Carreras Justin, Carter Alice S, Heberle Amy, Forbes Danielle, Gray Sarah A O
Department of Psychology, Tulane University, 6400 Freret Street, New Orleans, LA, 70118.
University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, MA.
J Child Fam Stud. 2019;28(11):2953-2962. doi: 10.1007/s10826-019-01471-z. Epub 2019 Jun 5.
Sensitive parenting requires modulation of emotions in order to effectively organize and orient behavioral responses. There is considerable evidence that psychological distress can impair sensitive parenting practices, and also that psychological distress is associated with deficits in emotion regulation capacities. The negative effect that psychological distress has on parents' emotion regulation capacities may be a mechanistic pathway through which psychological distress impacts parenting, as dysregulated emotions may be more proximal to parenting behaviors than distress itself; however, this specific link between psychological distress, emotion regulation, and parenting is not often examined in parenting models.
The current study tested these relations in a high sociodemographic risk community-sample, oversampled for violence exposure, of caregivers of preschoolers. Caregivers self-reported on their psychological distress and emotion regulation difficulties. Parent sensitivity was assessed via observations of parent-child interactions.
Results indicated that difficulties in emotion regulation were a mediator for the relation between parents' psychological distress and sensitive parenting behaviors. Difficulties in emotion regulation predicted decreased sensitivity above and beyond the effect of psychological distress.
These findings emphasize the importance of regulation of emotional reactions in order to orient and engage in sensitive parenting behaviors. Additionally, they suggest clinically that supporting parents' emotion regulation capacities specifically may promote more sensitive parenting in contexts of parental psychological distress.
敏感型养育需要调节情绪，以便有效地组织和引导行为反应。有大量证据表明，心理困扰会损害敏感型养育方式，而且心理困扰与情绪调节能力的缺陷有关。心理困扰对父母情绪调节能力产生的负面影响可能是心理困扰影响养育方式的一种机制途径，因为情绪失调可能比困扰本身更直接地影响养育行为；然而，在养育模型中，心理困扰、情绪调节和养育方式之间的这种特定联系并不常被研究。
本研究在一个社会人口统计学风险较高的社区样本中测试了这些关系，该样本对遭受暴力的学龄前儿童照料者进行了过度抽样。照料者自我报告他们的心理困扰和情绪调节困难。通过观察亲子互动来评估父母的敏感性。
结果表明，情绪调节困难是父母心理困扰与敏感型养育行为之间关系的一个中介因素。情绪调节困难预示着敏感性的降低，这超出了心理困扰的影响。
这些发现强调了调节情绪反应对于引导和参与敏感型养育行为的重要性。此外，它们在临床上表明，专门支持父母的情绪调节能力可能会在父母心理困扰的情况下促进更敏感的养育方式。
