ReviewEmotion socialization and child conduct problems: A comprehensive review and meta-analysis
Section snippets
Child conduct problems and the importance of emotion
The role of emotion in child conduct problems has been subject to growing attention in recent years, as increasing evidence has indicated that emotion-related features may be more core to such problems than has often been assumed, and that distinct forms of emotion-related deficits may characterize heterogeneous pathways to these problems (see Frick & Nigg, 2012). As reflected in current diagnostic criteria for the disruptive behavior disorders, the majority of children with conduct problems
Conceptualizations of emotion socialization
Eisenberg, Cumberland, and Spinrad (1998) proposed there are at least three key processes through which parents socialize their children to the world of emotions: a) reactions to their child's emotional displays; b) discussion of emotion; and c) emotional expressiveness within the family. These parental emotion socialization behaviors (ESBs) have generally been identified as either supportive (e.g., discussion of the causes and meaning of emotions, reactions that are emotion-focused,
Theories of emotion socialization and conduct problems
Theoretical perspectives on the potential importance of emotion socialization to conduct problems have focused on the emotion processing and regulatory deficits thought to underlie these problems. In recent years these regulatory deficits have often been conceptualized in terms of degree of effortful control, which includes abilities to shift and focus attention as needed, and to inhibit a dominant response and/or to activate a subdominant response (Rothbart, Sheese, Rueda, & Posner, 2011).
Aims and hypotheses
The primary aim of this paper was to examine current evidence regarding the association between active parental ESBs and child conduct problems, and to quantify this association using the meta-analytic method. As such, our focus was on emotion coaching, discussion of emotions, and reactions to emotions, rather than broader aspects of PMEP (e.g., parents' awareness and acceptance of emotions in themselves and others). Such a meta-analysis is timely and stands to inform emerging prevention and
Literature search
A comprehensive literature search was conducted to identify studies examining the relation between parental ESBs and child conduct problems. For this purpose, we defined conduct problems broadly in terms of the features of oppositional defiant disorder or conduct disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 2000, American Psychiatric Association, 2013). That is, developmentally excessive and persistent behavior that is oppositional, defiant, aggressive, or involves serious rule violations, which
Characteristics of total sample
The final sample consisted of 51 articles, representing 52 studies. The references of all included studies are provided in Appendix B. Thirty of the studies utilized a cross-sectional design, 14 were longitudinal, and eight were intervention studies that also measured relevant variables prior to treatment. A total of 49 studies assessed concurrent associations between ESBs and conduct problems. A total of 14 studies assessed longitudinal associations between ESBs and conduct problems - 11 of
Discussion
ESBs were found to demonstrate a small but significant negative association with severity of concurrent conduct problems, and an association of the same magnitude was seen longitudinally. Also consistent with predictions, when ESBs were separated into supportive versus nonsupportive forms, both were significantly associated with concurrent conduct problems, but the effect for nonsupportive ESBs in the cross-sectional data was significantly larger in size. This reflects evidence regarding more
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