Poster #170 - Emotion Regulation in Refugee Children: The Roles of Life Stressors, Daily Hassles, and Family Routines

• In Event: 1-115 - Poster Session 03
  In Poster Session: PS 03 Section - Race, Ethnicity, Culture, Context

Integrative Statement

The number of displaced people in the world is at its highest in history, according to the United Nations’ refugee agency (UNCHR, 2016). Of them, more than 30 million are children (UNICEF, 2018). Understanding what factors are most important to these children’s emotional resilience and regulation is more vital now than ever. Although pre-migratory major life stressors and post-migratory chronic stressors have been implicated as key contributors to refugee children’s emotional well-being, findings regarding their relative strengths are inconsistent (Miller & Rasmussen, 2010).

We examined the unique contributions of pre-migratory life stressors and post-migratory daily hassles and routines to children’s sadness and anger regulation in a sample of 5- to 13-year-old Syrian refugee children (N = 66) who were resettling in Canada. We also investigated interaction effects between pre- and post-migratory factors. Parents and children completed questionnaires assessing pre-migratory life stress (Bean, Derluyn, Eurelings-Bontekoe, & Broekaert, & Spinhoven, 2006; Holmes & Rahe, 1967) and post-migratory daily hassles (Kanner, Coyne, Shaefer, & Lazarus, 1981; Wright, Creed, & Zimmer-Gembeck, 2010). Family routines (Jordan, 2003) and emotion regulation (i.e., anger and sadness regulation; Zeman, Shipman, & Suveg, 2002) were parent-reported.

As Table 1 demonstrates, parents’ post-migratory daily hassles were associated with children’s poorer anger regulation. Parent and child pre-migratory life stressors moderated the relations between post-migratory factors and children’s anger regulation. Specifically, as depicted in Figure 1, simple slopes analyses revealed that when children’s experiences with pre-migratory major life stressors was lower, the presence of family routines was beneficial for their anger regulation (β = -.42, p < .05). Additionally, when parents’ experiences with pre-migratory major life stressors was lower, the presence of children’s (β = .38, p < .05) and parents’ (β = .27, p < .05) daily hassles was harmful for their anger regulation. Conversely, when children and parents’ experiences with pre-migratory major life stressors was higher, children’s anger regulation was either higher or unaffected by the presence of daily hassles and the absence of family routines. No pre- or post-migratory factors were associated with sadness regulation.

These findings may point to the presence of an “immunizing effect”, whereby children are strengthened against later adversity because of their exposure to previous adversity (Rutter, 2004). The differences found in the patterns of emotion regulation between the refugees who were exposed to higher and lower amounts of pre-migratory stressors may also illustrate the specificity of their experience, whereby migrants’ unique circumstances influence the relation between their resettlement experiences and development (Bornstein, 2017; Malti, 2018). We discuss the findings in relation to current theorizing on the roles of pre- and post-migration factors in the social-emotional development of children who face high environmental adversity.

Authors

• Danah Elsayed, University of Toronto Mississauga
  Non-Presenting Author

• Eleanor Myatt, University of Toronto
  Presenting Author

• Tina Malti, University of Toronto
  Non-Presenting Author