Citation

Milojevich HM, Haskett ME. Child Abuse Negl. 2018; 77: 144-154.

Affiliation

Department of Psychology, North Carolina State University, United States.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.chiabu.2018.01.011

PMID

29353718

Abstract

The present study took a developmental psychopathology approach to examine the longitudinal association between parents' emotional expressiveness and children's self-regulation. Data collection spanned from 2004 to 2008. Ninety-two physically abusive parents completed yearly assessments of their emotional expressiveness, as well as their children's self-regulation abilities. Observational and behavioral measures were also obtained yearly to capture both parents' emotional expressiveness and children's self-regulation. Specifically, parents participated in a parent-child interaction task, which provided insight into their levels of flat affect. A puzzle box task was completed by each child to assess self-regulation.

RESULTS indicated, first, that greater parental expression of negative emotions predicted poorer self-regulation in children, both concurrently and across time. Second, parental expressions of positive emotions and parents' flat affect were unrelated to children's self-regulation.

FINDINGS inform our understanding of parental socialization of self-regulation and provide insight into the roles of distinct components of emotional expressiveness. Moreover, findings have crucial implications for understanding emotional expressiveness in high-risk samples and increase our understanding of within-group functioning among maltreating families that may serve as a means to direct intervention efforts.

Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Language: en

Keywords

Children; Emotional expressiveness; Maltreatment; Parents; Self-regulation