Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T06:33:04.679Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Emotion regulation strategies and later externalizing behavior among European American and African American children

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2009

Lauren H. Supplee ,
Emily Moye Skuban ,
Daniel S. Shaw  and
Joanna Prout
Lauren H. Supplee*
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
Emily Moye Skuban
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
Daniel S. Shaw
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
Joanna Prout
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
*
Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Lauren H. Supplee, 8320 Draper Lane, Silver Spring, MD 20910; E-mail: lauren.supplee@gmail.com.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Children's early emotion regulation strategies (ERS) have been related to externalizing problems; however, most studies have included predominantly European American, middle-class children. The current study explores whether ERS use may have differential outcomes as a function of the mother's ethnic culture. The study utilizes two diverse samples of low-income male toddlers to examine observed ERS during a delay of gratification task in relation to maternal and teacher reports of children's externalizing behavior 2 to 6 years later. Although the frequencies of ERS were comparable between ethnic groups in both samples, the use of physical comfort seeking and self-soothing was positively related to African American children's later externalizing behavior but negatively related to externalizing behavior for European American children in Sample 1. Data from Sample 2 appear to support this pattern for self-soothing in maternal, but not teacher, report of externalizing behavior. Within group differences by income were examined as a possible explanatory factor accounting for the ethnic differences, but it was not supported. Alternative explanations are discussed to explain the pattern of findings.

Type
Regular Articles
Information
Development and Psychopathology , Volume 21 , Issue 2 , May 2009 , pp. 393 - 415
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Achenbach, T. (1991). Manual for the Child Behavior Checklist 4–18 and the 1991 profile. Burlington, VT: University of Vermont, Department of Psychiatry.Google Scholar
Achenbach, T. M. (1992). Manual for the Child Behavior Checklist 2/3 and 1992 profile. Burlington, VT: University of Vermont, Department of Psychiatry.Google Scholar
Aiken, L. S., & West, S. G. (1991). Multiple regression: Testing and interpreting interactions. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Ainsworth, M. S., Blehar, M. C., Waters, E., & Wall, S. (1978). Patterns of attachment: A psychological study of the strange situation. Oxford: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Bates, J. E., Freeland, C., & Lounsbury, C. A. (1979). Measurement of infant difficultness. Child Development, 50, 794–803.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bates, J. E., Maslin, C. A., & Frankel, K. A. (1985). Attachment security, mother–child interaction, and temperament as predictors of behavior-problem ratings at age three years. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 50(1–2).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Baumrind, D. (1971). Current patterns of parental authority. Developmental Psychology, 4, 1–103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baumrind, D. (1972). An exploratory study of socialization effects on black children: Some black–white comparisons. Child Development, 43, 261–267.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Belsky, J. (1993). Etiology of child maltreatment: A developmental ecological analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 114, 413–434.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blair, C. (2002). School readiness: Integrating cognition and emotion in a neurobiological conceptualization of children's functioning at school entry. American Psychologist, 57, 111–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bornstein, M. H., Cote, L. R., & Venuti, P. (2001). Parenting beliefs and behaviors in northern and southern groups of Italian mothers of young infants. Journal of Family Psychology, 15, 663–675.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bornstein, M. H., Tamis-LeMonda, C., Pascual, L., Haynes, O. M., Painter, K. M., Galperin, C. Z., et al. (1996). Ideas about parenting in Argentina, France, and the United States. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 19, 347–367.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bradley, R. H., Corwyn, R. F., Burchinal, M., McAdoo, H., & Garcia Coll, C. (2001). The home environments of children in the United States Part II: Relations with behavioral development through age thirteen. Child Development, 72, 1868–1886.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brody, G. H., & Flor, D. L. (1998). Maternal resources, parenting practices and child competence in rural, single-parent African American families. Child Development, 69, 803–816.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brody, G. H., Flor, D. L., & Gibson, N. M. (1999). Linking maternal efficacy beliefs, developmental goals, parenting practices, and child competence in rural single-parent African American families. Child Development, 70, 1197–1208.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Calkins, S. D., & Howse, R. (2004). Individual differences in self-regulation: Implications for childhood adjustment. In Philipot, P. & Feldman, R. (Eds.), The regulation of emotion (pp. 307–332). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Calkins, S. D., & Johnson, M. C. (1998). Toddler regulation of distress to frustrating events: Temperamental and maternal correlates. Infant Behavior and Development, 21, 379–395.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campos, J. J., Frankel, C. B., & Camras, L. (2004). On the nature of emotion regulation. Child Development, 75, 377–394.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Caughy, M. O., O'Campo, P. J., Randolph, S. M., & Nickerson, K. (2002). The influence of racial socialization practices on the cognitive and behavioral competence of African American preschooler. Child Development, 73, 1611–1625.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caughy, M. O., Nettles, S. M., O'Campo, P. J., Lohrfink, P. J., & Fraleigh, K. (2006). Neighborhood matters: Racial socialization of African American children. Child Development, 77, 1220–1236.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cheah, C. S. L., & Rubin, K. R. (2004). European American and mainland Chinese mothers' responses to aggression and social withdrawal in preschoolers. Journal of Behavioral Development, 28, 83–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Compas, B. E., Connor-Smith, J. K., Satzman, H., Thomsen, A. H., & Wadsworth, M. E. (2001). Coping with stress during childhood and adolescence: Problems, progress, and potential in theory and research. Psychological Bulletin, 127, 87–127.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Deater-Deckard, K., Dodge, K. A., Bates, J. E., & Pettit, G. S. (1996). Physical discipline among African American and European American mothers: Links to children's externalizing behaviors. Developmental Psychology, 32, 1065–1072.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Denham, S. A., Zoller, D., & Couchoud, E. A. (1994). Socialization of preschoolers' emotion understanding. Developmental Psychology, 30, 928–936.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dodge, K. A. (1989). Coordination responses to aversive stimuli: Introduction to a special section on the development of emotion regulation. Developmental Psychology, 25, 339–342.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eisenberg, N., Cumberland, A., Spinrad, T. L., Fabes, R. A., Shepard, S. A., Reiser, M., et al. (2001). The relations of regulation and emotionality to children's externalizing and internalizing problem behavior. Child Development, 72, 1112–1134.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Eisenberg, N., Fabes, R. A., Nyman, M., Bernzweig, J., & Pinuelas, A. (1994). The relations of emotionality and regulation to children's anger-related reactions. Child Development, 65, 109–128.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Eisenberg, N., Fabes, R. A., Guthrie, I. K., Murphy, B. C., Maszk, P., Holmgren, R., et al. (1996). The relations of regulation and emotionality to problem behavior in elementary school children. Development and Psychopathology, 8, 141–162.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eisenberg, N., Sadovsky, A., Spinrad, T. L., Fabes, R. A., Losoya, S. H., Valiente, C., et al. (2005). The relations of problem behavior status to children's negative emotionality, effortful control, and impulsivity: Concurrent relations and prediction of change. Developmental Psychology, 41, 193–211.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Eisenberg, N., & Spinrad, T. L. (2004). Emotion-related regulation: Sharpening the definition. Child Development, 75, 334–339.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ellenbogen, M. A., & Hodgins, S. (2004). The impact of high neuroticism in parents on children's psychosocial functioning in a population at high risk for major affective disorder: A family–environmental pathway of intergenerational risk. Development and Psychopathology, 16, 113–136.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Evans, G. W. (2004). The environment of childhood poverty. American Psychologist, 59, 77–92.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fox, N. A., & Calkins, S. D. (2003). The development of self-control of emotion: Intrinsic and extrinsic influences. Motivation and Emotion, 27, 7–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frazier, P. A., Barron, K. E., & Tix, A. P. (2004). Testing moderator and mediator effects in counseling psychology research. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 51, 115–134.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garcia, M., Shaw, D. S., Winslow, E. B., & Yaggi, K. (2000). Destructive sibling conflict and the development of conduct problems in young boys. Developmental Psychology, 36, 44–53.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Garcia Coll, C., Lamberty, G., Jenkins, R., McAdoo, H. P., Crnic, K., Wasik, B. H., et al. (1996). An integrative model for the study of developmental competencies in minority children. Child Development, 67, 1891–1914.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garcia-Coll, & Pachter, L. M. (2002). Ethnic and minority parenting. In Bornstein, M. H. (Ed.), Handbook of parenting: Vol 4. Social conditions and applied parenting (2nd ed., pp. 1–20). Mahway, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Gardner, F. E. M. (2000). Methodological issues in the use of observational methods for measuring parent–child interaction. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 3, 85–198.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garner, P. W., & Spears, F. M. (2000). Emotion regulation in low-income preschoolers. Social Development, 9, 246–264.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gilliom, M., Shaw, D. S., Beck, J. E., Schonberg, M. A., & Lukon, J. L. (2002). Anger regulation in disadvantaged preschool boys: Strategies, antecedents, and the development of self-control. Developmental Psychology, 38, 222–235.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Graham, S. (1992). “Most of the subjects were white and middle class”: Trends in published research on African Americans in selected APA journals 1970–1989. American Psychologist, 47, 629–639.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grolnick, W. S., Bridges, L. J., & Connell, J. P. (1996). Emotion regulation in two-year-olds: Strategies and emotional expression in four contexts. Child Development, 67, 928–941.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gunnoe, M. L., & Mariner, C. L. (1997). Toward a developmental–contextual model of the effects of parental spanking on children's aggression. Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 15, 768–775.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hill, S. (1999). African American children: Socialization and development in families. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Houck, G. M., & Lecuyer-Maus, E. A. (2004). Maternal limit setting during toddlerhood, delay of gratification, and behavior problems at age 5. Infant Mental Health Journal, 25, 28–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hughes, D., Rodriguez, J., Smith, E. P., Johnson, D. J., Stevenson, H. C., & Spicer, P. (2006). Parents' ethnic–racial socialization practices: A review of research and directions for future study. Developmental Psychology, 42, 747–770.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Izard, C. E. (1983). Emotions in personality and culture. Ethos, 11, 305–312.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, D. J., Jaeger, E., Randolph, S. M., Cauce, A. M., Ward, J., & Nichd Eccrn, (2003). Studying the effects of early child care experiences on the development of children of color in the United States: Toward a more inclusive research agenda. Child Development, 74, 1227–1244.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Julian, T. W., McKenry, P. C., & McKelvey, M. W. (1994). Cultural variations in parenting: Perceptions of Caucasian, African-American, Hispanic, and Asian-American parents. Family Relations, 43, 30–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaufmann, D., Gester, E., Lucia, C., Salcedo, O., Redina-Gobioff, G., & Gadd, R. (2000). The relationship between parenting style and children's adjustment: The parents' perspective. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 9, 231–245.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelley, M. L., Power, T. G., & Wimbush, D. D. (1992). Determinants of disciplinary practices in low-income black mothers. Child Development, 63, 573–582.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kochanska, G., & Knaack, A. (2003). Effortful control as a personality characteristic of young children: Antecedents, correlates, and consequences. Journal of Personality, 71, 1087–1112.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kopp, C. B. (1989). Commentary: The codevelopments of attention and emotion regulation. Infancy, 3, 199–208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lansford, J. E., Chang, L., Dodge, K. A., Malone, P. S., Oburu, P., Palmerus, K., et al. (2006). Cultural normativeness as a moderator of the link between physical discipline and children's adjustment. Child Development, 76, 1234–1246.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Larzelere, R. E., Martin, J. A., & Amberson, T. G. (1989). The Toddler Behavior Checklist: A parent-completed assessment of social-emotional characteristics of young preschoolers. Family Relations, 38, 416–425.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lesane-Brown, C. L. (2006). A review of race socialization within Black families. Developmental Review, 26, 400–426.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leyendecker, B., Harwood, R. L., Comparini, L., & Yalcinkaya, A. (2005). Socioeconomic status, ethnicity, and parenting. In Luster, T. & Okagaki, L. (Eds.), Parenting: An ecological perspective (2nd ed., pp. 319–341). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
McAdoo, H. P. (2002). African American parenting. In Bornstein, M. H. (Ed.), Handbook of parenting: Vol. 4. Social conditions and applied parenting (2nd ed., pp. 47–58). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
McCarty, C. A., Weisz, J. R., Wanitromanee, K., Eastman, K. L., Suwanlert, S., Chaiyasit, W., et al. (1999). Culture, coping, and context: Primary and secondary control among Thai and American youth. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 40, 809–818.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McHale, S. M., Crouter, A. C., Kim, J., Burton, L. M., Davis, K. D., Dotterer, A. M., et al. (2006). Mothers' and fathers' racial socialization in African American families: Implications for youth. Child Development, 77, 1387–1402.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McLoyd, V. C. (1997). The impact of poverty and low socioeconomic status on the socioemotional functioning of African-American children and adolescents: Mediating effects. In Taylor, R. D. & Wang, M. C. (Eds.), Social and emotional adjustment and family relations in ethnic minority families (pp. 7–34). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
McLoyd, V. C. (1998). Socioeconomic disadvantage and child development. American Psychologist, 53, 185–204.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Middlemiss, W. (2003). Brief report: Poverty, stress and support: Patterns of parenting behavior among lower income Black and lower income White mothers. Infant and Child Development, 12, 293–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miech, R. A., Caspi, A., Moffitt, T. E., Wright, B. R. E., & Silva, P. A. (1999). Low socioeconomic status and mental disorders: A longitudinal study of selection and causation during young adulthood. American Journal of Sociology, 104, 1095–1131.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, W. R., & Rollnick, S. (2002). Motivational interviewing: Preparing people for change. New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
NICHD Early Childhood Research Network. (2004). Does class size in first grade relate to children's academic performance or observed classroom processes? Developmental Psychology, 40, 651–664.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
NICHD Early Childhood Research Network. (2006). Infant–mother attachment classification: Risk and protection in relation to changing maternal caregiving quality. Developmental Psychology, 42, 38–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olson, S. L., Bates, J. E., & Bayles, K. (1989). Predicting long-term developmental outcomes from maternal perceptions of infants and toddler's behavior. Infant Behavior and Development, 12, 77–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ogbu, J. U. (1981). Origins of human competence: A cultural–ecological perspective. Child Development, 52, 413–429.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ogbu, J. U. (1988). Cultural diversity and human development. New Directions for Child Development, 42, 11–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Patterson, G. R. (1982). Coercive family processes (Vol. 3). Eugene, OR: Castalia.Google Scholar
Patterson, O. (1998). Rituals of blood: Consequences of slavery in two American centuries. Washington, DC: Citivtas/Counterpoint.Google Scholar
Pianta, R. C., Smith, N., & Reeve, R. E. (1991). Observing mother and child behavior in a problem solving situation at school entry: Relations with classroom adjustment. School Psychology Quarterly, 6, 1–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Posner, M. I., & Rothbart, M. K. (2000). Developing mechanisms of self-regulation. Development and Psychopathology, 12, 427–441.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raver, C. C. (2004). Placing emotional self-regulation in sociocultural and socioeconomic contexts. Child Development, 75, 346–353.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Raver, C. C., Blackburn, E. K., Bancroft, M., & Torp, N. (1999). Relations between effective emotional self-regulation, attentional control, and low-income preschoolers' social competence with peers. Early Education and Development, 10, 333–349.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ravindran, A. V., Matheson, K., Griffiths, J., Merali, Z., & Anisman, H. (2002). Stress, coping, uplifts, and quality of life in subtypes of depression: A conceptual frame and emerging data. Journal of Affective Disorders, 71, 121–130.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rothbaum, F., Weisz, J., Pott, M., Miyake, K., & Morelli, G. (2000). Attachment and culture: Security in the United States and Japan. American Psychologist, 55, 1093–1104.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rubin, K. H., Coplan, R. J., Fox, N. A., & Calkins, S. (1995). Emotionality, emotion regulation and preschoolers' social adaptation. Development and Psychopathology, 7, 49–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rydell, A. M., Berlin, L., & Bohlin, G. (2003). Emotionality, emotion regulation and adaptation among 5- and 8-year-old children. Emotion, 3, 30–47.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Shaw, D. S., & Bell, R. Q. (1993). Developmental theories of parental contributors to antisocial behavior. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 21, 493–518.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Shaw, D. S., Dishion, T., Supplee, L. H., Gardner, F. E., & Arnds, K. (2006). A family-centered approach to the prevention of early-onset antisocial behavior: Two-year effects of the family check up in early childhood. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 74, 1–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shaw, D. S., Keenan, K., & Vondra, J. I. (1994). Developmental precursors of externalizing behavior: Ages 1 to 3. Developmental Psychology, 30, 355–364.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shaw, D. S., Owens, E. B., Vondra, J. I., Keenan, K., & Winslow, E. B. (1996). Early risk factors and pathways in the development of early disruptive behavior problems. Development and Psychopathology, 8, 679–699.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shaw, D. S., Winslow, E. B., & Flanagan, C. (1999). A prospective study of the effects of marital status and family relations on young children's adjustment among African American and European American families. Child Development, 70, 742–755.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Silk, J. S., Shaw, D. S., Forbes, E. E., Lane, T. J., & Kovacs, M. (2006). Maternal depression and child internalizing: The moderating role of child emotion regulation. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 35, 116–126.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Silk, J. S., Shaw, D. S., Skuban, E., Oland, A., & Kovacs, M. (2006). Emotion regulation strategies in offspring of childhood-onset depressed mothers. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 47, 69–78.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Smith, P. B., & Pederson, D. R. (1988). Maternal sensitivity and patterns of infant–mother attachment. Child Development, 59, 1097–1101.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Snyder, J., Stoolmiller, M., Wilson, M., & Yamamoto, M. (2003). Child anger regulation, parental responses to children's anger displays, and early child antisocial behavior. Social Development, 12, 335–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sprinrad, T. L., Stifter, C., Donelan-McCall, N., & Turner, L. (2004). Mothers' regulation strategies in response to toddlers' affect: Links to later emotion self-regulation. Social Development, 13, 41–54.Google Scholar
Stansbury, K., & Sigman, M. (2000). Responses of preschoolers in two frustrating episodes: Emergence of complex strategies for emotion regulation. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 161, 182–202.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Stansbury, K., & Zimmerman, L. K. (1999). Relations among child language skills, maternal socialization of emotion regulation, and child behavior problems. Child Psychiatry and Human Development, 30, 121–142.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Supplee, L. H., Shaw, D. S., Hailstones, K., & Hartman, K. (2004). Family and child influences on early academic and emotion regulatory behaviors. Journal of School Psychology, 42, 221–242.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, R. A., & Calkins, S. D. (1996). The double-edged sword: Emotional regulation for children at risk. Development and Psychopathology, 8, 163–182.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vaughn, B. E., Kopp, C. B., & Krakow, J. B. (1984). The emergence and consolidation of self-control from eighteen to thirty months of age: Normative trends and individual differences. Child Development, 55, 990–1004.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Whaley, A. (2000). Sociocultural differences in the developmental consequences of the use of physical discipline during childhood for African Americans. Cultural Diversity & Ethnic Minority Psychology, 6, 5–12.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Whiting, B. B. (1996). The effect of social change on concepts of the good child and good mothering: A study of families in Kenya. Ethos, 24, 3–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Witherington, D. C., Campos, J. J., & Hernstein, M. J., (2001). Principles of emotion and its development in infancy. In Fogel, A. & Bremner, G. (Eds.), Handbooks of developmental psychology (pp. 427–464). Malden, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar