Parent dysregulation and child negativity in relation to parent responses to child negative emotions

• Published in: Family relations Vol. 73; no. 2; pp. 737 - 752
• Main Authors: Hafiz, Mariam, Nelson, Jackie A, Patel, Nishita H, Holub, Shayla C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Minneapolis National Council on Family Relations 01.04.2024
• Subjects: Behavior; Child Development; Child Rearing; Children; Children & youth; Coparenting; Coping; Early Adolescents; Effects; Emotional Experience; Emotional Intelligence; Emotional regulation; Emotions; Energy consumption; Families & family life; Family (Sociological Unit); Family roles; Family support; Fathers; Feedback (Response); Gender roles; Hypotheses; Mothers; Negative emotions; Parent Child Relationship; Parents & parenting; Path Analysis; Psychological distress; Reactivity; Social Development; Socialization; System theory; Systems Approach; Systems theory; Young Children
• ISSN: 0197-6664; 0197-6664
• DOI: 10.1111/fare.l2950

Objective: This study examined the effects of mothers' and fathers' emotional dysrégulation and their responses to their children's distress, as well as the moderating role of child negative reactivity. Background: Parents with better emotion regulation strategies tend to provide more supportive and less nonsupportive responses to their children's distress. Child temperamental negative reactivity may create emotionally challenging parenting situations and thus may moderate this relation. However, dyadic effects are less clear; family systems theory suggests parents' dysrégulation may crossover to degrade their partners' responses, or parents may compensate for their partners' dysrégulation with more constructive responses. Method: Parents from 119 families with a 3- to 5-year-old child (50.4% boys) reported on their emotional dysrégulation, responses to child negative emotions, and child negative affectivity. Path models tested actor and partner main effects and interaction effects. Results: There were two partner main effects, such that when fathers were more dysregulated, mothers reported providing more supportive and fewer nonsupportive responses to their children. Additionally, two interaction effects were found. Maternal dysrégulation was related to increased maternal nonsupport only when child negative affectivity was low. Maternal dysrégulation was also related to greater maternal support only when child negative affectivity was high. Conclusion: Our findings demonstrate the importance of parent gender roles and compensatory processes. Implications: These results provide enhanced understanding of coparenting dynamics and the combined impact of mother, father, and child negativity, which can be used by practitioners.