1. Introduction

Psychiatrists have reported new types of depression that differ significantly from melancholic-type depression, a typical form of depression in Japan. These new types of depression include Gendai-gata utsu-byo (Matsunami & Yamashita, 1991), Dysthymia-gata utsu-byo (Tarumi, 2005), Mizyuku-gata utsu-byo (Abe, 2011), and modern depression (Kato et al., 2016). Although each type has unique characteristics, they share many common features; therefore, they are collectively referred to as Shin-gata utsu in Japan. A previous study (e.g., Sakamoto et al., 2021) showed that these types comprise “new-type depression (NTD),” as opposed to traditional type depression (TTD), which is depression with melancholic features according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). NTD has been reported in other countries, including Australia, India, South Korea, and the United States (Kato et al., 2011). Although its prevalence lacks clarity, NTD is more widespread than TTD and is particularly common among young office workers (Saito, 2011), as summarized in Table 1.

Although NTD is a concept raised by psychiatrists, contributions from psychology are expected for interventions and prevention, partly because antidepressants have shown limited efficacy for NTD, unlike TTD (Saito, 2011). In other words, pharmacotherapy is less likely to be effective in treating NTD because several psychosocial factors are involved in its onset (e.g., Tarumi, 2005). Psychological approaches to NTD include Nakano (2016) and Sakabe and Yamazaki (2013); however, the present study approaches it from the perspective of Interpersonal Sensitivity/Privileged Self (Yamakawa et al., 2015), which has produced several empirical studies.

Two psychological characteristics of NTD, that is, interpersonal sensitivity (IS) and privileged self (PS), have been identified as psychological factors related to the onset of NTD (Yamakawa et al., 2015). IS refers to the tendency to be excessively worried about others’ negative evaluations and to react excessively (i.e., overreact) to these evaluations. IS comprises three subordinate factors: evaluation apprehension, overreaction to negative feedback, and avoidance. PS refers to the tendency to pursue pleasure and satisfaction for oneself at the expense of maintaining harmony with others. PS also comprises three subordinate factors: sense of victimization, self-righteousness, and dependence on results. IS and PS were coined based on the descriptions of NTD by psychiatrists to explain its onset from a psychological perspective, which has been reported to occur in company employees (Muranaka et al., 2015). However, as stated later, the association between

Table 1. Differences between melancholic depression and new-type depression in Japan.

	Melancholic depression (Traditional type depression)	New-type depression (NTD)
Ages	Mainly in middle age	Mainly in 20s and 30s
Characters	Attachment to rules	Attachment to self without roles
	Love for order, models	Negative feelings toward order or model
	Sympathetic, honest, obsessive	Vague sense of almighty
	Hard worker	Not a hard worker
Consciousness or awareness of being ill	Little recognition of the disease	Emphasis on being ill
Symptoms	Agitation or retardation	Fatigue and not feel good enough
	Exhaustion and guilt	Avoidance and blame others
	Well-prepared suicide	Impulsive suicidal action
Temporal changes in depressive symptoms	Depression continues on weekends and holidays	Energetic on weekends and holidays
Therapeutic relationship	Resist to diagnosis of depression	Cooperate with diagnosis of depression
	When recovered, learn from experience of depression	Tend to check depressive symptoms
		Hard to depart from diagnosis (like to stay in depression)
Drug response	Usually good	Partial response
Prognosis	Good response to rest and antidepressants	Become chronically ill only with rest and antidepressants

Note. Cited and adapted from Kato et al. (2011), Muranaka et al. (2019), and Tarumi (2005).

high IS and PS and interpersonal maladjustment is not limited to office workers. For example, people with high IS may feel depressed and anxious because they are concerned about negative evaluations from others. People with high PS may become isolated from others, as they seek their own pleasure without regard for relationships with others.

Previous studies have shown that IS and PS are associated with depression in both office workers and undergraduates. For example, in longitudinal studies, IS and PS at baseline increased depression at follow-up, after controlling for baseline depression mediated by interpersonal stressors at follow-up (office workers; Muranaka et al., 2023; undergraduates; Muranaka et al., 2019). Furthermore, in an undergraduate sample, Fujiwara et al. (2024) demonstrated that PS was related to an increase in subsequent experiences of negative events after controlling for negative events experienced at baseline and that PS was associated with an increase in subsequent depressive symptoms via experiences of negative interpersonal dependent events. In addition, some studies showed that IS and PS are associated with NTD-like characteristics in company employees and undergraduates (office workers; Sakamoto & Yamakawa, 2022; undergraduates; Sakamoto et al., 2022). For example, in an office worker sample, Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2022) showed that the differences between distress during working hours and distress outside of working hours were greater when IS and PS were higher. Specifically, the difference was greatest when both IS and PS were high. Although evidence is not yet complete, the results suggest that high IS and PS negatively affect interpersonal adjustment in both office workers and college students.³ However, since the nature of others with whom college students and company employees interact in daily life is different, the present study focused on company employees. Based on the psychological model (Sakamoto & Yamakawa, 2020) that explains the onset of NTD in the workplace, we developed a scale to measure self-regulation, which is mentioned in the model but for which no measurement tool has been developed. Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2020: p. 123) assumed that NTD and TTD are the result of dysfunction in the adjustment process of healthy people to their environment due to predisposing and environmental factors. The next section discusses the work environment related to the onset of NTD.

To the best of our knowledge, no empirical studies have been conducted on the work environment involved in the occurrence of NTD; however, media reports indicate that it occurs among employees of large companies and public officials (e.g., “Patients’ Are All Office Workers”, 2012). In the magazine article, a psychiatrist explained the reason: “The bigger the company or the public employee, i.e., the better the system of recuperation, the more likely there is to be NTD. For example, if you take a leave of absence, you get 100% of your salary for a few months. For several years after that, about 80% of the salary is paid in some form. In many cases, after a certain period of time after returning to work, the leave track record is cleared once and the employee can take another long leave of absence, so the reality is that the employee can receive a salary for almost no work.” Thus, in a company with a well-developed sick care system, an employee suffering from depression can recover without worrying about income while on leave, as long as the employee submits a medical certificate for depression to the company and is recognized as sick. Thus, a company that has the financial resources to implement such an extensive medical treatment system (i.e., a “large company”) can be considered an environment that promotes the onset of NTD.

Indeed, NTD is more likely to be observed in a larger number of employees. Kurabayashi et al. (2015) examined the percentage of Human Resource Management personnel in companies with 300 or more employees who had experienced confusion in dealing with NTD-like conditions and found that there was a relationship between the percentage and the total number of employees (four levels: 300 – 499, 500 – 999, 1000 – 4999, and greater than 5000 employees). As a result, the larger the number of employees, the greater the number of cases that had characteristics of NTD, such as “another leave of absence immediately after returning to work,” “enthusiasm for hobbies and fun instead of focusing on rest and recuperation during leave,” and “not knowing whether the employee was sick or skipping work.” However, the rank correlation coefficients between the number of employees and the percentage of personnel experiencing confusion were low at 0.214, 0.157, and 0.092. Kurabayashi et al. (2015: p. 78) explained that the reason for limiting the number of employees to 300 or more was that they expected companies with fewer than 300 employees to have fewer mental health problems.

There are two major ways to define a “large company” in terms of the number of employees. One is to define a “large company” as one with more than 1000 employees, as shown in the Basic Survey on Wage Structure published by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare. The other is to use the Small and Medium-sized Enterprise Basic Act’s definition of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and define “large enterprises” as those larger than SMEs. Although details are omitted, the definition of SMEs is based on both capitalization and the number of full-time employees for each industry, with “less than 300 employees” being the largest criterion in the definition of SMEs. Therefore, an organization with more than 300 employees can be considered a “large company.” In this study, we adopted the latter as the definition of large companies, referring to Kurabayashi et al. (2015).

In the next section, to create a scale to measure self-regulation related to the onset of depression, we described the assumed self-regulation based on Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2020) (Figure 1) and theoretically predicted its relationship with IS and PS.

As stated above, IS and PS are useful concepts for explaining the psychological onset of depression, including TTD and NTD. However, one missing element is self-regulation. Referring to self-awareness theories (Carver & Scheier, 1981; Duval & Wicklund, 1972) and theoretical models explaining the onset of depression from self-focus (Pyszczynski & Greenberg, 1987; Sakamoto, 2000), Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2020) proposed a model to explain the onset of NTD/TTD by incorporating IS and PS. This model, the “Self-Regulation Model for Negative

Figure 1. Self-regulation process model for negative emotions in workplace.

Emotions in the Workplace,” describes how individuals self-regulate their negative emotions triggered by interpersonal stressors in the workplace. Self-regulation may vary depending on the IS and PS levels. According to this model, TTD is more likely to occur when IS is high and PS is low, while NTD is more likely to occur when both IS and PS are high (Sakamoto & Yamakawa, 2020: p. 124).

This study proposed a modified model of Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2020). Two modifications were made. First, the arrow on the right side of the figure showing the self-regulation model (in (3A) in this paper) that starts with “Discrepancy reduction” was passed through “Motivation for reducing discrepancy” in (3A), instead of through “Conscious of self-standard” in (2). The reason for this is that Carver and Scheier (1981), whom Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2020) referred to when formulating their model, did not set up an arrow that feeds back from “Discrepancy reduction” to “Conscious of self-standard,” and no positive reason or evidence can be found to assume this arrow. Second, in Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2020), the numbers indicating the squares enclosed by dotted lines are (2), (3), (4), and (5), whereas in this study, they are (2), (3A), (3B), and (4). In this study, as in Sakamoto and Yamakawa’s (2020) study, it was assumed that both processes can run in parallel when the appropriateness criterion is conscious and when it is not. However, to clarify this assumption, (3A) and (3 B) were used instead of (3) and (4), which imply an order. As shown in Figure 1, the modified model illustrates the five stages of the self-regulation process caused by negative emotions in the workplace:

1. Experiencing workplace stressors that lead to self-focus. Workplace stressors cause negative emotions, which increases self-focus (Salovey, 1992;Wood et al., 1990).
2. Awareness of self-standards. Increased attention to the self can lead to awareness of self-standards (Carver & Scheier, 1981). In this context, self-standard refers to one’s standards as an employee or office worker because attention or self-focus is directed toward the self in one’s workplace. Any discrepancy between self-standards and the actual self is recognized, which increases negative emotions (Carver & Scheier, 1981;Duval & Wicklund, 1972).

3A. Self-regulatory processes may be activated to resolve the discrepancy between self-standards and the actual self. Various strategies can be adopted to self-regulate unpleasant situations. If negative emotions are regulated successfully and the discrepancy is resolved, the loop of self-regulation ends and negative self-evaluation and emotions disappear. However, if one fails repeatedly, the expectation of reducing the discrepancy may become lower, and the motivation to resolve the discrepancy would decrease. Subsequently, to diminish negative emotions, one may proceed to (4).

3B. When self-standards are not recognized, self-attention processes information about the self (Carver & Scheier, 1981; Sakamoto, 2000). Negative emotions are amplified (Duval et al., 1972) and information about the activated negative self is processed (Bower, 1981), eliciting even stronger negative emotions (Sakamoto, 2000). As this state is unpleasant, emotion-focused coping is used to proceed to (4).

4. Activation of self-regulation of negative emotions or emotion-focused coping.Carver and Scheier (1981)and Sakamoto (2000) described a strategy for ending self-regulation initiated by self-attention, which can be achieved by distracting attention from oneself. For example, leaving a situation that forces self-attention (Duval et al., 1972) or distracting self-attention through exercise (Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991; Stathopoulou et al., 2006) may reduce negative emotions. If this strategy is successful, then self-attention decreases, thereby reducing negative emotions. However, if unsuccessful, negative emotions become stronger, an individual becomes more conscious of negative information about themselves, returning to the interaction phase with negative emotions and cognitions depicted in (3B).

In summary, individuals experience negative emotions owing to interpersonal stressors that lead to self-attention. Subsequently, various self-regulations to reduce negative emotions occur, resulting in recovery from negative emotions or, conversely, an increase in negative emotions and delayed recovery. Self-regulation of negative emotions varies depending on IS and PS. In the next section, we discuss this possible link between IS and PS and self-regulation.

This section describes the relationship between IS/PS and self-regulation in the three stages (i.e., 3A, 3B, and 4).

Stage 3A and IS. IS should be associated with self-regulation independent of PS levels. Given the high correlation between IS and public self-consciousness (cf. Sakamoto et al., 2017), a higher IS would lead to the perception of paying more attention to the public self, that is, the self observed by others. Being observed by others around them at work (i.e., peers and superiors), attention would be focused on the self as a company employee, and the discrepancy between the standards of appropriateness as a company employee and the actual self would be perceived. When attempting to reduce the perceived discrepancy between the self-standard (e.g., being perceived as a competent colleague) and the actual self in (3A), people with high IS may try to enhance evaluation from others (e.g., I will work hard to meet my company’s interests and expectations). If such self-regulation does not come to fruition soon, the expectation of discrepancy reduction diminishes. However, according to the expectation-value theory of motivation (Atkinson, 1957), motivation to achieve a goal is maintained if the value of achieving the goal is increased. Thus, to eliminate the discrepancy, they will seek to increase the value of discrepancy reduction, that is, the value of their workplace and the value of working there (e.g., I think the time I have spent at my workplace is rewarding for my life). Thus, self-regulation, or valuing work, is thought to occur.

Stage 3A and PS. PS should also be associated with self-regulation independent of IS levels. When PS is high, greater attention is focused on the self. Because PS is negatively correlated with taking the perspective of others (cf. Suzuki et al., 2023), people with high PS are less likely to pay attention to the public self. Instead, when they turn their attention to the self, they may think about themselves from their own perspective (Froming et al., 1982). Because PS contains a component of self-righteousness, they think about themselves in terms of their own criteria and think highly of themselves. However, in reality, others evaluate them less highly, and people with high PS are aware of the discrepancy between high self-evaluation and low evaluation by others. To reduce this discrepancy, they take actions that (i) directly demonstrate their competence, (ii) assert that their competence is not correctly evaluated by others, or (iii) assert that there are factors that prevent them from demonstrating their competence (Sakamoto & Yamakawa, 2020: p. 128).

However, many Japanese office workers recognize that they work in a culture in which group work and harmony are coordinated (Hechter & Kanazawa, 1993); thus, it may be rare for them to actively engage in the above three behaviors that could disrupt harmony in the workplace. To detect self-regulation by means of a questionnaire, it is more appropriate to ask about the frequency of recognition or intention, that is, for (i), the perception of self-competence behind behaviors indicating their competence (feeling self-trust, e.g., I feel that I can get through anything if I do it my own way), and for (ii), the perception of their competence not properly evaluated (demanding to be more respected, e.g., I have felt that my workplace should respect what I had to say more). As for (iii), although there are various reasons for not being able to demonstrate competence, depression or physical and mental distress may be used as an excuse often found in patients with NTD (Saito, 2011). Thus, Complaining of Not Feeling Well (e.g., I could not focus on my work because of my poor physical and mental conditions) is adopted as an indicator of self-regulation.

Stage 3B and IS. According to Sakamoto and Yamakawa (2020), when one is unaware of self-standards, one experiences negative emotions due to self-focus and is thus more likely to be aware of negative self-information. This can be described as a state of rumination (Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991) or self-preoccupation (Sakamoto, 2000).

When IS is high, individuals are considered to have low self-esteem and a negative self-concept because they are overly concerned about what others think of them. These individuals are more likely to process the negative self-information of which they are aware in (3B) because of their self-verification motive (Swann, 2012). In other words, they are thought to remain in a state of worry and rumination, which confirms their negative self-concepts.

It is not possible to theoretically describe the relationship between PS and positive/negative self-concepts. Therefore, no special hypotheses can be formulated.

Stage 4 and IS. As stated above, people with high IS are thought to remain in (3B). However, when the appropriateness criterion becomes conscious (3A), individuals with high IS may experience negative emotions. Given that IS includes avoidance, avoidance-type emotion-focused behavioral coping (Takamoto & Matsui, 2012) can be considered self-regulation. Specifically, detaching from work (attempting to detach oneself physically or psychologically from the workplace) may occur. However, as people with high IS are thought to stay in (3B) when they are unaware of self-standards, the number of cases in which a person with high IS tries to lower negative affect in (4) will be limited. Thus, the link between IS and detaching from work could not be clearly observed.

Stage 4 and PS. If PS is high, individuals will try self-regulation in (3A) and (3B) and may experience strong negative emotions; therefore, they will actively implement regulations aimed at reducing negative emotions. Consequently, they directly express their emotions (Uchida & Yamasaki, 2008) to a third party not involved in the workplace, typically a social networking service (SNS) (Expressing Emotions via SNS). They will also attempt to physically and psychologically detach themselves from the workplace, a place that makes them aware of the self as an office worker (detaching from work) (e.g., I wish that I do not have to get closer to my workplace so I do not feel stressed). Here, negative emotions are stronger if they admit that staying away from the workplace is due to their inability to do so. Therefore, they may refer to their illness (complaining about not feeling well) as an often-experienced and uncontrollable cause.

Once again, the hypothesized relationship between self-regulation and IS/PS is presented. However, given that IS and PS are significantly correlated (e.g., Muranaka et al., 2021), the expected correlation between IS (PS) and self-regulation is described after statistically controlling for PS (IS).

Valuing work (appeared in 3A among workers with high IS). To resolve the discrepancy between their standards of appropriateness as company employees and their actual self, those with high IS in (3A) will make efforts to gain recognition from people at work. They will also try to increase the value of the workplace to maintain their motivation to resolve the discrepancy even if their attempts to do so fail. Therefore, valuing work is significantly correlated with IS.

Worrying and ruminating (appeared in 3B among workers with high IS). When the criterion of the self is not conscious, negative self-information is present. Individuals with high IS are likely to have a negative self-concept and more likely to remain in a state of rumination (Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991) or self-preoccupation (Sakamoto, 2000), where negative self-information is made conscious due to self-verification. Thus, worrying and ruminating are significantly correlated with IS.

Feeling Self-Trust, Demanding to be More Respected, and Complaining of Not Feeling Well (appeared in 3A among workers with high PS). To resolve the discrepancy between their evaluation that they meet the standard of adequacy and low evaluation by others, individuals with high PS in (3A) are convinced of their competence or want more respect for themselves because of the unfairly low evaluation by others. They also believe that they cannot demonstrate competence because of their illness. Therefore, feeling self-trust, demanding to be more respected, and complaining of not feeling well are significantly correlated with PS.

Detaching from Work, Complaining of Not Feeling Well, and Expressing Emotions through SNS (appeared in 4 among workers with high PS). In order to avoid a sense of self as an employee, people with high PS will detach themselves from their workplace. As they fear that workplace detachment is attributed to their incompetence, they may appeal to their illness as an excuse. They may also express their emotions via SNS to reduce negative emotions. Thus, detaching from work, complaining of not feeling well, and expressing emotions through SNS are significantly correlated with PS.

Hypotheses regarding the relationship between self-regulation and (IS + PS). IS and PS should have a combined effect on self-regulation. The combined effect is likely to occur with the three types of self-regulation involved in (4), which focus on reducing negative emotions: detaching from work, complaining about not feeling well, and expressing emotions through SNS. It has been argued that these three types of self-regulation are more likely to occur when PS is high, but they are also likely to occur when IS is high for the following reasons.

Of the three types of self-regulation described above, we begin with detaching from work. In Stage (4), people with high both IS and PS may experience more negative emotions than others, as they may face two types of discrepancies in (3A), which are difficult to diminish: one is the discrepancy between the standard of appropriateness as an employee and the actual self (in case of high IS), and the other is the discrepancy between high self-evaluation and low evaluation by others (in case of high PS). Originally, since the recognition of the discrepancy is the result of self-focusing in their workplace, they may be motivated to avoid their workplace. Thus, self-regulation of detaching from work is significantly correlated with the total IS + PS scores.

Next, complaining of not feeling well and expressing emotions through SNS are discussed. When IS is high, people are concerned about what others think of them; thus, they are motivated to reduce criticism from others when regulating negative emotions. Here, those with high IS may think that claiming that they are unwell is an excuse for not being able to fulfill their obligations as company employees (cf. Yamakawa & Sakamoto, 2017) and they can mitigate criticism from others. Those with high IS may also believe that emotional displays directed toward people unrelated to the workplace (i.e., SNS) are less likely to be criticized by colleagues in the workplace. Thus, self-regulation of complaining about not feeling well and expressing emotions through SNS is significantly correlated with the total IS + PS score.

So far, hypotheses regarding the relationship between IS and PS were proposed to test the validity of the self-regulation scale. Because self-regulation overlaps with coping behavior toward stressors, the present study also tested the validity of the SRS-NEW in relation to coping using the Workplace Coping Scale (WCS: Shoji & Shoji, 1992). The WCS consists of three subscales: positive action and cognition (i.e., controlling and positive coping behaviors and a positive strategy to make positive sense of the stressor and re-evaluate it), avoidant action and cognition (i.e., avoidant and passive coping behaviors and a strategy to deny the stressor), and symptom management (i.e., coping to improve physical and mental discomfort resulting from the stress response). The authors hypothesized that positive action and cognition would be positively correlated with feeling self-trust and valuing work, whereas detaching from work and worrying and ruminating would be positively correlated with avoidant action and cognition.

This study aimed to develop and validate a scale to measure self-regulation of negative emotions in the workplace (SRS-NEW) that would allow researchers to primarily measure the three shaded boxes shown in Figure 1. To examine the validity of the self-regulation scale, correlations between self-regulation and IS, PS, and their total scores were examined to test the hypotheses described above. However, because significant correlations between IS and PS were reported (e.g., Muranaka et al., 2021), we also examined partial correlations.