Università Roma Tre

What is self-control and what is emotion regulation? How do they work; what psychological and brain mechanisms do they depend on? Why is voluntary control of psychological processes, such as staying focused, resisting distractions, managing a negative emotion, inhibiting rumination or stopping the mind from wandering, so difficult? And why does voluntary control of actions often fail? That is, for what reasons do we relapse into habits we no longer want to have, into various forms of addiction, or frequently fail to contain an inappropriate impulse or the expression of a potentially harmful emotion?
Are there techniques or exercises capable to improve self-control and emotion regulation? What psychological and brain mechanisms are they based on? How are they performed and what evidence of effectiveness exists in the scientific literature?
The Workshop on Self-Control and Emotional Regulation. Theories and Practices, aims to provide participants with knowledge of the main theoretical elements and models of explanations of the processes of self-control and emotion regulation, between neuroscience, psychosocial science and philosophy. At the same time, the Lab aims to teach exercises and techniques useful for improving self-regulatory capacity, including several Mindfulness based practices, illustrating its scientific basis and experimental verification of effectiveness.
At the end of the Workshop, the student should know and understand the main explanatory models of self-control and emotion regulation and will have a basic mastery of the principal and scientifically validated techniques, exercises and trainings for cognitive enhancement, self-control and emotional regulation.
If the number of participants will be sufficient, the Workshop may involve conducting an experimental study designed for measuring the impact of training on some basic variables of self-control, mood, impulsivity, and perceived stress level.