Viewing negative emotions as toxic is associated with poorer psychological outcomes.
Numerous explanations have been provided for recent increases in mental distress and poorer well-being. One avenue of research has linked specific beliefs about emotions with poorer psychological outcomes, including heightened mood and anxiety symptoms and lower levels of life satisfaction. The current project builds on this prior work by developing a new measure of beliefs that the experience of negative emotions can cause physical or psychological harm, akin to ingesting a toxic substance and exploring its association with various psychological outcomes in three large independent samples (Ntotal = 1,849) collected from 2023 to 2025. In Sample A (N = 954), we describe the initial development of the Beliefs That Negative Emotions Are Toxic Scale (B-NETS). In Samples B (N = 419) and C (N = 476), we validate the B-NETS and link higher B-NETS scores with greater irritability, depression, and anxiety. These associations remained significant even after accounting for existing emotion belief, emotion regulation, and experiential avoidance measures. If replicated, especially in non-U.S. samples with greater racial and ethnic diversity, these findings suggest this new measure may provide unique information about mental health beyond existing measures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).