DBT Skills Can Help "Protect Yourself from Emotional Contagion" (Copy)

Often clients that look to dialectical behavior therapy for help describe experiencing higher emotional sensitivity than others around them. At times, that sensitivity to others and their emotions can produce a deep love and sympathy in relationships. At other times, it can lead to reactivity that results in regret or negative affects on relationships. Psychology Today posted an article by Carlin Flora discussing the experience of emotional contagion. She describes emotional contagion as a “a basic building block of human interaction [that] helps us coordinate and synchronize with others” (Flora, 2019). We are naturally affected by the mood of others around us and it is needed to build relationships. If you are extremely sensitive though, this could create problems for self worth or relationships without DBT skills.

Since the emotion contagion effect is a natural survival mechanism, our goal is not to avoid others or to suppress our emotional experience. Instead, increasing awareness of our emotional experience and how we react to others will lead to being more effective. On the flip side, we can affect others emotions as they affect ours. We can use this to change our environment in a way that improves our own mood! 

Flora suggests different ways to decrease the effect of the contagion effect on our own mood. Her suggestions are to “make yourself less susceptible to bad moods that you can easily pass on to others”,  “set aside your negative thoughts and emotions” until a later time, “ask for feedback”, and “quarantine yourself.” What she describes are DBT skills that fall under the distress tolerance skill and emotion regulation skill categories! Decreasing emotional vulnerability and checking the facts are taught during the emotion regulation module to assist clients with regulating our emotions on a daily basis. Taking a brief vacation or a step back and proceeding mindfully are taught during the distress tolerance module to teach clients how to manage a crisis with high intense emotions. 

While being emotionally sensitive can make it more difficult to manage your emotional experience when it comes to the contagion effect, it is possible through increasing mindfulness and learning DBT skills. There are even more options taught in DBT group to control thoughts and emotions than the ones listed above! 

If you are interested in learning DBT skills to help manage your own emotional sensitivity, contact us to set up an intake appointment,

Click here to read Carlin Flora’s article, “Protect Yourself from Emotional Contagion.”