The interplay between parent and child
Parental emotion socialization and children’s emotional competence in a Norwegian preschool
sample
Heidi Namtvedt Leiknes and Ingvild Marie Fredwall
Submitted as a Master’s thesis to the Department of Psychology University of Oslo
Autumn 2021
Abstract
Authors: Heidi Namtvedt Leiknes and Ingvild Marie Fredwall
Title of the thesis: The interplay between parent and child: Parental emotion socialization and children’s emotional competence in a Norwegian preschool sample
Supervisors: Associate Professor Sophie S. Havighurst (main supervisor), Professor Egil Nygaard (co-supervisor)
The current thesis aimed to assess how parental emotion socialization was related to child emotion competence, specifically how parental emotion coaching and emotion dismissing relate to pre-schoolers’ emotion regulation and emotion knowledge in a Norwegian sample.
The thesis also sought to assess what characterizes parents' self-reported emotion
socialization behaviours in Norway. The data used in this study was part of a randomized controlled trial (RCT) evaluating the implementation of Tuning in to Kids for kindergarten teachers (N-TIK). Data was collected in 2019 from parents of children attending the kindergartens participating in the study. The research questions we have examined in our thesis arose on the basis of the variables collected and coded by the larger study. Parent questionnaires were collected and assessed emotion knowledge was conducted by the
research team. We contributed to the study by cleaning the data and coding responses for the production part of assessed emotion knowledge. We also participated in a two-day training in Tuning in to kids. Our study variables were child age, emotionality, emotion coaching, emotion dismissing, emotion regulation and emotion knowledge. We conducted two sequential multivariate regression analyses, both with emotion coaching and emotion
dismissing as independent variables. One analysis was conducted using emotion regulation as a dependent variable, and the other with parent reported emotion knowledge as the dependent variable. We conducted a multilevel modelling analysis, controlling for the clustering effect of kindergarten with assessed emotion knowledge as the dependent variable. We found that emotion coaching and emotion dismissing parenting styles was related to the emotion
regulation of Norwegian pre-schoolers, emotion coaching was related to emotion knowledge when looking at parent reported emotion knowledge, there was no effect of emotion coaching or dismissing on emotion knowledge, Norwegian parents were lower than Iranian mothers on emotion dismissing and higher than Australian mothers on emotion coaching. We address issues regarding the generalizability of our findings and implications for further research.
Acknowledgements
An era has come to an end. Not everyone can say they wrote a thesis during a pandemic. It has been an emotional roller coaster, but we made it through. Naturally, there are many people to thank.
We would like to thank you Sophie, for managing to coach us from across the globe, through lock-downs, storms and time differences. Your extensive knowledge of the field, encouragement and wise comments have helped us tremendously in writing this thesis. We are also grateful to you Egil, for all the hours you have dedicated to help us with our data processing and navigating us safely through the intricate labyrinth that is SPSS. Your optimism, precise comments and vast knowledge has been invaluable in this process.
A big thanks to our fellow students for weekly debrief-sessions and companionship during the numerous days at the University library, not to mention all the wonderful experiences, academically and socially during the six last years. You’re simply the best.
I, Ingvild, want to thank my family for cheering on me, offering your support and always being my favourite team. I want to thank Oda for being my personal emotion coach through this process while writing a thesis of your own, for your cheeky sense of humour and your never-ending kindness. Thanks, Heidi, for hours and hours of work and laughter, you really are the best friend and your passion for this topic has really inspired me.
I, Heidi, would like to thank my husband, Bård, for always believing in and encouraging me, to both work and take breaks, and helping me regulate my emotions throughout this process. I want to thank my family for showing me the meaning of an emotion coaching approach, for your sense of humour and your support. Thank you Ingvild, for your incredibly sharp mind and motivation. You are the best friend and colleague there is.
Oslo, October 2021
Ingvild Marie Fredwall & Heidi Namtvedt Leiknes
Table of Content
Emotional Competence ... 1
Parental Emotion Socialization ... 4
How is Parental Emotion Socialization Related to Children’s Emotional Competence? ... 6
Cultural Dimensions ... 9
Materials and Methods ... 12
Participants ... 12
Main Sample: Parent Report Data ... 12
Subsample: Participants with Parent Report and Child Assessment Data ... 13
Procedure ... 13
Main Sample ... 13
Subsample ... 14
Measures ... 15
Parent Report Questionnaires ... 15
Child Assessment ... 17
Data Analyses ... 18
Missing Data ... 18
Preliminary Analysis. ... 19
Assumptions of Parametric Tests ... 19
Data Analysis Plan ... 20
Results ... 22
Main Analyses ... 22
Research Question 1: How Does Parental Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing Relate to Pre-Schooler’s Emotion Regulation? (Main Sample) ... 22
Research Question 2: How Does Parental Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing Relate to Pre-Schooler's Emotion Knowledge? ... 23
Research Question 3: What Characterizes Parents' Self-Reported Emotion Socialization Behaviours in Norway? (Main Sample) ... 23
Discussion ... 28
Research Question 1: How Does Parental Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing Relate to Pre-Schoolers’ Emotion Regulation? ... 28
Research Question 2: How Does Parental Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing Relate to Pre-Schoolers’ Emotion Knowledge? ... 31
Research Question 3: What Characterizes Norwegian Parents’ Emotion Socialization Styles Compared to Other Countries? ... 33
Strengths, Limitations and Future Research ... 36
Strengths ... 36
Limitations ... 37
Implications and Applications of Research ... 38
Clinical and practical implications ... 38
Implications for further research ... 39
Conclusion ... 40
References ... 41
List of Tables
Table 1………. 24Table 2………. 25
Table 3………. 26
Table 4………. 27
Table 5………. 27
“It is a deep comfort to children to discover that their feelings are a normal part of the human experience. There is no better way to convey that than to understand them”
(Ginott, p.21, 2003)
Children are born with the capacity to feel, but in order to know the world of
emotions, they learn from the people around them. Through navigating the ups and downs of daily life, both parent and child accommodate one another as the child discovers the facets of their emotions and learns to regulate them in more or less culturally appropriate ways. How the parent views emotions in themselves and others and how they model expressivity and emotion regulation set the stage for the child's development of emotional competence.
Naturally, there is extensive research on this topic, laying the groundwork for understanding how children develop emotional competence and which factors contribute to this aspect of their development. Even though toddlerhood and the preschool years are a period where children are at their most dependent on their parents to navigate the world and their own and others emotional expressions, current research on the topic has largely examined school-aged children. Additionally, not many studies have looked at these associations in a Norwegian context. The current study aimed to study the relationship between parents' emotional
socialization style and pre-schoolers’ emotional competence in a sample of parents and young children across Norway.
Emotional Competence
Emotional competence is a child’s ability to understand emotions in themself and others, to express emotions in a situationally and culturally appropriate manner and the ability to control and regulate emotional reactions (Eisenberg et al., 1998). Eisenberg and colleagues (1998) definition of emotional competence encompasses key components we will refer to when using the term emotional competence in this thesis. These components are emotion knowledge and emotional regulation (Denham et al., 2015). Another important factor in a child’s emotional competence is temperament. Temperament can be defined as the individual differences in emotionality, activity level and capacity for attention that underlies children’s emotional reactivity and capacity for emotional regulation (Buss & Plomin, 1986; Rothbart &
Jones, 1998).
The development of emotional competence is an ongoing process happening
continuously throughout life, but for which the foundations are laid in childhood (Denham et al., 2015). Emotional competence is a crucial component in a child’s ability to interact, connect and form meaningful relationships with the people around them (Parke, 1994). In the current study, we were interested in examining two aspects of emotional competence:
emotional regulation and emotion knowledge in pre-schoolers, and how these components were associated with parent emotion socialization behaviours. To better understand these key elements of children’s emotional and social development we start with some definitions.
The first component of emotional competence is emotional regulation. Denham and colleagues (2015) define emotional regulation as the ability to situationally adapt emotional experience to the expectations of others or for one’s own comfort. The regulation of
emotional experience or expression is done by using physical, behavioural and/or cognitive strategies to moderate internal and/or external emotional pressure (Denham et al., 2015).
Learning to control and modulate emotional experiences is a crucial developmental task, starting in infancy and continuing throughout the lifespan (Kopp, 1989). Research on the development of emotion regulation in young children suggests that infants have a restricted repertoire of regulatory behaviours and that their range of emotion regulation skills develop gradually (Malatesta et al., 1989). Already during the first two years of life, their regulatory repertoire is steadily increasing in complexity, from gaze aversion to furrowing of the brows and lip biting (Malatesta et al., 1989; Haviland & Lelwica, 1987). However, the presence of parents is important to develop the capacity for regulation, as infants depend on parents' soothing, i.e. physical touch to calm themselves down (Calkins & Hill, 2007). The parental regulation of the child’s emotions can also be labelled extrinsic emotion regulation and is thought to be a precursor of the child’s intrinsic emotion regulation strategies (Ford & Gross, 2018). As distress and adversity occurs in life, it is especially important to learn how to tolerate and regulate negative emotions. Kopp (1989) suggests that discomfort serves as a catalyst to motivate humans to practice adaptive emotion regulation techniques in order to obtain physiological and psychological well-being. Previous research on emotion regulation has linked the concept to higher academic achievement (Eisenberg et al., 2005; Graziano et al., 2007), greater social competence (Denham et al., 2003) and better mental health in later life (Keenan, 2000).
The ability to regulate emotional responses is a learned process, but is also influenced by a child’s inherent temperament. Thomas and Chess (1977) divided temperament into nine categories of behavioural styles to reflect how children behave across different situations.
The categories were: activity level (physical activity), rhythmicity (predictability of
behaviour), approach or withdrawal (response to change), adaptability (response to novelty), threshold of responsiveness (level of intensity needed to spark a reaction), attention span and persistence (length of time and continuation of an activity), intensity of reaction (energy level of response to stimuli), quality of mood (amount of positive and negative emotions and behaviour the child inhabits) and distractibility (amount of external stimuli needed to change behaviour) (Thomas & Chess, 1977). When examining emotional competence, it is relevant to highlight intensity of reaction and quality of mood as some of the key components of temperament that contribute to the development of emotional competence (Thomas & Chess, 1977).
Buss and Plomin (1986) viewed temperament as an aspect of personality, focusing on four dimensions called emotionality, sociability, shyness and activity. They defined
emotionality as the level of arousal and intensity of emotions a child is born with, with a focus on the high-arousal feelings; fear and anger. Children differ in how they express emotions (i.e., the intensity of anger or fear), and this can be viewed as differences in emotionality. Research has shown that individual differences in reactivity, e.g., how easily one becomes distressed, are related to variations in emotionality and emotion regulation (Thompson, 1994). Attention skills and behavioural inhibition are likely to be influenced by temperament which partly determines emotion regulation. The two combined have been found to predict aspects of social functioning, such as prosocial behaviour and adjustment (Eisenberg et al., 1995). It is more difficult for a child with negative reactivity to regulate their emotions, because the aspects of emotional regulation which entail shifting one’s attention to down regulate, is partly biologically wired (Denham et al., 2015). This can be linked to the concepts of intensity of reaction and quality of mood (Thomas & Chess, 1977).
Thomas & Chess (1977) stressed the importance of not viewing temperament as a separate entity, but always in a reciprocal relationship with the child's other abilities and the context in which the child interacts.
The second aspect of emotional competence is emotion knowledge which is defined by Denham, Basset and Wyatt (2015) as children’s knowledge about their own and other’s emotions. This includes the comprehension of basic emotions and how and when they are expressed. It also includes an understanding of what causes different emotions and the consequences of different emotional reactions across situations (Denham et al., 2015).
Emotional knowledge also encompasses knowledge about complex and mixed emotions, which are important in order to understand how one person can feel two emotions at the same
time and that a situation or an event can elicit different emotional reactions depending on who is experiencing them (Denham et al., 2015). Emotion knowledge is an important factor in children’s ability to communicate with their surroundings. Pre-schoolers with higher emotion knowledge have a more prosocial approach to their peers and are often better liked by other people (Denham et al., 2003). Emotions serve as important social signals for pre- schoolers, because even though their vocabulary might be limited, young children navigate their social world through assessing and interpreting other people's emotional expressions, facial expressions and vocal patterns that follow an emotion (Denham, 1998). Knowledge about emotions provides children with a cognitive understanding of emotional experiences which facilitates the development of emotion regulation (Denham et al., 2015), showing that the different aspects of emotional competence influence each other (Eisenberg et al., 2005). A high level of emotion knowledge has been linked to children’s ability for prosocial behaviour with peers (Denham, 1986), social competence (Denham et al., 2003) and less emotional and behavioural problems (Fine et al., 2003; Shields et al., 2001).
The elements of emotional competence are biologically wired and then shaped over time by experience and socialization (Blair et al., 2004). In order to examine parent’s emotion related socialization behaviours relationship with pre-schoolers’ emotional competence in the current study, we need to be mindful of the interactions between the different traits within the children and the environment surrounding and influencing them.
Parental Emotion Socialization
Children learn about the world, including the world of emotions, from their
surroundings. Although it is acknowledged that the wider family, kindergarten/school, peers and significant others influence different aspects of the emotional lives of children, the vast majority of studies have been conducted on parental socialization of emotions (Denham et al., 2020; Zahn-Waxler, 2010). The concept of socialization can be defined as the way an
individual becomes a part of a social group, and how the members of the social group influence each other bidirectionally into the group’s explicit and implicit rules, roles and values (Denham et al., 2015). Socialization of emotions is an ongoing process where the primary socializers, usually the parents, both consciously and subconsciously, influence their child’s knowledge about emotions, how emotions are expressed and how they are regulated (Denham et al., 2015). Eisenberg and colleagues’ original model of emotion socialization paved the way for later research in the field, outlining the ways in which parents influence
their child, namely through their a) reactions to children's emotions, b) discussion of emotion, and c) expression of emotion. This framework has been useful in mapping out the
mechanisms of emotional socialization and has allowed researchers to build upon it. Others have suggested expanding this framework further to include broader categories of emotion socialization, like modelling techniques, contingent reactions to emotions and teaching mechanisms (Denham et al., 2015).
Under each of these domains, complex processes interact in shaping a child's emotional competence. One way socialization occurs is through parental modelling of emotions in which parents set an example of emotional competence by how they normally behave including their expression, knowledge and regulation of emotions. Thus, parental modelling of emotion serves as guidance in the valence, intensity and frequency that different emotions should be expressed (Hajal & Paley, 2020). Another way socialization occurs is through contingent reactions to emotions which encompasses how parents react to children's positive and negative emotions. Parental reactions have commonly been categorized in the literature as either supportive or non-supportive of the child’s emotions (Denham et al., 2015). The third way emotion socialization occurs is through the way parents discuss or talk with their children about emotions. “Emotion talk” is where parents help their child relate their emotional experience to an event or expression or point out cues for them to help them recognize the relevant emotion (Denham et al., 2015). This behaviour has also been labelled emotion coaching (discussed further below).
These three aspects of socialization, the modelling of, contingent reactions to and teaching about emotions are often referred to as emotion related socialization behaviours (ERSB) and are not independent of each other. Links have been found between higher maternal expression of negative emotions and fewer supportive reactions to children’s
emotions (Scammel, 2019). Furthermore, supportive reactions to children's negative emotions have been found to correlate with the level of maternal empathy, an important aspect of an emotion coaching approach to emotions (Scammel, 2019).
Combinations of parenting practices can be labelled parenting styles. The parenting styles considered most relevant to the socialization of emotions stem from the research and theoretical work on parental meta-emotion philosophies by Gottman and colleagues (1996) identified four main parenting styles: “emotion coaching”, “emotion-dismissing”, “laissez- faire” and “disapproving”, that all depend on parents' attitudes towards emotions (Gottman et al., 1996). An emotion coaching parenting style is characterized by the viewpoint that
emotions are important, and that when the child is experiencing an emotion, this is an
opportunity for intimacy and learning (Gottman et al., 1996). Emotion coaching parents will validate and empathize with the child's experience before helping them solve the problem or set limits for the child (Havighurst et al., 2010). In doing this, emotion coaching parents teach emotion regulation skills like self-soothing, inhibition of negative affect and refocusing of attention, which helps the child to adapt to social situations (Gottman et al., 1996). Gottman and colleagues proposed that emotion coaching teaches the child how to label and talk about emotions which assists them in understanding their own emotions. Parents who have an emotion dismissing parenting style tend to view negative emotions as harmful, conveying to their children that emotions are something that should be quickly discarded. They may help their child out of the emotional state by using distraction or comfort for a short while, although with some impatience (Gottman et al., 1996). The two last parenting styles, disapproving and laissez-faire parenting styles, have received less attention in the research literature. The first refers to parents having derogatory attitudes regarding emotions and conveying contempt, criticism and belittlement of their child when they express emotions (Gottman et al., 1996). The last parenting style, laissez-faire, is an accepting style, but does not involve problem-solving or helping the child understand the emotion. This is a less
attuned parenting style regarding emotions than the emotion coaching style. The disapproving and laissez-faire styles have been more difficult to validate in other studies, suggesting that what the Gottman framework first and foremost provides is a distinction between parents who approve or disapprove of emotional expression and how actively or passively they respond to their children when they are in an emotional state (Hakim-Larson et al., 2006).
The emotion coaching and emotion dismissive parent style are the most studied, especially because they have been found to be related to children’s emotional competence.
How is Parental Emotion Socialization Related to Children’s Emotional Competence?
Parental emotion socialization can be linked to crucial components of emotional competence, i.e. emotion regulation and emotion knowledge (Eisenberg et al., 1998). At the same time, there are biological wired facets of emotional competence that are not themselves influenced by parental socialization, but rather have an impact on the socialization process (Calkins & Hill, 2007). This makes untangling how emotion socialization and emotional competence are related an important issue to address, especially when taking into account the many possible effects of this interaction.
Eisenberg and colleagues (1998) hypothesized a wide range of effects of parental ERSBs, including that these aspects of parenting impacted the child's experience of emotion, their emotion regulation and emotion-related behaviour in a given situation. ERSBs can influence the child’s understanding of relevant emotions and shape their attitudes toward different emotions and even how they perceive themselves as an expresser of that emotion.
Parental ERSBs are even thought to have an impact on the quality of the relationship with the socializer in addition to building schemas about the self, relationships with others and the social world (Eisenberg et al., 1998).
Research has shown positive correlations between mother’s non-supportive behaviours and children’s internalizing and externalizing problems (Denham et al., 2000;
Eisenberg et al., 1999), whereas mothers’ acceptance of emotions has been linked with greater self-esteem in children and fewer internalizing and externalizing problems (Katz &
Hunter, 2007). A recent longitudinal study demonstrated how the socializer’s reactions to emotions, supportive or non-supportive, at age five predicted the child’s physiological regulation of emotions at age 10 which in turn predicted social competence in the teenage years (Perry et al., 2020). These findings suggest that socialization of emotions and emotional competence are related, but to establish the directionality of this relationship is a challenge in the field. Another essential point when considering influences on emotional competences is how a warm emotional climate in the family has proven necessary to enable effective
regulation of emotions (Morris et al., 2017). The emotional climate is described in Morris and colleagues' framework as the symphony of family relationships, parent-child relationships, parenting styles, the attachment relationship and emotionality at home. Children do not yet possess the neurobiological and cognitive capacities necessary to fully regulate their
emotions on their own, and therefore depend on their caregivers to help them (Morris et al., 2017). Neuropsychological studies have given us exciting clues to how these processes may occur. Research has found that ERSBs can serve as protective factors against (over)arousal by mitigating the activation of neural networks supporting emotion reactivity (Tan et al., 2020). Tan and colleagues also point out that positive parenting might promote voluntary emotion regulation processes. They observed different functional patterns in the salience detection network when processing emotional information in youth who had experienced low levels of positive parenting in addition to alterations in white matter tracts connecting regions involved in emotional reactivity and regulation (Tan et al., 2020). Thus, the correlates of parenting practices can be seen with both functional and structural brain imaging, although longitudinal data is needed to support these findings.
In order to get a fuller picture of the socialization process we need to take a look at the contributions of child characteristics. Eisenberg and colleagues (1999) hypothesized that the child’s inherent emotionality and emotion regulation would affect how the parent
responded to and interacted with the child. A laboratory study conducted on children between 14–27 months during a mother-child interaction reported how mothers displayed different levels of support with children of different temperaments (Bryan & Dix, 2009). The parent and child affected each other bidirectionally. Bryan and Dix (2009) reported that the effect of temperament was mediated by the child’s tendency towards compliance. The child’s
compliance or non-compliance with explicit requests from their parents further influenced parent’s emotions. Consequently, the emotional state the parents were in shaped how they perceived their child and how they acted towards them. Whether a child was likely to comply with the adult’s plans and wishes could be traced back to aspects of the child’s temperament such as their activity level and anger proneness (Bryan & Dix, 2009). As follows, non- compliant children exhibiting reactive temperaments receive less supportive response from parents than fearful, compliant children for example. To further complicate the matter, external factors like the amount of stress the caregiver is under may affect how calm and emotionally supportive parents manage to be when the child is distressed or dysregulated (Havighurst & Kehoe, 2017).
Another important aspect of parent socialization is the goodness of fit between the parent characteristics and the child characteristics. For example, although an emotion
coaching parenting style has been associated with better social functioning for behaviourally dysregulated children (Havighurst et al., 2015), it may not be optimal for all children.
Researchers have found that an emotion coaching style was associated with higher levels of child anxiety among more well-regulated pre-schoolers (Lagacé-Séguin & Coplan, 2005).
The authors hypothesized that in well-regulated children, an emotion coaching style might serve as overly solicitous parenting creating too much focus on emotions and making the child anxious.
Although the socialization of emotional competence has been extensively studied in the US and other Western countries, fewer studies have looked at samples from the remaining 88% of the world (Raval & Walker, 2019) which leaves cultural influences on these
processes an important topic to address. We do not know whether findings on emotion socialization and emotion competence from one cultural context can be applied in another.
Our study seeks to establish how a sample from a Norwegian context compares to the existing literature on parental emotion socialization and emotional competence.
Cultural Dimensions
An important issue regarding parental socialization of emotions, is the finding that the outcome of different parenting approaches is dependent on the cultural context in which the socialization process takes place (Eisenberg et al., 1998). The culture a child grows up in creates the context in which the socialization of emotions happens, and therefore also influences the emotion socialization process (Keller, 2003). As previously outlined, the development of a child's emotional competence is partly shaped by parents’ ERSBs. The culture a child is exposed to growing up, and socialized into, defines what it means to be emotionally competent (Friedlmeier et al., 2011). How an emotion is expressed, the value of the emotion and the norm surrounding when and how the emotion should be expressed varies from culture to culture (Mesquita et al., 2014). Mesquita and colleagues (2014) argued that parental emotion socialization can serve as a mediator of the relationship between cultural context and a child’s emotional functioning. The socialization process parents practice is inevitably shaped by the cultural context the parents operate in by internalized cultural values. A study conducted on the emotion socialization behaviours of mothers living in rural India demonstrated how cultural values shaped people’s attitudes toward emotions (Raval et al., 2014). The mothers gave explanations that helped children understand and accept the situation they were in, encouraging more relational strategies and emphasizing
accommodation to the family's wants and needs. A more autonomy- and emotion focused approach elaborating on the emotion elicited and problem solving would seem foreign in a collectivistic culture like this (Raval et al., 2014).
It is important to detangle the nuances of what is common socialization practices in different cultures because they lay the foundation for what will be appropriate interventions and guidelines regarding parenting in the different contexts. Research on the field of
psychology and on emotion socialization practices has been critiqued for focusing on samples from the US and other Western industrialized countries, raising the question whether findings from such studies are generalizable to other cultural contexts (Henrich et al., 2010; Raval &
Walker, 2019). Research by Raval & Walker (2019) have indicated that parental ERSBs that are associated with adaptive child outcomes in White middle-class families in the US may not be related to adaptive child functioning in families living in other cultural contexts.
There are several structural factors to consider, when aiming to characterise the context in which Norwegian parents raise their children. In Norway parents have the right to economically supported parental leave for both parents for a combined total of 12 months. In
2018, 71% of Norwegian fathers made use of their right to full paternity leave of 10 weeks (Statistisk sentralbyrå, 2019). Hence, in the child’s first year, parents can alternate staying full- or part time at home with their child. After this period, 92 % of Norwegian children between one- and five-years old attend kindergartens that are heavily subsidised by the Norwegian government (Statistisk sentralbyrå, 2021). These policies create circumstances that impact parenting and, therefore, could possibly contribute to families having different experiences in the early years of parenting compared to families from other countries. The governmental support Norwegian parents are entitled to facilitate that they are able to spend a substantial amount of time in close proximity with their child, which might facilitate a
breeding ground for an emotion coaching approach to parenting.
A study that compared emotion understanding in Brazilian, Peruvian and European children (predominantly from Italy and Norway) showed how socioeconomic status (SES) was an important factor to control for when comparing different cultures (Kårstad et al., 2016). Norway is an industrialized western country with a high gross domestic product on a global scale (Statistisk sentralbyrå, 2021) and the standard of living is high compared to other countries. External economic pressure on parents has been linked to increased levels of stress, impacting parents' abilities to relate to their children’s emotions and tolerate negative
expressivity (Eisenberg et al., 1998). As the overall standard of living in Norway is
considered to be high on a global scale, Norwegian parents might have a higher tolerance for their children’s negative emotions and this can perhaps result in a lower degree of emotion dismissing.
Hypothesizing how Norwegian parents compare to other countries is difficult as there are only a few studies that have looked at the socialization of emotional competence in Norwegian samples, and even fewer have made cross-cultural comparisons. Master’s theses conducted at the University of Oslo on emotion socialization have found that Norwegian parents score relatively high on emotion coaching and lower on emotion dismissing (Nelle, 2017; Woldstad, 2020). These findings need replication in larger samples, but they suggest that Norwegian parents might be more prone to emotion coaching strategies and less emotion dismissing strategies when relating to their children’s emotions. We identified one cross cultural study that found that Norwegian parents resembled American parents in the intensity of problem-focused responses and expressive encouragement using the Coping with
Children's Negative Emotions Scale (CCNES) (Bjørk et al., 2020). The authors highlighted that some dimensions differed between the two nationalities, particularly the level of distress reactions (e.g., the parent getting upset themselves), emotion-focused reactions (e.g., trying to
distract the child from their feelings) and the amount of punitive (e.g., criticizing the child) and minimizing responses (e.g., telling their child they are overreacting). Punitive and minimizing responses were more prominent in the US sample, but Norwegian parents had higher levels of emotion-focused reactions and distress reactions which could be associated with, but not equivalent to an emotion dismissive style. Our hypotheses regarding the
parenting styles advocated by Norwegian parents stemmed from the contemporary discourse around parenting in Norway, which has been characterized by several factors that were aligned with an emotion coaching parenting style. Good parenting has been defined as dialogue-based and being focused around the child’s needs and well-being (Hollekim et al., 2016).
In order to examine how parental socialization of emotion is related to emotional competence in Norwegian preschool sample the current study will explore the following hypotheses:
1) How does parental emotion coaching and emotion dismissing relate to pre-schoolers’
emotion regulation?
a) We hypothesized that an emotion coaching parenting style would be positively related to children’s emotion regulation.
b) We hypothesized that an emotion dismissing parenting style would be negatively related to children’s emotion regulation.
2) How does parental emotion coaching and emotion dismissing relate to pre-schoolers’
emotion knowledge?
a) We hypothesized that an emotion coaching parenting style would be positively related to children’s emotion knowledge.
b) We hypothesized that an emotion dismissing parenting style would be negatively related to children’s emotion knowledge.
3) Do Norwegian parents' emotional socialization styles differ compared to parents from other countries?
a) We hypothesised that Norwegian parents would be more emotion coaching than parents from other countries.
b) We hypothesised that Norwegian parents would be less emotion dismissive than parents from other countries.
Materials and Methods
Participants
Main Sample: Parent Report Data
Participants were a voluntary community sample of 723 parents (21% fathers) with children attending kindergarten. Parents completed questionnaires regarding one of their children (Mage= 3.55, SD = 1.22, 49% girls; 51% boys). There were originally 26 cases in the main sample which were identified as duplicates. Ten of these were parents who had filled out the questionnaire for the same child twice and we therefore kept the most recent version.
In the remaining 16 cases, both parents had completed the questionnaires for the same child.
We chose to keep the one filled out by the father in order to even out the gender gap. One case was removed because it was missing all parent responses. Moreover, 74 cases were excluded where the reported age of the children were too low for our sample (younger than 17 months). In addition, one case was removed because the child was older than 7 years.
Parents were on average 35.81 years (SD = 4.94) with the majority of the responding parents being the biological parent of the child (99%), although a small portion of the sample reported being a foster carer or co-parent (1%). Marital status was either married/co-habitant (94%), single (5%) or in a relationship but not cohabiting (1%). More than half of the parents (73%) reported that they had more than one child. The primary nationality of the responding parent was Norwegian (88%). Parents mainly reported having partners of Norwegian descent (80%). Most parents (62%) were well educated having attended college or university,
including 39% having completed a degree of 5-6 years. A minority of the parents (16%) reported having only completed high school. In Norway, 50% of adults aged 30-34 years have completed a college or university degree (Statistisk sentralbyrå, 2020). The income level was scored for the parents separately, on an ordinal scale from 1-12 with unevenly spaced intervals (1 = no income, 2 = under 150 000 NOK, 3 = 150 000 to 199 999 NOK, 4 = 200 000 to 299999 NOK and then 100 000 NOK intervals like this up to 12 = “above 1 million
NOK”). We computed a mean score for each household. The median income level of the mean of the household was 7 on the 12-point scale which referred to “between 500-599 999 NOK per annum” per person. Since this was a mean of both parents' scores, this could also be interpreted as higher or lower due to the fact that an individual score of 1 means no income and 12 only states that their income was higher than 1 million, thus complicating the
interpretation of their mean household income. The Norwegian national average for couples with children aged 0-5 was 1,153,500 NOK in 2019 (Statistisk sentralbyrå, 2020). Thus, the sample was representative of the average Norwegian family with young children with regard to socioeconomic status (SES), perhaps with a slightly higher level of education.
Subsample: Participants with Parent Report and Child Assessment Data Participants in the subsample consisted of 86 children recruited from the main sample (Mage= 3.89, SD = 1.08). Children ranged from 1.58 to 6.42 years old. The sample consisted of 42 girls (49%) and 44 boys (51 %). There were originally 95 children tested, but nine were removed from the dataset: two were duplicates, two had no corresponding parent
questionnaire and five did not meet the criterion of a completed familiarization trial.
The mean age of parents was 38.68 years (SD = 4.52). Marital status was 95%
married/cohabiting and 5% single, and all responding parents reported being the child’s biological parent. Fathers constituted 29% of the parents. The education level was slightly higher than the main sample, with 40% of the parents having completed a university degree of 5 to 6 years. The median income for each parent in the households was 9 on a 12-point scale, which refers to 700-790 000 NOK, thus income was slightly higher than in the main sample. The majority of parents reported being Norwegian (92%) and having partners from Norway (88%).
Procedure
Main Sample
The participants were recruited from 49 kindergartens across Norway as part of a larger project to evaluate an intervention - Tuning in to Kids – for Kindergarten Teachers that aimed to improve the social and emotional climate of the kindergarten. The project was carried out by the Department of Psychology at the University of Oslo in collaboration with FUS Kindergartens (FUS Barnehagene AS) and a Norwegian organization specializing in helping adults increase their competence about children’s psychological development and well-being (Kompetansetjeneste for tidlig innsats AS). The kindergartens were part of a chain called FUS that has 178 kindergartens across Norway (FUS Barnehagene, 2021). Of the FUS Kindergartens, 49 were selected by FUS management to participate in the larger project based on their proximity to the cities Oslo, Bergen and Trondheim. All parents of children in
the 49 kindergartens were invited via email to participate in the implementation of Tuning in to Kids in the Kindergarten by answering questions about their child’s functioning pre- and post-implementation. Parents who consented to participating in the program were sent an online questionnaire at two time points that equated to baseline and 10 months after baseline.
The questionnaire for the baseline was distributed in autumn 2019. The questionnaires asked about their child’s social, emotional and behavioural functioning, emotional language of the child and parents’ emotional socialization with their child, in addition to other information not used in the present study. Approval was obtained from The University of Oslo Human Ethics Committee and the Norwegian Centre for Research Data (Ref #651181) and was a registered trial (Clinical Trials Registry No. NCT03985124). The parent who answered the questionnaire gave informed consent for themselves and their children. For the purposes of this study, only baseline data was used (i.e., prior to any intervention) drawn from
kindergartens in both the intervention and the control conditions.
Subsample
Eight of the kindergartens within proximity to Oslo were randomly selected to participate in direct assessment of the children. Parents who completed questionnaires from these 8 kindergartens were asked for consent to allow their child to participate in a direct assessment of the child’s emotion language comprehension and production conducted at the kindergarten. Assessments were conducted by Master`s and Clinical Psychology students from the University of Oslo. These students were trained prior to testing by the main TIK FUS Kindergarten study’s research officer and given written information about the
procedure. The students were put in contact with each kindergarten's head of department and coordinated appointments for testing with them.
Measures
Parent Report Questionnaires
Parent Emotional Styles Questionnaire. Parental emotion socialization was assessed using the modified version of the self-report measure Maternal Emotional Styles Questionnaire (MESQ; Lagacé-Séguin & Coplan, 2005) called Parent Emotional Styles Questionnaire, hereafter labelled PESQ (Havighurst et al., 2010). The MESQ was developed by modifying an existing self-report questionnaire assessing parents’ overarching meta emotion philosophy when interacting with their child (MEI: Meta emotion interview, Fainsilber-Katz & Gottman, 1999, as cited in Lagacé-Séguin & Coplan, 2005). The MESQ consists of 14 items on parental attitudes towards their child’s feelings of sadness and anger.
The PESQ includes 7 additional items on fear/worry and has a total of 21 items. It is also gender neutral to include fathers as well. The PESQ has three subscales: Emotion Coaching (11 items) used as a measure of supportive ERSBs, Emotion Dismissing (10 items) used as measures of non-supportive ERSBs, and Empathy (7 items) which we omitted in this study because the items overlap completely with the items on Emotion Coaching. Parents rated on a 5-point Likert scale how strongly they agreed or disagreed with statements about how they usually respond with regard to different emotions in their child and their attitudes towards negative emotions (i.e., worry, fear, sadness and anger). Examples of items are: “When my child is worried, it's time to solve a problem” (Emotion Coaching) and “When my child is angry my goal is to get him/her to stop” (Emotion dismissing). The scales were computed by creating sum scores on each scale. The range of scores on the Emotion Coaching scale is 11- 55 and 10-50 on the Emotion Dismissing scale. A high score means that the parent have scored that they highly agree with the attitudes belonging to the scale of the respective parenting styles. Havighurst and colleagues (2010) found internal consistencies between α=.79-.84 for Emotion coaching and between α=.82-.87 for Emotion dismissing when they developed PESQ. The Cronbach's alphas for Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing in the current study are reported in Table 1.
The Emotion Regulation Checklist. Children’s emotion regulation was measured using the subscale Emotion Regulation on the Emotion Regulation Checklist (ERC; Shields
& Cicchetti, 1997).The ERC comprises of 24 items. Two subscales are calculated from the ERC: Emotion Regulation (8 items) and Lability-Negativity (15 items), but we have only utilized the former in our study. The Emotion Regulation subscale includes items describing
situationally appropriate displays of emotions, empathy, and affective self-awareness which assesses parents’ perceptions of their child’s typical response to emotional experiences on a 4-point Likert scale. Items include “Can modulate excitement in emotionally arousing situations,” and “Can say when she/he is feeling sad, angry or mad, fearful or afraid”. The scale was computed by creating a mean score of the 8 items after reverse coding the required items. The range of possible scores is 1-4, where a higher score indicates better regulatory abilities. Previous studies reported acceptable levels of reliability (α=.83), as well substantial interrater reliability and good construct validity for the scale (Shields & Cicchetti, 1997). See Table 1 for Cronbach alphas for the Emotion Regulation scale in the current study.
The Emotionality, Activity and Sociability Temperament Questionnaire (EAS).
The EAS was used to measure children’s temperament (Buss & Plomin, 1986). The EAS measures Buss and Plomin’s four dimensions of temperament: emotionality, activity, sociability and shyness through 20 items. There are 5 items on each dimension which are answered on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = not characteristic of your child to 5 = very characteristic of your child). Emotionality is the dimension of temperament that has been closest linked to emotion regulation in earlier research (Thompson, 1994) and we will therefore only include this subscale in our analysis. Emotionality refers to the tendency to become emotionally aroused easily and intensely, assessed through statements such as “Child cries easily”. The scores on the five items were added together and divided by the number of items, making 1-5 the possible range of scores. A higher score means that the child is
perceived by the parent as having a more reactive temperament. Mathiesen and Tambs (1999) translated the EAS to Norwegian and assessed the psychometric properties, stability and factor structure. They reported internal consistencies between α=.62 and α=.70 for
emotionality when assessing scores from children aged 50 months. The Cronbach alphas in the current study are reported in Table 1.
List of Emotion Words. Parents were given a list of 32 custom-based emotion words devised from the pre-schooler’s expected language comprehension level (Baron-Cohen et al., 2010). The list of words was not built on a previous measure, but was included for the
purposes of the TIK-FUS study (Havighurst et al. In Press). Parents were asked to indicate whether their child could understand and produce the word by ticking boxes labelled
“understand” and “produce” for each emotion. The emotion words varied from basic emotions, such as “happy” or “sad” to more complex emotions such as “ashamed” or
“embarrassed”. The scores on emotion understanding and production were added together as a combined total of parent reported child emotion knowledge making 0-64 the possible range
of scores on this measure. The list of emotion words demonstrated a good level of internal consistency using the Kuder-Richardson coefficient (see Table 1).
Child Assessment
Direct assessments of the children were conducted to measure their knowledge about emotions. The measure was constructed by researchers affiliated with the main TIK-FUS study based on a review of emotions that other researchers have found children to be able to recognize at different ages (Declercq et al., 2019; Pons et al., 2004). The basis was the six primary emotions (happiness, sadness, fear, disgust, anger and surprise). An additional six emotions were included to examine more complex emotions (content, frustration, irritation, worry, excitement and shyness). Using an iPad, children were first administered a
familiarization trial to ensure they understood the task. The familiarization trial consisted of naming four objects correctly, e.g., “ball” and “dog”. Subsequently, the emotion recognition task was administered followed by the emotion naming task to assess children’s ability to identify different emotional expressions in others and being able to name the emotion displayed. In the emotion recognition task, the children were shown four pictures of
children’s faces displaying different emotions and were asked by a pre-recorded voice on the iPad to tap on the image displaying the correct emotion (e.g., “Tap on the face that is sad”).
In the emotion naming task, children were shown a picture of a child displaying an emotion.
They were read four different emotion words out loud and asked to say out loud which emotion word corresponded to the picture that was displayed (e.g., “Is the face happy, sad, angry or scared?”). The test administrator would repeat the question posed by the pre- recorded voice if the child did not respond after the task was given or the child did not seem understand the question. Emotion recognition and emotion naming is expected to develop in stages through the toddler and preschool years (Pons et al., 2004). Therefore, the task had two difficulty levels. Children between two to three years were administered eight emotions (i.e., sadness, fear, anger, happiness, content, frustration, surprise and disgust), while children between four to six years were administered the same eight emotion words and an additional four emotion words of greater complexity (i.e., sadness, fear, anger, happiness, content, frustration, surprise, disgust, irritation, worry, excitement and shyness). Children were given one minute to respond for each picture in both the emotion recognition and the emotion naming task. Since children younger than four years were not administered the last block of emotion words (4 items) they were given a score of 0 for these, assuming they would not be
able to answer them because of the high difficulty. Children were given 1 point per correct answer. The emotion recognition and naming scales were added together producing a sum score, making 0-24 the possible range of scores. Hereafter, this measure will be labelled assessed emotion knowledge. The scale showed good internal consistency, measured using the Kuder-Richardson coefficient (see Table 1).
Data Analyses
All data analyses were conducted using IBM SPSS (IBM Corp, 2017). We used a significance level of .05 for all analyses.
Missing Data
Main Sample. There were no missing values in the Emotion coaching, Emotion Dismissing, Emotion Regulation or Emotionality scores in the main sample. When
conducting a Missing Values Analysis on all study variables, there were 26 missing values (<1%), all regarding age. Three children had an improbable low reported age, and one child had an improbable high reported age (likely due to parents entering the child’s date of birth incorrectly) and were interpreted as missing. Age was also missing for 13 of the parents and 9 of their partners. After conducting a Little's MCAR test which stated that the data was likely to be missing at random (p = .141) (Pallant, 2020), age was imputed using Expectation Maximization (EM) for child age, parent age and partner age based on background info (e.g., SES, education, gender, age) and scores on the other parent and child measures (PESQ, ERC and EAS).
Subsample. Where the child had not been administered all the emotion words, a simple imputation was conducted inserting a score of 0 for missing emotion naming and emotion recognition, assuming the test administrator assessed the child's comprehension to be too low to continue. A Missing Values Analysis was then conducted where 10 values
appeared missing (<1 %). These 10 values included one child who had not been administered the emotion recognition test, three children who had not been administered the emotion naming task and two parents who had not reported their age or age for their partner. Little’s MCAR test indicated that these items were missing at random (p = .867) (Pallant, 2020). The 10 missing values were imputed using expectation maximization (EM) based on background information (e.g., SES, education, gender, age) and scores on the other parent and child measures (PESQ, ERC and EAS).
Preliminary Analysis.
Assumptions of Parametric Tests
The assumptions for conducting a multiple regression analysis were tested: a) adequate sample size in relation to the number of independent variables included in the model, b) outliers, c) normality, linearity and homoscedasticity of errors, d) absence of multicollinearity and singularity, e) absence of outliers in the solution and f) independence of errors (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2014). Issues regarding sample size only concerned the
subsample since the main sample had a robust number of participants. A rule of thumb for assessing sample size was utilized which stated that an acceptable sample size would be n ≥ 50 + 8m (m being the number of independent variables), resulting in the need for 82 cases when 4 independent variables were included (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2014). Outliers were detected by inspecting boxplots of the predictors in the main and subsample, but because the outliers were few and not extreme, the scores were included unaltered. A multiple regression analysis was conducted to look at the scatterplot of residuals against the predicted scores on the dependent variable for each of the three outcome variables: parent reported emotion knowledge, parent reported emotion regulation and assessed child emotional knowledge.
There were no indications of violation of the assumption of homoscedasticity for either of the outcome variables. The assumption of normality was assessed looking at the Normal P-P Plot which displayed a straight line, indicating no major deviations from normality for all three outcome variables. Linearity between the predicted dependent variable scores and the errors of prediction were inspected looking at the scatterplot, which showed that the shape was rectangular for each of the outcome variables, indicating that the assumption of linearity is met. Multicollinearity was assessed by inspecting the tolerance and the variance inflation factor (VIF) statistics for the predictors we intended to use in the multiple regression analyses. The collinearity statistics exhibited high tolerance (>1) and low VIF (<10), which means that there was no indication for multicollinearity of the included predictors. The assumption of independence of errors was tested by inspecting the Durbin-Watson statistic, which was 2.01 for assessed emotion knowledge and parent reported emotion knowledge and 2.10 for emotion regulation indicating no autocorrelation which means that there was
independence of errors. We tested whether there was a cluster effect regarding which kindergartens the children originated from for parent reported emotion knowledge, assessed emotion knowledge and emotion regulation. The intra class correlation (ICC) was 1% for
parent reported emotion knowledge and <1% for emotion regulation, indicating that multilevel modelling was not necessary for these two measures. However, there was a significant clustering of scores on emotion knowledge on the basis of which kindergarten the child attended in the sub sample (ICC=10%). Therefore, the analysis conducted with assessed emotion knowledge was multilevel where kindergarten was included as a random effect.
Data Analysis Plan
We tested three different models in this study. Each examined how parenting influences aspects of emotional competence: 1) emotion regulation reported by parents, 2) emotional knowledge reported by parents and 3) assessed child emotion knowledge. Child age and emotionality were controlled for in all three models. We also did a cross-cultural comparison of parenting styles between our sample and previous studies.
The first model: how emotion coaching and emotion dismissing were related to child emotion regulation was tested using a multivariate sequential regression analysis in the main sample. Emotion regulation was set as the dependent variable. Children’s age and
emotionality were entered as covariates in step 1 before emotion coaching and emotion dismissing were entered in step 2 as independent variables.
The second model: how emotion coaching and emotion dismissing were related to parent report of child emotion knowledge was also tested using a multivariate sequential regression analysis in the main sample. Parent reported emotion knowledge was set as the dependent variable. Children’s age and emotionality were entered as covariates in step 1 and emotion coaching and emotion dismissing in step 2 as independent variables.
The third model: how emotion coaching and emotion dismissing were related to child assessed emotion knowledge was tested in the subsample. A linear multilevel model
assessing the random slope for two level-1 factors was applied entering which kindergarten the child belonged to as the random effect and emotion knowledge as the dependent variable.
We also examined the fixed effect of the two predictors: parent emotion coaching and emotion dismissing and the two covariates: child age and emotionality. The method of estimation utilized in the multilevel model was Restricted Maximum Likelihood (REML).
Our last research question was assessed by doing a literature search using PsycInfo and PubMed for studies with the words “emotion coaching” and “emotion dismissing” in order to identify other studies that had looked into parental emotion socialization attitudes using PESQ in a normal sample. This search yielded 36 results in PsychInfo and 62 results in
PubMed. Going through them we identified only one study using PESQ which was the study by Havighurst and colleagues (2010) who developed the PESQ. We subsequently used the Web of Science database to identify articles that had cited (Havighurst et al., 2010). Web of Science provided 57 results, where one additional study from Iran fulfilled our requirements of using the PESQ to assess parental attitudes in another cultural context than Norway and Australia. We conducted a simple pairwise comparison of means on emotion coaching and emotion dismissing between Australia, Iran and Norway, using an online t-test calculator plotting in means, standard deviations and sample sizes (MedCalc Software, 2021).
Based on our hypothesis regarding parental emotion socialization on emotional competence, we created this conceptual model.
Results
Preliminary Findings
Bivariate correlations between the variables included in the regression analyses are presented in Table 1 with their respective reliability measures, means and standard deviations for both samples. All measures except emotion regulation had acceptable internal
consistencies (α ≥ 70). Emotion regulation was significantly negatively correlated with emotionality, indicating that the more well-regulated the child was, the less emotionally reactive they were. Additionally, emotionality had a significant negative correlation with assessed emotion knowledge in the sub sample. Child age was significantly and positively correlated with parental reported emotion knowledge and assessed emotion knowledge, indicating that emotion knowledge increases with age. The two measures on emotion knowledge were positively correlated.
Main Analyses
Research Question 1: How Does Parental Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing Relate to Pre-Schooler’s Emotion Regulation? (Main Sample)
In the first model, including only the two covariates; child age and emotionality, only children’s emotionality explained 7% of the variance in child emotion regulation (see Table 2). When adding parent scores on emotion coaching and emotion dismissing the model explained an additional 8% of the variance in Emotion Regulation, F change (2, 720) = 26.18, p < .001. The total variance explained by the model as a whole thus doubled, F (2, 718) = 32.90, p < .001. In the final model, both emotion coaching, emotion dismissing and emotionality had statistically significant contributions to the variance. Effect sizes are reported in Table 2. Age did not make a significant contribution to the model. Emotion regulation was positively related to parent emotion coaching and negatively related to emotion dismissing and emotionality.
Research Question 2: How Does Parental Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing Relate to Pre-Schooler’s Emotion Knowledge?
Emotion Coaching, Dismissing and Parent Reported Emotion Knowledge (Main Sample)
The analysis revealed that in the first model, including only child age and
emotionality, only child age was significantly positively related to children’s parent reported emotion knowledge (see Table 3). When adding parent scores on emotion coaching and emotion dismissing in step 2, the model explained only 1% more of the variance in emotion knowledge, F change (2, 719) = 5.10, p < .05. Thus, the variance explained by the final model was 44% F (3, 719) = 183.93, p < .01. The effect size of the relationship between the parenting styles and emotion knowledge was very small. Parent emotion dismissing did not significantly contribute to the variance in parent reported emotion knowledge. The results of this analysis indicated that emotion coaching and child age was positively related to emotion knowledge.
Emotion Coaching, Emotion Dismissiveness and Assessed Emotion Knowledge (Subsample)
The analysis revealed that parent emotion coaching and emotion dismissing did not significantly contribute to the variance in assessed child emotion knowledge (see Table 4).
However, the covariate, child age, was significantly positively related to emotion knowledge.
Research Question 3: What Characterizes Parents' Self-Reported Emotion Socialization Behaviours in Norway? (Main Sample)
The comparison between means and standard deviations of emotion coaching and emotion dismissing in our sample and those from parents in an Australian sample
(Havighurst et al., 2010) and mothers in an Iranian sample (Aghaie Meybodi et al., 2017) are presented in Table 5. The results revealed that Norwegian parents were significantly lower than Iranian mothers on emotion dismissing (p < .001) but it was not possible to detect a difference on emotion coaching (p = .154). Compared to Australian mothers, Norwegian parents were significantly higher on emotion coaching (p < .001) but did not differ on scores on emotion dismissing (p < .985).
Table 1.
Correlation Matrix for the Study Variables in Main Sample and Subsample
Study Variables 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 α M SD
1. Child age -.19 .18 -.09 .10 .50** .79** - 3.89 1.08
2. Emotionality -.09* .18 .19 -.19 .01 -.26* .76 2.47 0.70
3. Emotion coaching -.03 -.03 .39** .11 .18 .18 .74 44.79 4.87
4. Emotion dismissing -.09* .06 .21** -.11 -.04 -.12 .78 33.47 5.25
5. Emotion regulation .07 -.26** .27** -.07 .29** .25* .63 3.50 0.34
6. Parent reported EK .65** -.03 .07 -.03 .13** .49** .95 34.62 12.63
7. Assessed child EK - - - .86 9.73 5.07
Cronbach´s α - .79 .79 .79 .58 .97
Mean 3.53 2.49 45.34 34.37 3.46 32.09
SD 1.22 0.69 5.17 5.49 0.33 16.77
Note. Lower left part of the matrix represents the main sample N=723. Upper right part of the matrix represents the subsample N=86.
Emotion knowledge is abbreviated EK in the table.
*p < .05, ** p < .01
Table 2.
Sequential Multivariate Regression Analysis with Emotion Regulation as the Outcome Variable
Step and Predictor B SE B β sr Change in R2 R2
Step 1 .07 .07
Child age .01 .01 .05 .04
Emotionality -.12 .02 -.25** -.25
Step 2 .08 .15
Child age .01 .01 .04 .04
Emotionality -.11 .12 -.28** -.24
Emotion coaching .02 .00 .28** .28
Emotion dismissing -.01 .00 -.11* -.11
Note. Main sample N=723. * p <.01, ** p < .001.
Table 3.
Sequential Multivariate Regression Analysis with Parent Reported Emotion Knowledge as the Outcome Variable
Step and Predictor B SE B β sr Change in R2 R2
Step 1 .43 .43
Child age 8.98 .39 .66** .65
Emotionality .54 .69 .02 .02
Step 2 .01 .44
Child age 9.03 .39 .66** .65
Emotionality .60 .68 .03 .02
Emotion coaching .29 .09 .09* .09
Emotion dismissing -.03 .09 .01 .01
Note. Main sample, N=723. * p <.01, ** p < .001.
Table 4.
Multilevel Model Controlled for Clustering Effect of Kindergarten with Assessed Emotion Knowledge as the Dependent Variable
Predictor B SE B β
Child age 3.52 .30 .75**
Emotionality -.57 .47 -.08
Emotion coaching .09 .07 .09
Emotion dismissing -.02 .07 -.02
Note. Subsample, N=86. β was calculated by re-running the analysis with z-scores for both independent and dependent variables. * p <.01, ** p < .001.
Table 5.
Comparisons between countries on emotion coaching and emotion dismissing.
Measure Australia
(N=110)
Iran (N=54)
Norway (N=723)
Emotion coaching M=40.63
SD=0.54
M=44.35 SD=0.96
M=45.34 SD=5.09
Emotion dismissing M=34.36
SD=0.59
M=43.39 SD=1.18
M=34.37 SD=5.52
Discussion
The main purpose of this study was to investigate how parental emotion socialization behaviours were related to child emotion regulation and emotion knowledge in a sample of Norwegian pre-schoolers. Research examining this relationship has not been done with such a large sample in a Norwegian population before, making this study an important contribution to the knowledge base on emotion socialization of preschool children’s emotional
competence in Norway. Our main finding was that an emotion coaching parenting style was positively related to the emotion regulation of Norwegian pre-schoolers, whereas an emotion dismissing parenting style was negatively related to emotion regulation. Secondly, we found a weak but positive association between emotion coaching and emotion knowledge when looking at parent reported emotion knowledge. However, we did not find an association between neither parenting styles nor emotion knowledge when looking at children’s assessed emotion knowledge in the smaller subsample. Lastly, we found that Norwegian parents were lower than Iranian mothers on emotion dismissing and higher than Australian mothers on emotion coaching. We will discuss each of these findings in light of our research questions and also address implications of our findings for clinical and practical purposes before presenting suggestions for further research.
Research Question 1: How Does Parental Emotion Coaching and Emotion Dismissing Relate to Pre-Schoolers’ Emotion Regulation?
The first aim of the current study was to investigate how parenting styles and emotion regulation were related in a Norwegian preschool sample. In accordance with our hypothesis, the results indicated that parents with more emotion coaching attitudes had children with greater emotion regulation skills. The positive association between emotion coaching and emotion regulation suggested that an emotion coaching parenting style had a positive effect on children’s emotion regulation. This could indicate that when parents tuned in and
welcomed the expression of unpleasant emotional states of both high and low intensity, it conveyed to the child that emotions are okay. By helping the child to problem solve when overwhelmed, emotions can become something that is manageable, and over time the child will acquire the ability to regulate their own emotional states. It could also be that in order to act in an emotion coaching manner, the parent needed to regulate their own emotions first, and thus modelling emotion regulation and coping strategies. The observed relationship between emotion coaching and emotion regulation could also mean that children with higher
