Maternal and Paternal Repertoires of Emotion Dysregulation: Links to Child Functioning

• In Event: Poster Session 06
  In Poster Session: PS 06 Topic - Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Abstract

Parental emotion regulation (ER) plays an essential role in emotion socialization (e.g., parental responses to children’s emotion; Xu et al., 2020), child ER (Shorer et al., 2019) and child psychopathology (Crespo et al., 2017). Research suggests that different dimensions of ER abilities (e.g., emotional awareness, clarity) operate together (i.e., ER repertoires) to differentially impact psychological outcomes (Rufino et al., 2017). However, ER repertoires have scarcely been examined in parents (Shaffer et al., 2018), and no studies have examined links with child psychological outcomes. Further, while research has examined the relation between parental ER and socialization of children’s negative emotion, no research has examined this regarding positive emotion.
Objectives: We aimed to: 1) Identify parental profiles (i.e., repertoires) of dimensions of ER difficulties using latent profile analysis (LPA); 2) Explore parent gender differences in profiles; 3) Examine parent and child correlates of these profiles, including parental socialization of positive emotion, child psychopathology, and child ER.
Method: 419 mothers (Mage = 35.88) and 451 fathers (Mage = 34.60) of children aged 8-12 completed measures about their ER difficulties (dimensions: non-acceptance of emotion; goal-directed behavior difficulties; impulse control difficulties; lack of emotional awareness; limited access to ER strategies; lack of emotional clarity; Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale; Gratz & Roemer, 2004), socialization of positive emotion (teaching, encouragement, reprimanding, discomfort responses; Parental Reactions to Children’s Positive Emotions Scale; Ladouceur et al., 2012), and their child’s psychopathology (Brief Problem Monitor; Achenbach et al., 2001) and ER (Emotion Regulation Checklist; Shields & Cicchetti, 1997).
Results: LPA yielded different profiles for mothers (3 profiles) and fathers (4 profiles). For both, profiles of low (mothers n=163; fathers n=186) and moderate (mothers n=116; fathers n=101) levels of all dysregulation dimensions emerged. Profiles of mostly high levels of dysregulation also emerged for both, although different in composition (“dysregulated”; DR; mothers n=140; fathers n=121). Among fathers, a profile emerged with the highest levels of all dysregulation dimensions, except for emotional awareness which was a notable strength relative to all paternal profiles (“highly dysregulated (emotionally aware)”; HDEA; n=43). DR mothers and HDEA fathers reported the highest levels of reprimanding (χ2=136.63 (p<.001), χ2=299.45 (p<.001), respectively) and discomfort (χ2=230.96 (p<.005), χ2=594.61 (p<.001), respectively) responses to their child’s positive emotion. Interestingly, HDEA fathers also reported the highest levels of encouragement, χ2=119.09 (p<.001), and teaching, χ2=89.81 (p<.001) responses. Further, DR mothers and HDEA reported the highest levels of child psychopathology (χ2=186.02 (p<.0005), χ2=526.31 (p<.001), respectively) and lowest levels of child ER abilities (χ2=288.15 (p<.0005), χ2=639.78 (p<.001), respectively) of the profiles.
Implications: The current study provides novel insight into maternal and paternal repertoires of emotion dysregulation, and their role in parental emotion socialization and child functioning. The findings offer preliminary evidence that emotional awareness may be a protective factor in the context of parental socialization of positive emotion, despite high levels of dysregulation otherwise. Specifically, results suggest that targeting parental emotional awareness may be a promising way to foster use of supportive positive emotion parenting practices (i.e., encouraging and teaching responses), which holds implications for children’s development.

Authors

• Jessica A. Seddon, University of Guelph
  Presenting Author

• Chelsea Reaume, University of Guelph
  Non-Presenting Author

• Leah Sack, University of Guelph
  Non-Presenting Author

• Linda Sosa-Hernandez, University of Waterloo
  Non-Presenting Author

• Kristel Thomassin, University of Guelph
  Non-Presenting Author