Low-effort emotion regulation: Implications for depression and anxiety.

Emotion regulation difficulties are a core feature of many mental health conditions, including depression and anxiety.One critical yet underrecognized barrier to effective emotion regulation is the effort it demands.People with depression and anxiety often experience motivational and cognitive impairments that limit their capacity to exert such effort.Accordingly, we propose low-effort emotion regulation as a promising approach to support mental health in these populations.We introduce three categories of loweffort emotion regulation strategies and synthesize evidence supporting their effectiveness, accessibility, and relatively effortless nature across clinical and nonclinical populations: (a) sensory-based strategies, which leverage environmental stimuli or physical sensations (e.g., music, touch); (b) low-effort language-based strategies, which involve simple verbal practices (e.g., affect labeling, distanced selftalk); and (c) placebo-based strategies, which harness beliefs and expectations (e.g., nondeceptive placebos).We conclude by offering recommendations for integrating these strategies into clinical care and proposing key directions for future research. Public Health Significance StatementDepression and anxiety often make it difficult for people to engage in effortful forms of emotion regulation.This article reviews evidence for low-effort emotion regulation strategies that can be more accessible and sustainable, such as sensory-based, low-effort language-based, and placebobased techniques.These approaches could help individuals better manage their emotions and improve mental health outcomes in everyday life and clinical care.