1. Introduction
Today, the global population is aging [1]. In Iran, along with the phenomenon of population aging, it is necessary to create conditions for better adaptation of the elderly to the living environment in order to make various plans in the physical, psychological and social areas appropriate to this group [2]. Healthy aging is the right of all human beings [3]. Emotion regulation is one of the effective factors in promoting mental health [4]. Considering that the development of emotion regulation strategies in the life span continues uninterruptedly [5], and adaptive emotion regulation is associated with mental health and maladaptive emotion regulation is associated with psychological pathology [6], studies have shown that the elderly have higher emotional well-being than young adults due to the use of more adaptive strategies [7, 8]. In this study, an attempt is made to compare the emotional regulation patterns in the elderly and adults in order to take more effective educational measures in accordance with the age of individuals to promote emotional health and mental well-being in the community.
2. Methods  
This is a casual/comparative study with an ethical approval from the Ethics Committee of Iran University of Medical Sciences (Code: IR.IUMS.REC.1398.955). Participants were 235 older and young adults. The older adults were selected from neighborhood houses and young adults from health centers in Tehran, Iran in 2019. The sample size was calculated 233 using the formula [9] where the standard deviation was 3.9, the mean effect size (d) was 0.5 and α=0.05 [10]. However, 235 were recruited using a convenience sampling method. Due to lack of access to the elderly during the COVID-19 pandemic, most of participants were young adults. Inclusion criteria were age ≥60 years for the elderly and 20-59 years for adults, verbal consent, literacy, ability to understand the questions, cognitive health, and no history of specific mental and physical disorders. Exclusion criteria were lack of cooperation and inability to understand the questions. For collecting data from the elderly, we visited the neighborhood houses and for adults, we visited health centers. After providing explanations about the research conditions to the participants and the confidentiality of their information, the research process began by completing a demographic form (surveying age, gender and education) and Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS), Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (ERQ), Mentalized Affectivity Scale (MAS), and Emotion Regulation of Others and Self (ERO and ERS). The reliability of the subscales of these questionnaires were high (0.63 to 0.92), except for the total score of the ERS (0.63) and extrinsic affect-worsening subscale score of the ERO (0.65) which were low. Data were analyzed in SPSS v. 22 software using the descriptive statistics, MANOVA to compare the scores of DERS, ERQ and ERO, independent t-test to compare the scores of ERS and MAS, and paired t-test was used to compare cognitive reappraisal and suppression in each group. Normality test was performed using Shapiro-Wilk test.
3. Results
Young adults included 42.1% men and 57.9% women, and older adults included 46.1% men and 53.9% women. Educational level between older and young adults was significantly different based on chi-square test (p<0.05), but there was no significant difference between them in terms of gender. In the study of normality of data distribution for groups in all variables, results showed a normal distribution (P>0.05). The mean total scores of DERS, ERQ, ERO, ERS, and MAS were higher in older adults than in young adults. The correlation between MAS and DERS showed a significant negative relationship (P<0.05), which was higher in young adults than in the elderly. The relationship between MAS and other variables was significant and positive, where it had higher correlation with ERO and ERQ in the elderly, but its correlation with ERS was higher in young adults. As presented in Table 1, the scores of DERS, ERQ and ERS showed a significant difference between the two groups.


Regarding the variables of ERO and MAS, although their means were higher in the elderly, but this difference was significantly difference (P>0.05). Furthermore, the difference in the strategies of reappraisal and suppression between the two groups was significant (P<0.05) where the difference in cognitive reappraisal of both age groups was higher than in suppression.
4. Discussion and Conclusion
The scores of DERS, ERS, and cognitive reappraisal subscale of ERQ are higher in the elderly, but there is no significant difference between the elderly and young adults in ERO and MAS scores. The elderly are more likely to use adaptive emotion regulation and self-emotion regulation strategies. Therefore, some of the factors that affect emotion regulation in the life span are changing, while some are relatively fixed. In other words, given the use of adaptive emotion regulation strategies in old age, it can be said that some patterns of emotion regulation are modified at older ages and can lead to effective interpersonal relations, decision-making and adaptive behaviors. As a result, greater adjustment is due to better emotional regulation, which can be taken into account in the areas of interpersonal and intrapersonal emotion regulation, empathy and mutual understanding, relevant trainings to promote psychological well-being of all people, especially younger people.

Ethical Considerations
Compliance with ethical guidelines
This study is approved by the Ethics Committee of Iran University of Medical Sciences (Code: IR.IUMS.REC.1398.955).

Funding
This research did not receive any grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or non-profit sectors. 

Authors' contributions
All authors equally contributed to preparing this article.

Conflicts of interest
The authors declared no conflict of interest.


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