3-043 - Parental Socialization of Children’s Positive Affect Regulation

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

This symposium advances the limited understanding of how children learn to regulate their positive affect (PA). Each research team presents data from parents and children in middle childhood and each draws from a unique sample (2 community and 2 clinical). This research suggests that parents up-regulate or down-regulate their children’s PA through various means, including mothers’ own beliefs and expressions of pride (Presentation 1), mothers’ prioritization of children’s PA and encouragement to savor (Presentation 2), familial savoring of PA (Presentation 3), and mothers’ coaching children’s PA during discussions (Presentation 4). The symposium also suggests that parents’ socialization of children’s PA is important to understand. Specifically, socialization predicts children’s feelings of pride (Presentation 1), their value of happiness, which relates to their depressive symptoms (Presentation 2), symptoms of depression but not anxiety (Presentation 3), and symptoms of oppositional defiant disorder (Presentation 4). The presentations go a step further by offering new insight into why parents may socialize their children’s PA. Results indicate that familial socialization of PA is linked to parenting style (Presentation 3), and parents’ beliefs about positive emotions (Presentations 1, 2, and 4), which also depends on children’s characteristics (Presentation 4). Overall, the symposium should generate useful directions for future research, including the importance of studying parents’ emotional beliefs to understand goals underlying their socialization behaviors, how much parents should foster children’s PA and encourage savoring, the specificity of effects and essential third variables to consider, and next methodological steps to capture this complex process.

Sub Unit

• Social, Emotional, Personality

Chair

• Amy L Gentzler, West Virginia University

Individual Presentations

• Parental Beliefs and Socialization of Children’s Pride - Presenting Author: Kevin A Leary, North Carolina State University; Amy G Halberstadt, North Carolina State University

• Mothers’ Value of Happiness and their Socialization of Children’s Positive Affect Regulation - Presenting Author: Amy L Gentzler, West Virginia University; Cara Alexis Palmer, University of Houston; Meagan Ramsey, West Virginia University

• Family Savoring of Positive Events is Uniquely Inversely Related to Depression among Youth Admitted for Inpatient Psychiatric Care - Presenting Author: Aaron M. Luebbe, Miami University, Ohio; Laura Stoppelbein, University of Alabama at Birmingham Glenwood Autism and Behavioral Health; Leilani Greening, University of Mississippi Medical Center; Stephen P. Becker, Cincinnati Children Hospital; Paula J Fite, University of Kansas

• Socialization of Positive Emotions in Families with a Child with Oppositional Defiant Disorder - Presenting Author: Julie C Dunsmore, Virginia Tech; Jordan A Booker, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Thomas H Ollendick, Virginia Tech