Poster #126 - Relations between Empathy, Emotion Regulation and Prosocial Behavior during Early Childhood

• In Event: 2-163 - Poster Session 08
  In Poster Session: PS 08 Section - Moral Development

Integrative Statement

Prosocial behavior develops in young children as early as 14 months old (Warneken & Tomasello, 2009). Although the literature has not reached a consensus on why it develops, some scholars contend that prosocial motivation may include empathetic concern for others (for a review, see Paulus, 2014). Emotion regulation has also been linked to prosocial responding (for a review, see Eisenberg et al., 2015), though few studies to date have examined relations between empathy and emotion regulation with regard to prosocial behavior. Recent studies have found sympathy and empathy to be mediators between emotion regulation and prosocial behavior in middle childhood and adolescence (Benita et al., 2017; Song et al., 2018), whereas Lockwood et al. (2014) found emotion regulation to moderate the association between empathy and prosocial behavior in adults. Given these mixed findings, the current study aims to explore the ways in which empathy and emotion regulation interact to inform prosocial behavior in early childhood.

The current sample consists of 69 preschoolers (43.8% girls, M age=45.76mo, SD=3.89) from various ethnic backgrounds (2.8% African American, 8.5% Asian or Pacific Islander, 1.4% Hispanic, 15.5% multiracial, and 71.78% White), a subsample of an ongoing longitudinal study. Questionnaire packets were collected from the children’s teachers and from trained research assistants who had observed the children over a period of 2 months, as well as from parents who visited the lab over the summer. Empathy was assessed using the empathy subscale of the Hawley Teacher Report of Internalization and Empathy (Hawley & Geldof, 2012), which consisted of three items gauging children’s empathetic responding to peers (e.g., “Will try to comfort or reassure another in distress”). Emotion regulation was assessed using the emotion regulation subscale of the teacher-reported Emotion Regulation Checklist (Shields & Cicchetti, 1997), which included eight items evaluating children’s ability to understand emotions and respond appropriately (e.g., “Responds positively to neutral or friendly overtures”). To assess prosocial behavior, we utilized the four-item prosocial behavior subscale of the Children’s Social Behavior-Parent Report (Crick, 2006). The scales were generally reliable for this sample (αEmpathy=.60, αER=.83, αProsocial=.87).
Results from a linear regression model controlling for age and gender are displayed in Table 1. Significant main effects for gender and empathy were found, as well as a marginally significant interaction between emotion regulation and empathy. However, in contrast to the adult sample from Lockwood et al. (2014), the moderation was negative—empathy predicted prosocial behavior at low, but not high, levels of emotion regulation (Figure 1). This interaction significantly replicated using a reduced sample of research assistant reported empathy and emotion regulation (N=39, β=-.32, p=.039). These results may be indicative of an over-regulating effect in young children which inhibits their ability to behave prosocially, consistent with studies that found negative consequences of over-regulation using physiological measures such as respiratory sinus arrhythmia (e.g., Liew et al., 2011). Future studies should explore this interaction in young children using experimental and physiological measures in addition to parent and teacher reported data. Additional longitudinal models will be run for the meeting.

Authors

• Sarah Alexandria Probst, University at Buffalo
  Presenting Author

• Kristin Perry, University at Buffalo, SUNY
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jamie Ostrov, University of Buffalo
  Non-Presenting Author