The UTC Graduate School is pleased to announce that William Moore will present Master's research titled, Signals and the Self: Interoception and Emotion Regulation on 07/10/2026 at 10:00 AM Est in https://us05web.zoom.us/j/84887182339?pwd=2zgTxyH21a7zfTL2bIEBVVUwg56Cgd.1. Everyone is invited to attend. 

Psychology

Chair: Dr. Ashley Howell

Abstract:

A central problem for many young adults is difficulty regulating emotions, which is linked to stress, poorer mental health, and academic impairment. Interoception, the perception of internal bodily sensations, broadly, may support emotional resilience; however, prior work on interoception often measures only one facet of the construct at a time. This study examined how three interoceptive facets (sensibility, accuracy, and metacognitive awareness) relate to self-reported emotion regulation difficulties in college students (n = 98 survey; n = 73 heartbeat counting task). Emotion regulation difficulties and interoceptive sensibility were assessed with validated self-report measures. Participants completed a laboratory heartbeat counting task in which accuracy was indexed by how closely each participant’s reported heart rate tracked their actual heart rate across 30 trials. Metacognitive awareness was indexed by the correspondence between trial-by-trial confidence ratings and actual counting accuracy. Interoceptive sensibility was significantly and negatively bivariately associated with emotion regulation difficulties (r = -.58, p < .001), accounting for approximately 34% of the variance in total scores. Interoceptive accuracy and metacognitive awareness were not significantly associated with emotion regulation difficulties. Results suggest a divergence across interoceptive dimensions, wherein the subjective quality of one's relationship with bodily sensations, rather than objective accuracy or metacognitive qualities, relates to difficulties in emotion regulation. Findings indicate the importance of multidimensional interoceptive assessment and point toward sensibility-focused research as a promising direction for supporting emotional resilience in college populations.