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Panel information
Panel 23. Social, Emotional, Personality

Abstract

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Introduction. Emotion regulation refers to individuals’ control of their emotions, including the types of emotions experienced, when they are experienced, and how they are expressed (Gross, 1998). Parents’ displays of emotional regulation and responses to their child's emotions have been shown to influence emotion regulation outcomes in the child (Seddon et al., 2024; Wang et al., 2024). Conflict may be an important context for this development, as low levels of family conflict have been shown to promote greater emotional expression and increased use of regulation strategies (Lin et al., 2024). As such, the present study hypothesized that (1) parental use of negative conflict resolution strategies would predict increased emotion regulation difficulties for adolescents, (2) parental use of positive conflict resolution strategies would predict decreased emotion regulation difficulties for adolescents, and (3) associations in (1) and (2) would be mediated by adolescents’ level of emotional expressivity.

Method. Data were collected from a sample of 184 ethnically and socioeconomically diverse participants (86 males, 98 females; 58% Caucasian, 29% African American, 13% mixed or other; median income in 1999 = $40,000-59,999). The current study interviewed participants when they were ages 16, 22, and 28. Participants were assessed at 16 with a self-report questionnaire regarding their parents’ use of conflict resolution tactics. At 22, participants were assessed for emotional expressivity via self-report questionnaire including measures of positive expressivity, negative expressivity, and emotional impulse strength. At 28, participants completed a questionnaire regarding their emotion regulation abilities.

Results and Discussion. Regression analyses controlling for income and gender revealed that fathers’ use of psychological aggression when participants were 16 was a significant negative predictor of positive expressivity (β = -.19, p < .05) and impulse strength (β = -.19, p < .05) at age 22. Fathers’ use of physical aggression when participants were 16 was a significant predictor of impulse control difficulties (β = .24, p < .01), lack of emotional awareness (β = .25, p < .01), lack of emotional clarity (β = .20, p < .05), and total emotion regulation difficulty (β = .20, p < .05) at age 28. Father’s use of positive relatedness when participants were 16 was a significant negative predictor of impulse strength (β = -.20, p < .01) at age 22. Fathers’ use of positive autonomy was not related to any subscales of emotional expressiveness or difficulty with emotion regulation.

Interestingly, none of mothers’ conflict tactics were related to any subscales of emotional expressiveness or difficulty with emotion regulation. Analyses also investigated the possibility of mediation effects, such that the relationships between fathers’ conflict tactics and adolescents’ later emotion regulation difficulties were mediated by adolescents’ emotional expressivity. However, no such effects were found.

Results indicate that fathers’ conflict resolution behaviors may be more influential than mothers’, and that the impact of fathers’ conflict tactics on emotion regulation abilities does not seem to be a function of adolescents’ emotional expressiveness. Findings will be discussed in terms of differential experiences for adolescents with their mothers versus their fathers within the contexts of parent-child conflict and sharing of emotions.

Author information

Author	Role
Jaclyn Snyder, James Madison University	Presenting author
Nisa M. Khaldun, James Madison University	Non-presenting author
Cameron M. Piper, James Madison University	Non-presenting author
David E. Szwedo, James Madison University	Non-presenting author
Joseph P. Allen, University of Virginia	Non-presenting author

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