and the moderating effect of emotion regulation strategies (i.e. cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression) on the association between participation level and mental health. Methods: Participants were 106 Hong Kong university students (mean age = 19.7, 60.4% female) who filled out a four-part questionnaire: demographic characteristics, level of participation in social movement, Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ)(Gross & John, 2003), and a set of mental health status questionnaires which included the Generalized Anxiety Disorder Scale (Spitzer, Kroenke, Williams, & Löwe, 2006), 9-item Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9; Yeung et al., 2008), and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Checklist-Civilian (PCL-C) Questionnaire (Weathers et al., 1991, 1993) Results: Results showed that 1) Around 30% of the respondents reported moderate to severe levels of anxiety and depressive symptoms and about 50% of the respondents reported significant symptoms of PTSD. 2) Participation level was significantly correlated with depressive symptoms (r = .22, p< .05) and posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms (r = .28, p< .05). However, 3) emotion regulation strategies (cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression) were not significant moderators in the relationship between participation level and mental health outcomes. Conclusion: Findings suggest that the participants’ mental health was associated with the pro-democracy movement. The higher the level of participation in the movement that involves conflicts and violence, the higher psychological distress that the individuals would gain. All rights reserved.