Category: Parenting / Families
Price, N. N., & Kiel, E. J. (2022). Longitudinal links among mother and child emotion regulation, maternal emotion socialization, and child anxiety. Research on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology, 50 (2), 241–254.
,Miller-Slough, R. L., & Dunsmore, J. C. (2016). Parent and friend emotion socialization in adolescence: Associations with psychological adjustment. Adolescent Research Review, 1, 287-305.
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W. John Monopoli, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
Assistant Professor
Susquehanna University
Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania
Patricia Long, Ph.D. (she/her/hers)
Professor
University of New England
Biddeford, Maine
Rosanna Breaux, Ph.D. (she/her/hers)
Assistant Professor
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Blacksburg, Virginia
Molly Hale, M.S. (she/her/hers)
University of Georgia
Athens, Georgia
Nicole Cardona, M.A. (she/they (either set))
PhD Candidate
Boston University
Brighton, Massachusetts
Benjamin Katz, M.S. (they/them/theirs)
Graduate Student
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Shorewood, Wisconsin
W. John Monopoli, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
Assistant Professor
Susquehanna University
Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania
Emotion socialization (ES) is the process through which one’s emotions are attended to by others. Supportive socialization (e.g., validation) has been associated with adaptive emotion regulation and better mental health outcomes (Moran et al., 2018); unsupportive ES (e.g., ignoring) may lead to worse regulation and consequently worse mental health outcomes (Price & Kiel, 2022). These results suggest the importance of ES for increasing joy in individuals’ lives. Although previous work has informed us about the importance of ES, much of it has been focused on children and thus solely on the role of parents/caregivers as sources of ES. As youth transition to adolescence and then emerging adulthood—both of which represent unique vulnerability periods for mental health challenges—peers become additional sources of socialization. As such, our talks highlight the importance of ES from both parents/caregivers and peers in these developmental stages, examine longitudinal trends in ES, and explore ES in diverse populations (sexual and gender minority youth; survivors of child abuse). We anticipate that these talks will broaden clinical implications beyond parent training programs for children, which to date have been the focus of much programming (see England-Mason & Gonzalez, 2020, for a review).
Our first study examined how ES from peers changes over adolescence (N=209 adolescents assessed four years apart) and how these changes vary based on gender. This study found greater use of supportive ES with increasing age, and gender differences in types of strategies experienced. Our next study used qualitative methods to investigate how early parent/caregiver ES is associated with current emotional functioning (e.g., awareness, regulation) in a sample of N=28 sexual and gender minority (SGM) young adult participants. Results suggest a link between early socialization and current emotional functioning in this group. Our third study investigated both supportive and unsupportive ES from both peers and parents/caregivers as mediators in the relation between child physical and sexual abuse (CPSA) and experiential avoidance in a sample of college students (N=675). Findings revealed different patterns of mediation, with supportive ES from fathers and unsupportive ES from mothers most influential for women, and unsupportive strategies from both parents and peers most influential for men. Our final study investigated the structure of ES from peers in emerging adulthood (N=770 college students) and examined differences by gender and racial identity. Results indicate that there are different types of ES according to the emotion being socialized, but perceptions of these types remain consistent across gender and racial identity.
We anticipate that results highlighted here will impact current practice by 1) reinforcing the importance of emotion psychoeducation and emotion-focused coping as a means of managing unsupportive ES, particularly in samples at-risk for mental health problems; 2) exposing other mechanisms by which positive emotions like joy, as well as psychological difficulties, may arise, and 3) facilitating dialogue regarding strategies to promote socialization more broadly (e.g., as part of school or college-level programming).
