Understanding the Parent-Child Coregulation Patterns Shaping Child Self-Regulation

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Integrative Statement

Biobehavioral coregulation is the process by which parents and their children regulate one another through their goal-oriented behavior, affect, and physiology, thought to support children’s burgeoning regulatory capacities. Recent findings suggest that particular coregulatory patterns appear beneficial in early childhood, namely that behavioral contingency and dyadic affective flexibility are associated with preschoolers’ fewer behavior problems (e.g., Hollenstein et al., 2004; Lunkenheimer et al., 2013). However, it is not yet clear whether and how parent-child biobehavioral coregulation supports other aspects of self-regulation in the child. The present study examined whether dyadic affective flexibility and the contingency between parental autonomy support and child compliance predicted behavioral, emotional, and temperament-based components of preschoolers’ self-regulation. We also examined the relative contributions of affective and behavioral coregulation patterns in predicting children’s individual regulatory capacities.

Mother and child affect (from high negative to high positive) and behavior (e.g., maternal teaching, child compliance) were coded in real time during free play, clean-up, and puzzle tasks when children were 3 ½ years (M = 3.42, N = 100). State Space Grids (Lewis et al., 1999) were used to compute the dyad’s duration of neutral and positive affect, duration of positive behavior, and affective flexibility across all tasks. We utilized state lag sequential analysis to calculate behavioral contingencies in Noldus Observer XT 13.0 across all tasks. Children also completed an effortful control battery (Kochanska et al., 1996) and cognitive assessment (Wechsler, 2002). Four months later, mothers reported on their children’s task persistence and social persistence with adults (Morgan et al., 2009), inhibitory control (Rothbart et al., 1996), and emotional lability (Shields & Cicchetti, 1997). We used path analyses to assess the relationship between our dyadic predictors and children’s later self-regulation, controlling for child sex, cognitive abilities, and effortful control.

Our model (Figure 1) showed excellent fit, χ2(33)=33.46, p=.45, CFI=1.00, TLI=0.99, RMSEA=0.01, SRMR=0.07, explaining variance in inhibitory control (29%), emotional lability (25%), social persistence (9%), and task persistence (6%). The interaction between dyadic affective flexibility and duration of positive and neutral affect significantly positively predicted children’s social persistence with adults and was marginally positively related to children’s task persistence, suggesting that higher dyadic flexibility of affect, as long as it was primarily positive affect, supported child persistence. The interaction between behavioral contingency and duration of positive behavior was marginally negatively associated with children’s emotional lability such that stronger behavioral contingencies, as long as behavior was primarily positive, were related to lower emotional lability.

Our findings suggest that flexible parent-child affective exchanges and contingent and predictable behavioral exchanges, as long as the interaction content is primarily positive, may support multiple aspects of children’s self-regulation in early childhood. The present findings also point to the potential importance of investigating cross-domain relations between coregulatory patterns and children’s regulatory capacities, given that affective coregulation was associated with children’s behavioral self-regulation whereas behavioral coregulation was associated with children’s emotional self-regulation. Discussion centers on the importance of considering process, content, and domain in studies examining parent-child biobehavioral coregulation as a mechanism of child regulatory development.

Authors

• Frances Lobo, The Pennsylvania State University
  Presenting Author

• Catherine Hamby, The Pennsylvania State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Erika Lunkenheimer, Pennsylvania State University
  Non-Presenting Author