Poster #209 - Peer Nominated Happiness Regulation and Social Acceptance in Children

• In Event: 1-005 - Poster Session 01
  In Poster Session: PS 01 Section - Social, Emotional, Personality

Integrative Statement

Emotion regulation (ER), one’s ability to modulate emotional responses, is an important aspect of emotional development (Saarni, et al., 2008). ER is typically studied through observer ratings, parent report, self-appraisal, and physiology (Zeman et al, 2007). Alternative approaches to measurement could provide new perspectives. Studies on ER in youth have found gender differences in the management of emotions, particularly negative ones (Perry-Parrish & Zeman, 2011). Studying the effects of gender on positive emotion regulation is needed (Perry-Parrish, Zeman, & Veits, 2009).

This study examined the use of peer nomination, a novel approach to ER measurement, of children’s ability to regulate the emotion happiness and how these ratings affected social acceptance. Happiness in children is associated with greater sociability (Holder & Klassen, 2010). It was predicted that children who were rated as more adaptively regulating their happiness would be rated higher on social acceptance. Target child gender, race, and age as well as rater gender were also examined to see if there were differences based on these characteristics.

286 (49% female) children and adolescents in grades 3-4 and 7-8 from two Southeastern United States public schools participated in this study. 61% were White, 33% Black, and 6% Other. Participants selected which youth in their class adaptively and maladaptively regulated their expression of happiness. For the analyses, the proportions of the children’s peer nominated happiness regulation were used (i.e., number of children that rated the target child as adaptively/maladaptively regulating happiness divided by the total number of children rated in their classroom). Also completed were social desirability ratings for each child in the class by peers (How much do you like to play with/do activities with this child?) on a Likert scale, I don’t like (1) to I like a lot (5). Analyses used average social desirability scores.

Peer nomination of adaptive ER for happiness was associated with overall social acceptance (r = .189, p<.01). No association for maladaptive ER was found. For girls, adaptive ER rating by other girls was significantly associated with social acceptance (r = .334, p<.01). No significant results were found for female maladaptive ER and social acceptance by other females. There were no significant association for males in both adaptive and maladaptive ER and social acceptance by other males. Also, no effects of age or race were found.

In sum, children who were seen as more appropriately regulating their expressions of happiness were better liked by peers. When looking specifically at girls’ ratings of other girls, there was an even stronger effect of adaptive happiness regulation predicting social acceptance. This was not found for boys. This could be because girls, in general, tend to express more positive emotion than boys (Chaplin & Aldao, 2013), so happiness may be more salient for females in terms of social desirability. Since this is one of the first studies to use peer nominations of happiness regulation to assess associations with social acceptance across development, further research should continue to examine peer ratings of child positive emotions across more specific social contexts.

Authors

• Daniel Gordon, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine
  Presenting Author

• Nicholas P. Seivert, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Carisa Parrish, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine
  Non-Presenting Author