Poster #8 - Examining Pretend Play as an Emotion Regulation Strategy for Preschool Children

• In Event: Poster Session 08

Abstract

Background: The ability to engage in self-regulation in early childhood is associated with positive social, academic, and health outcomes later in life (Moffitt et al., 2011; Robson et al., 2020). Development of self-regulation skills during preschool coincides with increased engagement in pretense play (Berk et al., 2006), and research suggests pretense may facilitate the use and development of self-regulation skills (Goldstein & Lerner, 2016). For example, preschoolers who were instructed to pretend be an exemplar character (e.g., Batman) demonstrated improved performance on executive function tasks (White & Carlson, 2016), increased persistence during a tedious activity (White et al., 2017), and, depending on baseline self-regulation, better emotional control during a challenge (Grenell et al., 2019). Similarly, Karniol and colleagues (2011) found that pretending to be an exemplar character increased children’s performance in a delayed gratification task, but this effect only held when children were told the character was good at waiting. No studies have examined if this same level of character-specific guidance is needed for pretense to support emotion regulation in preschool children. In this study, we will replicate and extend previous research to examine whether specific guidance about an exemplar character’s emotion regulation ability is necessary to support greater persistence and emotion control during an emotionally salient and challenging task.
Method: Children ages 4-5 years will be randomly assigned to one of three conditions: a pretense-only condition in which children will be told to pretend to be a character; a pretense-quality condition in which children are told to be an exemplar character who is good at staying calm and controlling their feelings when they are frustrated; or a control condition where children will not be given any specific instructions. All children will then complete the Locked Box challenge (Goldsmith et al., 1999). We will conduct two one-way ANOVAs with planned contrasts to examine differences across the three conditions in persistence (i.e., time on task) and frustration (based on observations of affect; Grenell et al., 2019).
Hypotheses: Based on the work of Karniol et al. (2011), we hypothesize that children in both pretense conditions will spend more time on task and have lower frustration scores than children in the control condition. We further expect that children in the pretense-quality condition will spend more time on task and have lower frustration scores than children in the pretense-only condition.
Implications: Early childhood is a critical period for strengthening emotional regulation skills as children transition from reliance on adult emotional support to internalized regulation of emotion (Holodynski & Friedlmeier, 2005). Emotion regulation in preschool is associated with later social competence (Blair et al., 2015), and emotional difficulties that become evident in preschool tend to persist into later childhood (Campbell, 2002). Pretense is potentially an evidence-based and cost-effective strategy for caregivers and teachers to scaffold emotion regulation when preschoolers encounter everyday challenges (i.e., waiting their turn, sharing, persisting in a difficult activity). This study seeks to translate research into practice by identifying the specific instructions necessary to guide children in utilizing pretense to regulate emotions.

Authors

• Shannon E Dier, University of Missouri - Columbia
  Presenting Author

• Marina McGreevy

• Alaina Wilson, University of Missouri - Columbia

• María Fernanda Rueda-Posada, University of Missouri - Columbia

• Rachel Thibodeau-Nielsen, University of Missouri - Columbia

• Melissa Stormont, University of Missouri-Columbia

• Rachel E White, Hamilton College