143 - Casey Kenyon Brown: Can Your Relationships Make You Depressed?
Dec 5, 2024
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In this engaging conversation, Dr. Casey Kenyon Brown, a Georgetown University Psychology Professor, dives into how our relationships shape our emotions and mental health. She discusses her journey in psychology and shares insights on empathic accuracy in close relationships. The conversation highlights the dual impact of emotional sharing, especially in caregiving scenarios, and the challenges faced in understanding relational dynamics. Casey also emphasizes the importance of emotional support, particularly for aging populations, revealing how interpersonal processes can influence well-being.
Dr. Casey Kenyon-Brown's research reveals that empathic accuracy in relationships can lead to both beneficial and harmful mental health outcomes depending on the partners' emotional states.
The podcast emphasizes the importance of interpersonal emotional processes in maintaining mental health and the need for careful exploration of emotional dynamics in vulnerable populations.
Deep dives
The Journey into Psychology
Dr. Casey Kenyon-Brown shares her transition from aspiring clinical psychologist to researcher in psychology, emphasizing the role of research in enhancing her understanding of interpersonal emotions. Initially drawn to therapy for her affinity for people and problem-solving, she soon discovered her passion for research while working at a lab focused on adolescent development. This experience opened her eyes to the significant impact of data analysis, transforming her career trajectory towards a focus on how emotional processes influence mental health. Her clinical psychology PhD program provided her with the dual training needed to incorporate both research and clinical practice effectively.
Understanding Interpersonal Emotional Processes
Kenyon-Brown investigates interpersonal emotional processes, which pertain to how emotions are shared, recognized, and influenced between individuals. Her research highlights that these emotional exchanges can profoundly affect mental and physical health, particularly as people age. Emphasizing the significance of deeper interpersonal relationships, she connects her findings to therapeutic practices, particularly in working with couples. By examining emotional support dynamics, she underscores the long-term implications on individual well-being derived from close relationships.
Empathy and Its Impacts on Relationships
Her recent studies revealed that empathic accuracy—the ability to accurately identify a partner's emotions—can have both beneficial and detrimental effects. In relationships where one partner experiences depression, heightened empathic accuracy may lead to sharing depressive symptoms, potentially harming mental health. However, in relationships devoid of depressive symptoms, such accuracy correlates with better mental health outcomes. The nuanced understanding of empathic accuracy reinforces the need to explore emotional dynamics carefully, especially in vulnerable populations such as caregivers of individuals with neurodegenerative diseases.
This week, Enna chats with Dr. Casey Kenyon Brown, Professor at Georgetown University in the Department of Psychology and the Interdisciplinary Program in Neuroscience. She has received numerous honors and awards, including the prestigious Pathway to Independence Award from the National Institute on Aging and the Rising Star Award from the Association for Psychological Science.
Casey’s research examines how we share, understand, and influence one another’s emotions. She’s interested in how these interpersonal emotional processes are beneficial for healthy aging, and how these processes may go awry and contribute to depression.
In this episode, Casey shares her journey in psychology, talks about her research on emotion and relationships, and provides advice on how we can build strong connections with people we love.
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