Parents' responses to the emotional distress of their children: Relations with children's competence.

Abstract

Although investigators have proposed in various theories that the socialization of emotions has important implications for children's general competence, very little empirical data exist. In the present study, parents' responses to the emotional distress of their preschool children were examined in the context of more general dimensions of parenting (warmth and control), and the relation of these responses to children's competence was assessed. Data on parent-child interactions were collected for 30 families, using home observations, parent self-reports, observer ratings, and child interviews. Children's competence in preschool was assessed by teacher ratings. Effective, situationally appropriate action was the most frequently observed parental response to children's upset, and children's attributions to parents of such pragmatic responses was positively related to their competence in preschool. Parental encouragement of emotional expressiveness was also positively associated with child competence. Variables assessing positive responses to upset, although related to warmth (as expected), also contributed independently to children's competence.

Parenting in Planned Lesbian Families

“…Research by Flaks and colleagues (1995) substantiates what we found in our study, namely that children in heterosexual families do not differ from children in lesbian families in terms of problem behavior. Our result is in line with the view of Roberts and Strayer (1987), who assume that higher levels of warmth and parental involvement do not result in increasing levels of well being of a child once a certain threshold has been passed. Our findings are also in line with the results among other parents who also have go through great lengths before they could fulfill their wish to create a family, such as IVF, AID, and adoptive parents (Golomok et al, 1995;Van Balen, 1998).…”

“…However, positive or negative consequences in psychological development of the child have not yet been established. It may be that increasing levels of warmth and parental involvement do not result in increasing levels of child well being once a certain threshold is passed (Roberts, 1986;Roberts & Strayer, 1987). On the other hand, the studies reviewed have shortcomings.…”

Parental Socialization of Emotion Expression: Gender Differences and Relations to Child Adjustment.

“…b n ϭ 33 for boys; n ϭ 21 for girls. research has not found gender differences in sadness and anxiety in this age group (e.g., Hinde, Tamplin, & Barrett, 1993;Roberts & Strayer, 1987). We may have found differences because this competitive game task, in which children experienced the anticipation of waiting for the tower of blocks to fall and the failure of having their own tower fall, elicited a range of sad and anxious expressions, enabling us to observe gender differences.…”

Emotion regulation and understanding: implications for child psychopathology and therapy

“…A caregiver appears to provide ''scaffolding'' (e.g., Denham, Mason, & Couchoud, 1995) or structure that enables and fosters a child's emotional development. Examples of this phenomenon include (a) coregulation of infant emotion that is sensitive to the infant's (e.g., temperamental) needs, (b) coconstruction of emotion narratives by mother-child dyads that may serve as later emotion ''scripts'' for the child, and (c) maternal encouragement of autonomy as the child learns how to regulate independently of the mother (e.g., Calkins, 1994;Calkins & Johnson, 1998;Casey & Fuller, 1994;Denham, Renwick, & Holt, 1991;Eisenberg et al, 1999;Feldman, Greenbaum, & Yirmiya, 1999;Grolnick, Kurowski, McMenamy, Rivkin, & Bridges, 1998;Kobak, Cole, Ferenz-Gillies, Fleming, & Gamble, 1994;Oppenheim, Nir, Warren, & Emde, 1997;Roberts & Strayer, 1987).…”