Poster #221 - Association Between Reflective Functioning and Perceptions of Stressful Interpersonal Events in Emerging Adulthood

• In Event: 3-053 - Poster Session 10
  In Poster Session: PS 10 Section - Social Relationships

Integrative Statement

Reflective functioning (RF), the capacity to understand the mental states of oneself and others in order to understand behavior (Fonagy, et. al., 1991), has been extensively studied in adults and parents, but less work has examined RF earlier in development. Further, RF has been studied in respect to its associations with psychopathology and trauma, but not in its relation to people’s reactions to everyday stress. Generally, theorists argue that RF is protective in the face of negative life events, such as trauma. In support of this assertion, one study found that among abused mothers, higher levels of RF were associated with a greater likelihood of having a child with secure attachment (Berthelot et al., 2015). Therefore, the literature does not assess the role of RF in coping with everyday stress or how RF functions earlier in development, limiting our ability to build developmental models of RF.   

Emerging adulthood is a developmental phase between ages 18-25 characterized by identity exploration, at which point social relationships, especially romantic ones, increase in emotional and physical intimacy (Arnett, 2000). During this phase, interpersonal conflicts are the most important and most common daily stressor, with conflicts between neighbors, coworkers, and friends viewed as the most distressing (Bolger, et al., 1989). Daily, negative, interpersonal interactions have been linked to higher levels of stress hormones, which when compounded over time, can exert negative effects on health and exacerbate existing illnesses (Chiang et al., 2012). Understanding the influence of protective factors, like RF, on emerging adults’ experiences of stress is therefore important.

The current study advances the literature by assessing whether emerging adults’ RF predicts their perceptions of acute interpersonal stressors over time. Using a short-term longitudinal design (two weeks), participants (N = 42) wrote about their most stressful social interaction every day for a week, providing stream-of-consciousness narratives regarding these experiences at the end of both weeks. Participants reported on their RF and trauma history. Perception of participants’ emotional reactions to the stressor was assessed the day of the stressor, at the end of week one, and at the end of week two using the Self-Assessment Manikin (see Figure 1). We hypothesized that students with higher RF would show decreases in negative emotion regarding the stressor over time and that the association between RF and reductions in negative emotion would be strongest for participants with greater trauma histories.

Preliminary analyses of data yielded results contradicting the hypothesis; participants with lower levels of RF reported lower levels of arousal in response to interpersonal stressors than those with higher levels of RF. Further, the interaction between RF and trauma was significant; but contrary to initial hypotheses, among participants with high trauma, lower RF was associated with greater reductions in negative emotion over time (see Figure 2). The findings suggest that among emerging adults with trauma histories, lower RF may protect against negative emotion in reaction to interpersonal stress. Findings have the potential to inform our understanding of models of RF, trauma, and emotional reactions to everyday stressors in emerging adulthood.

Authors

• Erin Elizabeth Ballard, UCI
  Presenting Author

• Jessica Borelli, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Aupshwara Tahmeen Khandoker, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ehsan Falasiri, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Michelle Samantha Molina, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author