Child Cardiac Vagal Regulation Moderates the Relationship between Parenting Behaviors and Anxiety Symptoms in Post-Deployed Military Families

• In Event: Examining Parental Effects on Risks for Child Psychopathology: The Role of Psychophysiological Markers

Abstract

Parental deployment to war and subsequent adjustment problems may present substantial challenges to children in military families. Compared to their peers, military children are more likely to exhibit internalizing problems and emotional distress (Mansfield et al., 2011). Effective parenting behaviors, such as supportive and warm behaviors, have positive impacts on children’s psychosocial functioning, whereas coercive and harsh parenting may lead to more behavioral problems (Lansford et al., 2014). Nevertheless, children may vary in their susceptibility to the influence of the external environment, and some children are more sensitive to the negative/positive impact of parenting than others (Belsky et al., 2007). This study sought to investigate whether children’s cardiac vagal regulation moderates the relationship between maternal parenting behaviors and child anxiety symptoms in military families. Cardiac vagal regulation, indexed by a decrease in respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) during challenging tasks, has been directly linked to adaptive emotion regulation (Perry et al., 2012). We hypothesized that children of parents with negative parenting behaviors may exhibit higher levels of anxiety if they have poorer emotion regulation.

Data were drawn from the After Deployment, Adaptive Parenting Tools study, which is a randomized controlled parenting intervention for post-deployed military families. A subset of the baseline data was used, including 153 children aged 4-13 years (77 boys, M age = 8.58, SD = 2.56) and their mothers. 29 mothers (19.0%) in this subsample have been deployed overseas since 2001. Child anxiety symptoms were measured with the child self-reported version of the Behavioral Assessment Scale for Children (BASC-2; Reynolds and Kamphaus 2004). Child RSA was collected during a baseline reading task and a 5-minute mother-child problem-solving task. Cardiac vagal regulation was quantified as the difference between the baseline and problem-solving tasks with positive values indicating RSA withdrawal. Maternal parenting behaviors were observed during a series of structured family interaction tasks with children. A composite score of five coded components (i.e., problem-solving, harsh discipline (reverse coded), positive involvement, skill encouragement, and monitoring) of parenting was used. Child age, gender, household income, and parent deployment status were controlled as covariates.

Results showed that the main effects of cardiac vagal regulation and parenting were not significant. However, cardiac vagal regulation was found to moderate the association between parenting and child anxiety (Table 1). The simple slope tests showed that parenting was negatively associated with anxiety symptoms in children with lower cardiac vagal regulation, whereas parenting was positively associated with anxiety symptoms in children with higher cardiac vagal regulation (Figure 1). Also, the difference in anxiety among children with high/medium/low cardiac vagal regulation was only significant when parenting was low.

Consistent with our hypothesis, children with lower cardiac vagal regulation (i.e., those lacking in internal self-regulatory resources) were more susceptible to the influence of external sources of regulation (i.e., parenting behaviors). Surprisingly, in those with higher cardiac vagal regulation, children showed more anxiety symptoms when mothers showed more effective parenting. This may due to the child-driven effect – parents showed more scaffolding and supportive behaviors in response to children’s internalizing problems.

Authors

• Jingchen Zhang, University of Delaware
  Presenting Author

• Abigail Gewirtz, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
  Non-Presenting Author