From Resilience to Risk Reduction: The Role of Cognitive Reframing in Problematic Drinking

Prior research suggests that resilience is associated with the use of adaptive emotion regulation strategies, such as cognitive reappraisal, and that these strategies are linked to lower levels of problematic drinking. However, it remains unclear whether resilience is related to problematic drinking directly or indirectly through specific emotion regulation processes. This study examines associations amongst resilience, cognitive reappraisal, and problematic drinking in a sample of 188 college students. Correlational analyses indicate that resilience is not significantly associated with problematic drinking. In contrast, resilience is positively associated with cognitive reappraisal, and cognitive reappraisal is negatively associated with problematic drinking. A mediation analysis tested whether cognitive reappraisal served as an indirect pathway linking resilience to problematic drinking. Results indicate a significant indirect effect of resilience on problematic drinking through cognitive reappraisal, despite the absence of a significant direct association. Together, these results suggest that resilience may not directly reduce problematic drinking, but instead operates through specific adaptive emotion regulation strategies, such as cognitive reappraisal, that protect against problematic drinking.