3-112 - When is Physiology Linked with Emotion and Regulation? Examining Individual Differences in Bio-Behavioral Coupling

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Guiding theories suggest that physiology should be closely coupled with emotions and efforts to regulate them (Ekman, 1992; Porges, 2007), but it has proven challenging to document such links in childhood (Dennis, Buss, & Hastings, 2012). However, instances of dissociation between biology and behavior may be as informative as instances of coupling (Fox, Kirwan, & Reeb-Sutherland, 2012). The papers of this symposium take an individual differences approach and discuss both the presence and absence of links between physiology and emotion or regulation. Together, the studies cover four biological systems and range from infancy to late childhood. Paper one examines multiple autonomic and endocrine measures and suggests that biology may be more strongly coupled with behavior in infancy, prior to strong regulatory influences. Paper two examines autonomic recovery and shows that, in preschoolers, behavioral regulation but not emotion expression is linked with dynamic patterns of reactivity and recovery. Paper three takes a process model approach, and shows that preschoolers’ error-related negativity (ERN) moderates the link between parenting and child fear behaviors. Paper four uses an experimental approach, and examines trait emotion regulation as a moderator of the coupling between state regulation and parasympathetic reactivity under different emotion regulation conditions in middle and late childhood. These papers present a diverse toolbox of approaches to studying bio-behavioral coupling. Collectively, this symposium speaks to contemporary themes in the field, including the examination of individual differences, trait versus state measures, and the importance of timing, both in terms of developmental change and measurement scale.

Sub Unit

• Social, Emotional, Personality

Chair

• Sarah Kahle, University of California, Davis

Individual Presentations

• The Prism of Reactivity: Concordance Between Behavioral, Questionnaire, and Physiological Domains of Stress Reactivity in Infants - Presenting Author: Zoe Caron, University of California, San Francisco; Karen Jones-Mason, University of California, San Francisco; Michael Coccia, University of California, San Francisco; Wendy Chu, University of California, San Francisco; Abbey Alkon, UCSF School of Nursing; Nicole Bush, UCSF

• Emotion Regulation is Linked in the Moment with RSA and PEP Reactivity and Recovery - Presenting Author: Sarah Kahle, University of California, Davis; Jonas G Miller, University of California, Davis; Paul David Hastings, University of California, Davis

• ERN as a Moderator of the Link between Parenting and Anxiety Risk: A Conditional Process - Presenting Author: Rebecca J Brooker, Montana State University

• Individual Differences in Regulatory Repertoire Contextualize the Physiology of Children’s Active Emotion Regulation - Presenting Author: Elizabeth Davis, University of California, Riverside; Laura Elena Quinones-Camacho, University of California Riverside; Parisa Parsafar, University California Riverside; Angela Sillars, University of California, Riverside; Emily W Shih, University of California, Riverside