Intergenerational Transmission of Perceived Bonding Styles and Paternal Emotion Socialization: Mediation Through Paternal Emotion Dysregulation

Abstract

We examined perceived parental styles, emotion socialization practices and emotion dysregulation among fathers from a community sample in order to understand the intergenerational transmission of normative parenting behaviors. The sample consisted of 217 fathers of school-age children ranging in age from 6 to 12 years. We used a cross-sectional design. The fathers completed a set of self-report questionnaires including parental boding instrument, difficulties in emotion regulation scale, and coping with children's negative emotion scale. The findings indicated that fathers' perceived parental care of their own parents (G1) was negatively linked to fathers' (G2) non-supportive responses to negative emotions shown by their children (G3) through its negative association with the father's (G2) emotion regulation difficulties, whereas fathers' perceived parental overprotection of their own parents (G1) was positively linked to fathers' (G2) nonsupportive responses to negative emotions shown by their children (G3) through its positive associations with the fathers' (G2) emotion regulation difficulties. The current study contributed to the further understanding of individual differences in fathers' emotion socialization practices. The findings potentially shed lights on prevention and intervention efforts regarding limiting the expansion of maladaptive emotional parenting behaviors across generations.

The Mediating Role of Parenting Stress in the Relations Between Parental Emotion Regulation and Parenting Behaviors in Chinese Families of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders: A Dyadic Analysis

“…The higher the optimal score, the more likely the parents’ behaviors are to promote bonding with their children and indicate adaptive parenting. The Chinese PBI has demonstrated good reliability in previous studies with families from similar cultural backgrounds (e.g., Yan et al 2015). In this study, the internal consistency was .81 for the fathers and .91 for the mothers for optimal bonding, .81 for the fathers and .76 for the mothers for care, and .66 for the fathers and .71 for the mothers for overprotection.…”

Grandparents’ Parenting on Children’s Internalizing Symptoms: The Serial Mediation of Parents’ Psychological Control and Children’s Emotion Regulation

“…This interpretation is consistent with Barber’s (1996) speculation, that is, the impacts of psychological control are mainly dependent on the extent to which children perceive these behaviors as controlling behaviors. Furthermore, numerous studies have demonstrated the crucial impacts of the perception of the parenting and family atmospheres on emotion regulation, from early childhood to adulthood (e.g., Brenning, Soenens, Van Petegem, & Vansteenkiste, 2015; Houltberg, Henry, & Morris, 2012; Jaffe, Gullone, & Hughes, 2010; Luebbe et al, 2014; Yan, Han, & Li, 2016). However, observed parental psychological control measured actual controlling behaviors rather than to what extent children perceived them.…”

The Importance of Parents' Community Connections for Adolescent Well‐being: An Examination of Military Families

“…While peers are influential during adolescence (e.g., Sumter, Bokhorst, Steinberg & Westenberg, ), caregivers, and especially parents, remain the central adults in an adolescent's life, particularly for serious matters (Hombrados‐Mendieta, Gomez‐Jacinto, Dominguez‐Fuentes, Garcia‐Leiva & Castro‐Travé, ). As such, adolescent offspring may utilize coping strategies that mimic those of their mothers during times of stress because these are the strategies they have been socialized to enact (Yan, Han & Li, ). This is in line with existing research indicating that youth imitate the resilient coping behaviors of their parents and, in doing so, feel confident about their ability to handle challenging situations (Sprague et al., ).…”