Behavioral sciences

Grieving the Loss of a Romantic Relationship: Ambiguous Loss, Attachment Styles, and Emotional Regulation
 

Star Sanchez 
Our Lady of the Lake University 

The end of a romantic relationship can lead to grief and emotional distress. Although romantic breakups are common, the grief associated with relationship loss is often overlooked (Reimer & Estrada, 2021). This study examines the relationships among attachment styles, emotional regulation difficulties, and grief severity following romantic relationship loss. Understanding factors associated with breakup-related grief improve knowledge of how individuals cope with relationship loss and provide information useful for counseling and mental health services. Participants include adults aged 18–62 years who have experienced the loss of a meaningful romantic relationship. Data were collected through an anonymous Qualtrics survey using the Attachment Style Questionnaire (Sperling & Berman, 1994), Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (Gratz & Roemer, 2004), and the Inventory of Complicated Grief–Revised (Boelen & Reijntjes, 2009). It is hypothesized that insecure attachment styles and emotional regulation difficulties will be associated with higher levels of grief. Data will be analyzed using SPSS to examine relationships among the study variables and determine whether attachment styles and emotional regulation difficulties predict grief severity. Positive relationships are expected among insecure attachment styles, emotional regulation difficulties, and grief severity. This study helps increase understanding of how attachment styles and emotional regulation relate to grief following romantic relationship loss. These findings could be applied to improve support for adolescents in schools who experience their first relationship loss. Future research should examine additional factors that may influence grief following romantic relationship loss.

Still a Fan? Social Identity and Cognitive Dissonance in Response to Moral Violations 
 

Emily Lunbery
Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi

People often form attachments to admired public figures, using them to express their values and signal group membership. When these figures commit moral violations, the resulting tension is both psychologically uncomfortable and sociologically meaningful. Prior research has not examined how identity strength, identity meaning, and cognitive engagement jointly shape responses to such violations. This study examines how the strength of a person’s social identities influences their cognitive dissonance responses to a moral violation. Participants will list 3-5 admired public figures, complete measures of social identity strength, identity meaning, and Need for Cognition, and then read either a moral violation or control scenario about a public figure. They will report their emotional reactions, defensive or reflective responses, and interpretations of the event. We anticipate that individuals with stronger identity ties to admired figures will show more defensive responses to moral violations, while those with weaker ties will show more reflective processing. Higher Need for Cognition is also expected to predict more reflective responses overall, regardless of identity strength. These findings will contribute to a deeper understanding of how social identity shapes responses to expectation-violating information and highlight how identity driven loyalty can allow admired figures to maintain influence despite their moral failures. 

Esther McCall

People with psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES) often experience comorbid conditions such as PTSD, anxiety, or depression. Recent research has focused on understanding how PNES interacts with these disorders and influences emotional regulation. Examining emotional regulation in patients with PNES may help identify risk for further psychological distress and reveal how the condition impacts processing of emotional cues and recovery. This study investigates the effect of possible comorbid depression and anxiety in children with PNES, specifically examining emotional regulation and potential neural dysfunction. The central question is whether these patients exhibit emotional dysregulation that could inform therapeutic interventions. An emotional conflict task (ECT) will be conducted with simultaneous recording of magnetoencephalography (MEG) and electroencephalography (EEG) in adolescents aged 10–19, including typically developing (TD) controls (n = 15) and those diagnosed with PNES (n = 15). Depression and anxiety will be assessed using the 9-item Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) and Generalized Anxiety Disorder scale (GAD-7). Independent samples t-tests will analyze group differences, and a 2 × 2 factorial ANOVA will examine incongruent and congruent trials of the ECT. Adolescents with PNES are expected to report higher depression and anxiety scores, slower reaction times, reduced accuracy on incongruent trials, and hypoactivation in posterior parietal, prefrontal, and cingulate regions. Identifying neural and behavioral markers of emotional dysregulation in adolescents with PNES may support earlier, more personalized treatments targeting anxiety and depression