Quality and Relevance Ratings

Quality and relevance ratings for each study are presented in Tables 2 and 3. The quality score columns demonstrate all studies score higher than 0.75 indicating that all reviewed studies were judged to be of sufficient quality for the analysis.

There was more variability in the relevance rating given to each study which assessed how useful study findings were for addressing the research question for this review. High relevance studies were centrally focused on the association between emotion controllability beliefs and symptoms of anxiety/depression and gave substantial consideration to mechanisms linking them. Medium relevance studies had some focus on the association between anxiety/depression symptoms and gave some consideration to mechanisms. Low relevance studies had some focus on the association between emotion controllability beliefs and anxiety/depression symptoms. Ten of the studies were judged to be highly relevant to this review, 9 of medium relevance and 2 of low relevance.

Emotion Controllability Beliefs and Symptoms of Anxiety

Cross-sectional and longitudinal studies found that believing emotions are relatively controllable was consistently associated with fewer symptoms of anxiety in young people. Of the 21 studies in the review, 11 assessed symptoms of anxiety. Table 4 presents the key findings of these studies and is structured by the type of measure that was used to assess emotion controllability beliefs (general vs. personal vs. anxiety/depression specific).

Table 4 Overview of studies and key findings Studies using a general measure of emotion controllability beliefs

Daniel et al. (2020) found that in a sample of young people with elevated social anxiety symptoms, those who believed emotions were relatively controllable had fewer symptoms of anxiety (r = − .27). King & dela Rosa (2019) found a similar pattern when using a second person measure of emotion controllability beliefs with university students, yet with a smaller (though still statistically significant), effect size (r = − .11). Conversely, a much larger effect size (r = − .74) was found between emotion controllability beliefs and anxiety symptoms in Russell et al.’s (2021) study of young people with cystic fibrosis. In the studies that used anxiety-specific measure of emotion controllability beliefs, similar patterns were found. Schroder et al.’s (2015) cross-sectional study found that their Theory of Anxiety (TOA) measure had consistently stronger correlations with all anxiety outcomes (rs = − 0.35 to − 0.44) than Tamir’s (2007) general emotion controllability beliefs measure (rs = − 0.09 to − 0.29). Zhu et al. (2021) used a similar anxiety-specific scale and found a strong negative correlation between beliefs that emotions are controllable and anxiety symptoms (r = − .53).

The current review also identified two longitudinal studies that examined emotion controllability beliefs and anxiety symptoms in young people. Schroder et al.’s (2019) study provides some evidence, at least in the short term, for the proposition that young people’s emotion controllability beliefs precede anxiety symptoms: they found that prior week’s ‘growth anxiety mindset’ contributed, beyond baseline ratings of depression symptoms, to subsequent distress (a composite of worry, anxiety, loneliness, depression, and anger items), an average of − 0.35 SD across the 5 weeks. Mesurado et al. (2018) tested three models in the opposite direction, which included (among other variables) anxiety symptoms at Wave 1 predicting three types of emotion controllability beliefs (positive affect, despondency/distress, and anger/irritation) at Wave 2. Anxiety symptoms did not predict emotion controllability beliefs in any of these models.

Taken together, these findings suggest that young people who believe emotions are relatively controllable tend to have fewer symptoms of anxiety. However, the majority of these findings were cross-sectional, and more research needs to be carried out examining these effects across different time points to gain a better understanding of the direction of this relationship.

Emotion Controllability Beliefs and Symptoms of Depression

Young people who believe emotions are controllable seem to be less likely to develop symptoms of depression. Evidence for this comes from 18 studies in the review that assessed symptoms of depression. As with the anxiety studies, a range of different emotion controllability beliefs measures were used. There were four cross-sectional studies that found a negative association between general emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms. The majority found a weak to moderate effect size (r = − .12 to r = − .28; De Castella et al., 2013; Ford et al., 2018; King & dela Rosa, 2019; Skymba et al., 2020), with the exception of Skymba et al.’s (2020) Study 2 which found a strong association between emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms for the 14–18-year-old group (r = − .52). The effect sizes in studies that used a personal emotion controllability beliefs measure were also mostly in the weak to moderate range (r = − .15 to r = − .45; Caprara et al., 2008, 2010; Daniel et al., 2020; De Castella et al., 2013; Di Giunta et al., 2022; Mesurado et al., 2018). However, in Russell’s (2021) study looking at emotion controllability beliefs in young people with cystic fibrosis, their novel measure of personal emotion controllability beliefs was strongly negatively correlated with depression symptoms (r = − .78). Additionally, Zhu et al. (2021) used a depression-specific measure of emotion controllability beliefs and found moderate to strong correlations with depression symptoms in two different analyses (r = − .47 and r = − .50).

There is also longitudinal evidence supporting the link between emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms, providing insight into the direction of this relationship. Five of the reviewed studies examining depression symptoms used a longitudinal design. In the first study to use the ITES measure, Tamir et al. (2007) found that believing emotions were controllable before starting university was associated with fewer symptoms of depression at the end of the students’ first year of undergraduate study (r = − .14). However, they did not control for baseline depression symptoms, making it difficult to determine whether emotion controllability beliefs predicted change in symptoms of depression. Schroder et al. (2019) also found associations between anxiety-focused emotion controllability beliefs and symptoms of depression across a five-week period, while Caprara et al. (2010) found links between personal emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms up to four years later (r = − .27). Some of the reviewed studies tested models in the opposite direction, examining whether depression symptoms predicted emotion controllability beliefs. Mesurado et al. (2018) tested three different models, each using a different measure of emotion controllability beliefs and found that depression symptoms at Time 1 did not predict emotion controllability beliefs relating to despondency or anger but did predict emotion controllability beliefs relating to positive emotions at Time 2. Crawford et al. (2021) also tested both directions and found that emotion controllability beliefs predicted depression symptoms 18 months later, but depression symptoms did not predict subsequent emotion controllability beliefs.

In the only qualitative study of the review, the secondary school students who were interviewed following a classroom-based universal prevention program for depressive symptoms reported that they did not believe they could control negative emotions using strategies such as reappraisal or mindful breathing. Instead the participants argued that avoidance strategies were more effective and believed that more cognitively engaged strategies, such as reappraisal, were only effective at a later stage, when the intensity of the negative emotion has reduced (Tang et al., 2022).

While the longitudinal studies offer support for the view that emotion controllability beliefs exert a causal influence on both anxiety and depression symptoms, further evidence is needed. One way of testing these causal hypotheses more directly is through experimentally manipulating these beliefs and measuring the effects of such manipulations on mental health outcomes.

Emotion Controllability Beliefs and Experimental Manipulation Studies

Of the 21 studies that met the inclusion criteria, only one used an experimental design. In this study, Kneeland et al. (2016) randomly allocated participants from a community sample (Mage = 21.6, SD = 4.19) to an ‘emotions are controllable’ (n = 41) or ‘emotions are uncontrollable’ condition (n = 48). The experimental manipulation involved participants reading a one-page passage which presented fictitious data and quotations to convey the argument that emotions were either controllable or uncontrollable. Following this, all participants were asked to complete an impromptu, brief speech task that was designed to elicit symptoms of anxiety. As predicted by the authors, those who were induced to see their emotions as being controllable were more likely to use cognitive reappraisal to regulate their anxiety symptoms during the speech task. However, no link was found between this increased use of reappraisal and anxiety symptoms.

What Processes Link Emotion Controllability Beliefs and Anxiety and Depression Symptoms?

Theoretical models posit that the more one believes emotions are controllable, the more likely they are to take steps to regulate their emotions, leading to reductions in symptoms of anxiety and depression (Ford & Gross, 2019). This section examines the indirect effect of emotion controllability beliefs on anxiety and depression symptoms in young people via emotion regulation and related pathways.

A number of studies in this review examined the associations between emotion controllability beliefs and cognitive reappraisal and/or expressive suppression (Daniel et al., 2020; De Castella et al., 2013; Ford et al., 2018; King & dela Rosa, 2019; Schroder et al., 2015; Tamir et al., 2007). In all of these studies, a significant positive association was found between emotion controllability beliefs and cognitive reappraisal (Personal emotion controllability beliefs rs = − 0.24 to − 0.46; General emotion controllability beliefs rs = − 0.17 to − 0.35). In contrast, suppression was only significantly associated with emotion controllability beliefs in one study out of the three that examined this link. Schroder et al. (2015) found weak associations between anxiety specific emotion controllability beliefs and suppression in two analyses (rs = − 0.13 to − 0.23).

Links between emotion regulation strategy use and anxiety or depression symptoms have been well established (Aldao et al., 2010), however, only three of the reviewed studies specifically tested mediation models that examine the effects of emotion controllability beliefs on anxiety and depression symptoms, via emotion regulation. Ford at al.’s (2018) findings were in line with hypothesized models showing that general beliefs that emotions are controllable predicted fewer depressive symptoms, via increased cognitive reappraisal (but not expressive suppression). De Castella et al. (2013) found a similar effect with cognitive reappraisal mediating the association between personal emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms. In contrast, King and dela Rosa (2019) found that reappraisal only mediated the link between general emotion controllability beliefs and positive emotions and not with anxiety and depression symptoms. This study used a shortened 3-item version of a commonly used measure of cognitive reappraisal (ERQ; Gross & John 2003). Internal consistency was not reported for this adapted scale, and it is possible this may explain this difference. However, it could also relate to this study being carried out in the Philippines, one of the few studies conducted in a non-Western context.

There were also studies that went beyond these two strategies when examining potential mediators in the link between emotion controllability beliefs and mental health. Caprara et al. (2010) investigated the role of interpersonal variables in the association between emotion controllability beliefs and mental health outcomes. They found that both filial self-efficacy (self-efficacy for handling emotions during interactions with parents) and empathic self-efficacy (self-efficacy for sensing and responding to someone else’s emotional needs during interactions) mediated the relationship between personal emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms. Believing that emotions were relatively controllable predicted higher levels of both types of self-efficacy which in turn predicted fewer symptoms of depression.

Skymba et al. (2020) extended the emotion regulation findings further by examining conceptually related groups of emotion regulation and emotion dysregulation measures. They found that both disengagement (e.g., cognitive avoidance) and emotion dysregulation (e.g., rumination) mediated the link between general emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms. Specifically, believing that emotions are controllable led to lower levels of disengagement and dysregulation and fewer symptoms of depression.

Age and Emotion Controllability Beliefs

As can be seen in Table 1, the current review covers a broad range of ages (14–24). Twelve of the 21 studies targeted university students, nine studies targeted high school students, three studies examined middle school students, and two studies targeted primary school students. Due to the number of different measures used across the studies, it is difficult to compare some of the studies. However, mean scores on the most widely used scale, Implicit Theories of Emotion Scale (Tamir et al., 2007) indicate that across the studies, younger participants were more likely to believe that emotions are controllable than older participants.

While few of the reviewed studies examined emotion controllability beliefs and age specifically, of those that did, a similar trend was observed. Crawford et al. (2021) had the largest age range of young people (7- to 18-year-olds) and found that the general belief that emotions were controllable was negatively correlated with age (r = − .23). Ford et al. (2018) carried out three separate studies with different participant groups, and although their first study of 14–18-year-olds did not find a link between age and general emotion controllability beliefs, their second study, which looked at a younger group of participants across a larger age range (aged 8–16 years) over a period of 18 months, found that participants’ beliefs that emotions are controllable decreased across the period of the study. Their data also indicated that emotion controllability beliefs may be more closely linked with puberty than age. This was based on an analysis comparing young people who were of different ages and had the same pubertal status (i.e., prepubertal 4th vs. 7th graders; pubertal 7th vs. 10th graders) and young people who were the same age but had a different pubertal status (i.e., prepubertal 7th graders vs. pubertal 7th graders). Furthermore, based on comparisons with adult participant scores, their data suggest that beliefs appear to remain relatively stable after 17–18 years.

Gender and Emotion Controllability Beliefs

Four of the general emotion controllability beliefs studies addressed gender differences in emotion controllability beliefs. King and dela Rosa (2019), who included a baseline measure of ‘trait malleability beliefs’ in their experimental study, found no gender difference. Tamir et al. (2007) found no consistent relationship between gender and emotion controllability beliefs. However, Ford et al. (2018) and Crawford et al. (2021) both found that boys believed emotions to be more controllable than girls. Neither study found a moderating effect of gender on the association between emotion controllability beliefs and symptoms of depression.

Skymba et al. (2020) examined a wider range of emotion regulation mediators between general emotion controllability beliefs and depression symptoms and found indications of pathway differences. Specifically, in their study of 14-18-year-olds, the negative association between believing emotions are relatively controllable and emotion disengagement was stronger for boys. They also found a stronger negative association between believing emotions are relatively controllable and emotion dysregulation for girls, and the indirect effect of emotion controllability beliefs on depressive symptoms, via emotion dysregulation was significant for girls but not boys.

In terms of personal emotion controllability beliefs studies, findings showed no gender differences in these beliefs (Daniel et al., 2020; De Castella et al., 2013). However, there were some significant yet small gender differences in emotion controllability beliefs in studies with a focus on specific aspects of emotion self-efficacy. Caprara et al. (2010) found that boys had stronger self-efficacy to manage negative affect; Mesurado et al. (2018) found boys had higher self-efficacy to manage despondency and distress, and Perchtold et al. (2019) found that males had higher self-efficacy in managing negative emotions.