Emotion Regulation and Well-Being in Adults With Congenital Heart Disease.

Maladaptive emotion regulation strategies were negatively associated with life satisfaction, mental health, and general health in adults with congenital heart disease.

• Rumination, suppression, and avoidance showed negative associations with all three well-being outcomes.
• Correlations with life satisfaction ranged from r = -0.20 to -0.34, p < .001.
• Correlations with mental health ranged from r = -0.38 to -0.28, p = .19 to < .001.
• Correlations with general health ranged from r = -0.10 to -0.16, p = .19 to < .001.

Adaptive emotion regulation strategies were positively associated with life satisfaction, mental health, and general health in adults with congenital heart disease.

• Reappraisal, acceptance, problem solving, and social support showed positive associations with all three well-being outcomes.
• Correlations with life satisfaction ranged up to r = 0.34, p < .001.
• Correlations with mental health ranged up to r = 0.28, p < .001.
• Correlations with general health ranged up to r = 0.16, p < .001.

Rumination predicted poorer general health in simple and moderate CHD severity groups but not in the complex severity group.

• Simple slope analyses were used to examine the moderating role of CHD severity on the relationship between rumination and general health.
• Analyses controlled for age, sex, relationship status, and employment status.
• The association between rumination and poorer general health was significant at simple and moderate severity levels.
• The association was not significant at the complex CHD severity level.

Suppression ability was linked to better general health only in adults with complex congenital heart disease.

• This moderation effect was identified through simple slope analyses across CHD severity groups.
• The finding suggests that the functional role of suppression may differ by disease complexity.
• This association was not observed in simple or moderate CHD severity groups.

The study sample consisted of 1187 adults with congenital heart disease classified into three severity groups.

• Participants were aged 18 to 85 years, with 60.2% female.
• Participants were drawn from the German National Register for Congenital Heart Defects.
• Participants were classified into simple, moderate, or complex CHD severity groups.
• Participants completed self-report measures of emotion regulation, mental health, general health, and life satisfaction.