Wang Xiaoyue, Xie Ruibo, Jiang Min, He Ting, Ding Wan
Zhejiang Key Laboratory of Intelligent Education Technology and Application, School of Psychology, Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science Laboratory for the Mental Health and Crisis Intervention of Children and Adolescents, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua, Zhejiang, China.
Institute of Developmental Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China.
Fam Process. 2025 Jun;64(2):e70050. doi: 10.1111/famp.70050.
The acquisition of emotional self-regulation is a key developmental goal in mid-childhood. Emotion dysregulation occurs when emotion regulation is ineffective. Emotion lability is a major manifestation of dysfunctional emotion regulation. Although previous literature has explored the influences on children's emotion regulation, previous studies have typically examined parental influences on children independently, ignoring the interdependence of mother, father and child within the family system as a whole and the parent-child gender differences that exist between these. The purpose of this study was to examine whether intergenerational transmission of emotion regulation continues to occur in the context of family members' emotion dysregulation and whether there are parent-child gender differences in this process. The study utilized three-wave data collected at 6-month intervals, with 317 parents of primary school children participating in the full assessment. Results indicated that intergenerational transmission of emotion regulation persists despite family members' emotion dysregulation. Bidirectional associations emerged between maternal emotion dysregulation and child emotion lability, highlighting mothers' central role in emotional transmission within family systems. In contrast, paternal emotion dysregulation showed limited observable expression in family interactions. Sons' emotion lability uniquely predicted paternal emotion dysregulation and mediated the maternal-paternal dysregulation link. Critically, parents' capacity to serve as effective emotional regulators for children depended on their active self-regulation. These findings necessitate emotion-focused family interventions that simultaneously target parental self-regulation and child outcomes, while integrating gender-specific strategies rather than relying solely on child-directed emotion control programs.
获得情绪自我调节能力是童年中期一个关键的发展目标。当情绪调节无效时，就会出现情绪调节障碍。情绪易变性是功能失调的情绪调节的主要表现。尽管以往的文献探讨了对儿童情绪调节的影响，但以往的研究通常是独立考察父母对儿童的影响，而忽略了整个家庭系统中母亲、父亲和孩子之间的相互依存关系以及其中存在的亲子性别差异。本研究的目的是检验在家庭成员情绪调节障碍的背景下，情绪调节的代际传递是否继续存在，以及在这个过程中是否存在亲子性别差异。该研究使用了每隔6个月收集一次的三波数据，317名小学生的家长参与了全面评估。结果表明，尽管家庭成员存在情绪调节障碍，但情绪调节的代际传递依然存在。母亲的情绪调节障碍与孩子的情绪易变性之间出现了双向关联，突出了母亲在家庭系统内情绪传递中的核心作用。相比之下，父亲的情绪调节障碍在家庭互动中表现出的可观察到的影响有限。儿子的情绪易变性独特地预测了父亲的情绪调节障碍，并介导了母亲与父亲的调节障碍之间的联系。至关重要的是，父母作为孩子有效情绪调节者的能力取决于他们积极的自我调节。这些发现需要以情绪为重点的家庭干预措施，同时针对父母的自我调节和孩子的结果，同时整合针对性别的策略，而不是仅仅依赖于针对孩子的情绪控制项目。
