Mothers' Beliefs about Feelings and Children's Emotional Understanding

We revised Hyson and Lee's (1996) Caregiver's Beliefs about Feelings questionnaire for use with parents. One hundred and fifteen mothers of 4- to 6- year-old children completed the Parents' Beliefs about Feelings questionnaire (PBAF). We assessed emotional understanding of 60 of the children using Denham's (1986) measure. Factor analysis supported a 2-factor solution for the PBAF. The first subscale (Emotion Language) reflected mothers' belief in socializing emotion language. The second subscale (Developmental Beliefs) assessed mothers' belief that their children were not developmentally ready to control or talk about emotions. Mothers' Developmental Beliefs scores were positively related to mothers' negative emotional expressiveness. Mothers' Emotion Language scores were positively related to children's knowledge of emotion terms. Results may help educators design intervention programs to teach children emotional and social skills.     

Mothers' Cognitive References to 2‐Year‐Olds Predict Theory of Mind at Ages 6 and 10

Mothers' mental‐state references predict individual differences in preschoolers' false‐belief (FB) understanding; less is known about the origins of corresponding variation in school‐age children. To address this gap, 105 children completed observations with their mothers at child ages 2 and 6, three FB tasks and a verbal comprehension test at age 3, and five FB tasks at age 6. Seventy‐seven of these children completed five Strange Stories at age 10. Individual differences in mothers' cognitive references at child age 2 predicted variation in children's FB understanding at age 6 and Strange Stories scores at age 10 (controlling for number of mothers' turns and children's mental‐state references, verbal comprehension and FB understanding at age 3, and mothers' cognitive references at child age 6).     

Mothers' Acculturation and Beliefs About Emotions,Mother–Child Emotion Discourse,and Children's Emotion Understanding in Latino Families

Research Findings: We examined associations among Anglo acculturation, Latino enculturation, maternal beliefs, mother–child emotion talk, and emotion understanding in 40 Latino preschool-age children and their mothers. Mothers self-reported Anglo acculturation, Latino enculturation, and beliefs about the value/danger of children's emotions and parent/child roles in emotion socialization. Mother–child emotion talk was observed during a Lego storytelling task. Children's emotion understanding was measured using 2 age-appropriate tasks. Correlations showed that mothers' Latino enculturation was associated with mothers' stronger belief in guiding children's emotions and children's lower emotion understanding. Anglo acculturation was associated with mothers' lower belief that emotions can be dangerous and children's better emotion understanding. Mothers with a stronger belief in guiding children's emotions more frequently labeled emotions. Mothers with a stronger belief that emotions can be dangerous less frequently explained emotions. Regressions controlling for child age and maternal education demonstrated that mothers with a stronger belief that children can learn about emotions on their own and mothers with greater Latino enculturation had children with lower emotion understanding, whereas mothers with greater Anglo acculturation had children with better emotion understanding. Practice or Policy: Results suggest that understanding both family acculturation and family enculturation will be helpful for early childhood researchers and educators seeking to assess and promote children's socioemotional development.     

Maternal Emotions During Mother-Toddler Interaction: Parenting in Affective Context

Objective. This study explored the emotional experiences of mothers in interacting with their 2-year-old children and examined interrelations among maternal emotion, family distress, and observations of parenting sensitivity. Design. Sixty mothers and their 2-year-old children were observed interacting during both enjoyable (free play) and challenging (waiting) interaction tasks, and mothers provided self-report information about their emotional experiences during each task. Mothers also completed self-report measures to assess family distress. Results. Mothers experienced and expressed a range of positive and negative emotions during interactions with their toddlers, however, mothers' expressed (observed) and experienced (self-reported) emotions were generally uncorrelated. Mothers reported experiencing more positive emotion during interactions characterized by less child negativity and less negative emotion during interactions characterized by child expressions of positive emotion. Mothers' self-reported emotional experiences during interactions with their children moderated the associations between family distress (as reported by mothers) and sensitive parenting behaviors (as observed during parent-child interaction). Conclusions. Findings support a conceptualization of parenting as multiply determined by child, parent, and family contextual factors, with emotion serving an integral role. Results are also discussed with regard to parenting emotion as a potential target for intervention in distressed families.     

Growth in emotion understanding across early childhood: A cohort-sequential model of firstborn children across the transition to siblinghood

Emotion understanding develops rapidly in early childhood. Firstborn children (N = 231, 55% girls/45% boys, 86% White, 5% Black, 3% Asian, 4% Latinx, M_age = 29.92 months) were recruited into a longitudinal study from 2004 to 2008 in the United States and administered a series of tasks assessing eight components of young children's emotion understanding from ages 1 to 5. Cohort sequential analysis across three cohorts (1-, 2-, and 3-year-olds) demonstrated a progression of children's emotion understanding from basic emotion identification to an understanding of false-belief emotions, even after controlling for children's verbal ability. Emotion understanding scores were related to children's theory of mind and parent reports of empathy, but not emotional reactivity, providing evidence of both convergent and discriminant validity.     

Theory of Mind Predicts Emotion Knowledge Development in Head Start Children

Research Findings: Emotion knowledge (EK) enables children to identify emotions in themselves and others, and its development facilitates emotion recognition in complex social situations. Sociocognitive processes, such as theory of mind (ToM), may contribute to developing EK by helping children realize the inherent variability associated with emotion expression across individuals and situations. The present study explored how ToM, particularly false belief understanding, in preschool predicts children's developing EK in kindergarten. Participants were 60 Head Start children ages 3 to 5 years. ToM and EK measures were obtained from standardized child tasks. ToM scores were positively related to performance on an EK task in kindergarten after we controlled for preschool levels of EK and verbal ability. Exploratory analyses provided preliminary evidence that ToM serves as an indirect effect between verbal ability and EK. Practice or Policy: Early intervention programs may benefit from including lessons on ToM to help promote socioemotional learning, specifically EK. This consideration may be most fruitful when the targeted population is at risk.     

Relationship between maternal scaffolding and preschooler's metacognitive strategies in a problem-solving situation

This study examined how mothers' scaffolding predicts preschoolers' metacognitive strategies and task performance. N = 132 preschoolers and their mothers participated in the study. Problem-solving tasks were solved in mother-child interactions and independently. Mothers' scaffolding (means; cognitive, metacognitive, autonomy support) and mother-child task performance were coded during mother-child interactions. Children's metacognitive strategies and task performance were coded during child-alone problem-solving. Path-model analyses found that mothers' metacognitive support was negatively – and autonomy support positively – associated with mother-child task performance. Mothers' scaffolding means served different scaffolding intentions, building two scaffolding strategies: (1) Mothers using more scaffolding means provided more cognitive support, which was related to lower levels of children's metacognitive strategies. (2) Mothers using fewer scaffolding means provided more autonomy support, which was related to higher levels of children's metacognitive strategies. This study demonstrates the importance of examining scaffolding strategies and shows that different scaffolding strategies may be relevant in joint and child-alone problem-solving.     

Low Income African American Mothers' Parenting Stress and Instructional Strategies to Promote Peer Relationships in Preschool Children

This study investigated mothers' stress as a predictor of her instructional strategies for promoting peer relationships in preschool children. Forty-two low income African American mothers responded to structured interviews on the teaching strategies they frequently used to facilitate peer interactions of their two to three- and-a-half-year-old children. Mothers' stress was measured by The Parenting Stress Index-Short Form. Using regression analysis, three stress predictors of mothers' strategies to promote peer relationships were examined: parental distress, difficult child, and parent-child dysfunctional interactions. The three predictors of stress had a differential impact on mothers' instructional strategies. As stress increased: (a) when teaching their own children, mothers more frequently used strategies that reduced antisocial behaviors and less frequently used the strategies that promoted pro-social behaviors towards peers; (b) when teaching their children's peers, mothers less frequently used strategies that would directly benefit these children. Educational implications of these findings for stressed parents, professionals who work with stressed parents, as well as those professionals who teach parent educators are examined.     

Effects of parenting style and preschool experience on children's verbal attainment: Results of a British longitudinal study

In order to assess the relative strengths of mothers' education, parenting styles, and children's experience of preschool in predicting children's verbal attainment scores, this study made use of data derived from a cohort of children born in England, Wales, and Scotland in March of 1946 (N = 5,362). The parenting styles of cohort members have been studied from the time members' firstborn children were 4 years old. Tests administered when these second-generation children were 8 years old assessed children's abilities in vocabulary, reading, and sentence completion. Although preschool experience was an independent and significant predictor of verbal attainment scores, its power was small when compared with mothers' education. In addition, preschool attendance had no significance in predicting the scores of children whose mothers were relatively understimulating.     

Association between mothers' education and grade six children numeracy and literacy in Kenya

The objective of the paper is to re-examine the mother–child education achievement hypothesis, by re-examining the effect of mother's education, on math and literacy test scores of children in Kenya. Data come from the classroom Education Research Programme at the African Population and Health Research Centre which was collected between January and March 2012. Since pupils are nested within schools, we fitted a two-level random intercept model. Our findings show that mothers' and fathers' education has a positive and significant independent association with literacy and numeracy achievement. After interacting mothers' and fathers' education and controlling for school and pupil characteristics, we observed two significant findings: (1) mother's education remains statistically significant but is negatively associated with the pupil's score in both literacy and numeracy; and (2) the interaction of both parents' education is significant and positively associated with pupil scores in literacy and numeracy. This study underscores the importance of the complementarity between mothers' and fathers' education in order for children to acquire and learn literacy and numeracy in schools. In as much as mothers' education is important in the children's literacy and numeracy, the importance of fathers in children's literacy and numeracy cannot be ignored.     

Mother-Child Play in Italy: Regional Variation,Individual Stability,and Mutual Dyadic Influence

Objective. This longitudinal study assessed similarities and differences in exploratory, symbolic, and social play in mother-child dyads in the south and north of Italy. Design. Altogether, 89 mothers and their children were observed and recorded at home when children were 13 and 20 months of age. From videotapes, exploratory, symbolic, and social play were coded and analyzed. Results. Children did not differ in their play with mothers across region and play type, but they played less in exploratory and more in symbolic modes as they grew. At 13 months, mothers in the south did not differ from mothers in the north in engaging in exploratory or symbolic play with their children; at 20 months, mothers in the south engaged in more demonstrations of exploratory and mothers in the north more demonstrations of symbolic play. Mothers in the south and north engaged in equivalent social play at the two ages, but northern mothers verbally praised their children more at the two ages. Child play was not stable, and mothers' play only irregularly stable. In both regions at both ages, individual variation in children's exploratory and symbolic play was specifically associated with individual variation in mothers' exploratory and symbolic play, respectively, but mothers' play did not predict children's play, nor did children's play predict mothers' play. Mothers' social play was not predictive of child play, although verbal praise was associated with child play. Conclusions. These data highlight the universality of general developmental processes in play as well as specific intra-cultural variation in parenting and child development.     

Emotion,understanding, and social skills among boys at risk of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

There is growing interest in the role of emotional competence in middle school children's adjustment and functioning, yet many populations remain underresearched. Few studies have explored the emotional competence, especially emotion understanding, of children with, or at risk of, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and even fewer have examined the role emotion understanding plays in these children's social skills. Our study investigates a profile of the emotion understanding capacities of Israeli boys at risk of ADHD and evaluates its association with their social skills. One hundred and fifty‐two boys (grades 4–6) were each assigned to an at‐risk (n = 66) or comparison (n = 86) group based on their scores on an ADHD symptoms questionnaire (Conners Rating System–Revised). The two groups were matched on age, socioeconomic status and class, and school environment. Group comparisons revealed that relative to their non–at‐risk counterparts, at‐risk boys demonstrated less mature emotion understanding. Finally, our findings indicate that poor emotion understanding plays a more notable role in the social functioning of at‐risk than non–at‐risk children. This study's contribution to the understanding and school treatment of children with ADHD emotional and social competencies is discussed. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Models of Emotion Skills and Social Competence in the Head Start Classroom

Research Findings: Fostering the social competence of at-risk preschoolers would be facilitated by knowing which of children's emotion skills are most salient to social outcomes. We examined the emotion skills and social competence of 44 children enrolled in a Head Start program. Emotion skills were examined in terms of children's emotional lability and emotion regulation, whereas social competence was measured in terms of three aspects of preschoolers' social relationships: social skills, student–teacher relationships, and peer likeability. Although emotion regulation emerged as an important predictor for social skills and positive relationships with teachers, emotional lability was a significant predictor of student–teacher conflict and peer likeability. In fact, emotional lability mediated the relation between student–teacher conflict and peer likeability. Practice or Policy: The findings are discussed in terms of the complex associations between children's emotion skills and early social relationships.     

Emotion work and emotional exhaustion in teachers: the job and individual perspective

Teaching requires much emotion work which takes its toll on teachers. Emotion work is usually studied from one of two perspectives, a job or an individual perspective. In this study, we assessed the relative importance of these two perspectives in predicting emotional exhaustion. More than 200 teachers completed a questionnaire comprising the DISQ (Demand‐Induced Strain Compensation Questionnaire), the Dutch Questionnaire on Emotional Labour (D‐QEL), and the UBOS (Utrechtse Burnout Schaal [Utrecht Burnout Scale]). In line with previous studies, our findings indicated that emotional exhaustion is positively associated with emotional job demands and surface acting. The relative importance of the two operationalisations of emotion work was assessed by comparing the results of two regression analyses. Whereas the model with job demands explained 18% of the variance, the model with emotional labour explained only 5%. In understanding what might contribute to emotional exhaustion in teachers, the emotional job demands might be much more important than the self‐regulation perspective that is measured with emotional labour.     

Ideas about infant and toddler care among Russian child care teachers,mothers, and university students

Child care center teachers working with toddlers in Moscow and St. Petersburg, mothers with children in these centers, and psychology students at Moscow State University completed questionnaires about their childrearing ideas and feelings. Correlational analyses revealed positive associations among scales tapping valuing of strict adult control over children, obedience in children, and concern with infant spoiling. Each of these variables in turn was positively correlated with superstitiousness and negatively correlated with belief in the importance of talking to infants. Maternal educational level was inversely related to valuing of peer orientation and rule conformity, and positively related to belief in the importance of talking to infants. Respondent age was unrelated to childrearing ideas. Teachers' and mothers' responses were similar on most of the measures; however, teachers indicated less belief in obedience training and greater valuing of inquisitiveness in children than did mothers. The greatest differences, however, were between students and both mothers and teachers. Students' responses suggested that they held more democratic and modern ideas about childrearing than did mothers and teachers.     

Antecedents of Maternal Sensitivity During Distressing Tasks: Integrating Attachment,Social Information Processing,and Psychobiological Perspectives

Predictors of maternal sensitivity to infant distress were examined among 259 primiparous mothers. The Adult Attachment Interview, self‐reports of personality and emotional functioning, and measures of physiological, emotional, and cognitive responses to videotapes of crying infants were administered prenatally. Maternal sensitivity was observed during three distress‐eliciting tasks when infants were 6 months old. Coherence of mind was directly associated with higher maternal sensitivity to distress. Mothers' heightened emotional risk was indirectly associated with lower sensitivity via mothers' self‐focused and negative processing of infant cry cues. Likewise, high physiological arousal accompanied by poor physiological regulation in response to infant crying was indirectly associated with lower maternal sensitivity to distress through mothers' self‐focused and negative processing of infant cry cues.     

Emotional correspondence between preschoolers and teachers: what are the effects on child–teacher relationships?

ABSTRACT

The effects of the emotion regulation skills of the children attending preschool education on their interactions with their teachers are emphasised in recent studies. Therefore, in this study, we examined the effects of emotion regulation skills on the quality of the relationship between the teacher and the child. In total, 39 preschool teachers and 119 preschool children (55 girls and 64) boys from 5 public preschools participated in the study. Teachers were asked to fill Student-Teacher Relationship Scale-Short Form regarding three children in their classrooms and Emotion Regulation Questionnaire for themselves. We conducted four observations by using MPAC-R/S in order to assess child’s abilities to express and regulate emotions. The results showed that children’s emotional states were effective on teacher’s relationship perception, and that teacher’s emotion regulation skills were also effective on his/her relationship perception. In addition, the cognitive reappraisal strategy used by the teacher in emotion regulation has also been found to have an impact on the negative emotional state of children.     

Early Attachment Relationships as Predictors of Preschool Children's Emotion Regulation with a Distressed Sibling

The present study examined (1) the emotion regulation of preschool children by observing their emotional responses to a distressed younger sibling during a separation episode; (2) whether children's regulatory responses were related to sibling interaction observed during the separation episode, and (3) whether individual differences in these children's regulatory responses and the quality of sibling interaction could be predicted from early attachment relationships. Older siblings who ignored their younger siblings' distress were more likely to experience personal distress and use avoidant coping strategies. Emotion regulation strategies were related to the quality of sibling interaction such that older siblings who offered comfort to a distressed younger sibling were more likely to express positive affect in sibling interaction, whereas older siblings seeking adult assistance were less likely to engage in conflict and hostile behavior with a younger sibling. Preschool children who had an insecure-resistant infant-mother attachment at 1 year, were more likely to seek comfort from their younger siblings and engaged in more sibling conflict and hostility when they were 4 years old. The quality of infant-father attachment relationships was not significantly related to the child's emotion regulation at 4 years of age. Results are discussed with respect to the social origins of preschool children's emotional self-regulation and the consequences of emotional dysregulation in preschool settings.     

False Belief,Emotion Understanding,and Social Skills Among Head Start and Non-Head Start Children

The present study investigated relationships among false belief, emotion understanding, and social skills with 60 3- to 5-year-olds (29 boys, 31girls) from Head Start and two other preschools. Children completed language, false belief, and emotion understanding measures; parents and teachers evaluated children's social skills. Children's false belief performance related to their understanding of their friend's emotions and to teacher's ratings of social skills. Aspects of emotion understanding related to social skills. Head Start (n =30) and non-Head Start preschoolers (n = 30) performed similarly on social skills and emotion understanding measures, however, non-Head Start children performed significantly better on false belief tasks than Head Start children. Results demonstrate the importance of including diverse groups of children in studies of social cognition.     

Mother–child joint writing in Chinese kindergarteners: metalinguistic awareness,maternal mediation and literacy acquisition

The present study examined the relations of Chinese word reading and writing to both maternal mediation of writing and a number of metalinguistic and cognitive skills in 63 Hong Kong Chinese kindergarteners. The whole process of maternal mediation of writing, in which mothers individually facilitated their children's writing of 12 two‐character words in their own ways, was videotaped. This study replicated and extended previous work on the cognitive strategies mothers use to help children in writing Chinese words. Mothers' typical mediation strategies were positively and significantly associated with both children's independent word reading and writing. In addition, maternal mediation of writing was uniquely associated with Chinese word reading, but not word writing, even with metalinguistic and cognitive skills, including phonological awareness, morphological awareness, orthographic processing and visual knowledge, statistically controlled. Findings underscore the importance of mothers' early scaffolding in facilitating children's literacy acquisition.