Associations Between Fathers' and Mothers' Psychopathology Symptoms, Parental Emotion Socialization, and Preschoolers' Social-Emotional Development.
- Resource Type
- Article
- Authors
- Pol, Lotte; Groeneveld, Marleen; Endendijk, Joyce; Berkel, Sheila; Hallers-Haalboom, Elizabeth; Bakermans-Kranenburg, Marian; Mesman, Judi,
- Source
- Journal of Child & Family Studies; Nov2016, Vol. 25 Issue 11, p3367-3380, 14p, 1 Diagram, 2 Charts
- Subject
- Child development
Parental influences
Behavior disorders in children
Books
Child Behavior Checklist
Communication
Statistical correlation
Emotions
Longitudinal method
Parent-child relationships
Inter-observer reliability
Pathological psychology
Psychology of fathers
Psychology of mothers
Emotions in children
Gender differences (Psychology)
Confidence intervals
Regression analysis
Research evaluation
Research funding
Video recording
Data analysis software
Descriptive statistics
Psychology
Netherlands
- Language
- ISSN
- 10621024
In this study we tested whether the relation between fathers' and mothers' psychopathology symptoms and child social-emotional development was mediated by parents' use of emotion talk about negative emotions in a sample of 241 two-parent families. Parents' internalizing and externalizing problems were measured with the Adult Self Report and parental emotion talk was observed while they discussed a picture book with their children (child age: 3 years). Children's parent-reported internalizing and externalizing problems and observed prosocial behaviors were assessed at the age of 3 years and again 12 months later. We found that mothers' use of emotion talk partially mediated the positive association between fathers' internalizing problems and child internalizing problems. Fathers' internalizing problems predicted more elaborative mother-child discussions about negative emotions, which in turn predicted more internalizing problems in children a year later. Mothers' externalizing problems directly predicted more internalizing and externalizing problems in children. These findings emphasize the importance of examining the consequences of parental psychological difficulties for child development from a family-wide perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]