056: Beyond “You’re OK!”: Modeling Emotion Regulation

I hear a huge crash. It’s my favorite glass vase.  I hear “I didn’t mean to hurt it, Mommy!  It just fell!” as I run full-pelt from the other end of the house. It was a family heirloom passed down by my grandmother.  I’ve asked her not to touch it a hundred times.  I am beyond furious.  “Please don’t be mad, Mommy.  It was an accident.” I clench my teeth.  “I’m not mad.” _______________________________________________________   What does my daughter learn from this exchange?  How does my own emotional regulation affect what she learns about how to regulate her own emotions?  We’ll learn about this in today’s episode. Note that this episode is the second in the ill-fated experimental short episodes – we’ll be back to the regular length hereafter!  In case you missed it, the first episode in this series was Three Reasons Not To Say You’re OK.   Taming Your Triggers If you need help with your own big feelings about your child’s behavior, register for the Taming Your Triggers workshop. We’ll help you to: Understand the real causes of your triggered feelings, and begin to heal the hurts that cause themUse new tools like the ones Katie describes to find ways to meet both her and her children’s needsEffectively repair with your children on the fewer instances when you are still triggered   Click the banner to learn more!     Other episodes mentioned in this show How parenting affects child developmentThe impact of divorce on a child’s developmentHow to scaffold children’s learning to help them succeed   References Bariola, E., Hughes, E.K., & Gullone, E. (2012). Relationships between parent and child emotion regulation strategy use: A brief report. Journal of Child and Family Studies 21(3), 443-448. Butler, E.A., Egloff, B., ,Wilhelm, F.H., Smith, N.C., Erickson, E.A., & Gross, J.J. (2003). The social consequences of expressive suppression. Emotion 3(1), 48-67. Christenfeld, B., Gerin, W., Linden, W., Sanders, M., Mathur, J., Deich, J.D., & Pickering, T.G. (1997). Social support effects on cardiovascular reactivity: Is a stranger as effective as a friend? Psychosomatic Medicine 59, 388-398. Cohen, S., & Wills, T.A. (1985). Stress, social support, and the buffering hypothesis. Psychological Bulletin 98(2), 310-357. Gershoff, E.T., & Grogan-Kaylor, A. (2016). Spanking and child outcomes: Old controversies and new meta-analyses. Journal of Family Psychology 30(4), 453-469. Gottman, J.M., & Levenson, R.W. (1992). Marital processes predictive of later dissolation: Behavior, physiology, and health. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 63(2), 221-233. Gross, J.J., & John, O.P. (2003). Individual differences in two emotion regulation processes: Implications for affect, relationships, and well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 85(2), 348-362. Gunzenhauser, C., Faasche, A., Friedlmeier, W.& von Suchodoletz, A. (2014). Face it or hide it: Parental socialization of reappraisal and response suppression. Frontiers in Psychology 4, 992. Kiel, E.J. & Kalomiris, A.E. (2015). Current themes in understanding children’s emotion regulation as developing from within the parent-child relationship. Current Opinions in Psychology 1(3), 11-16. Kopystynska, O, Paschall, K.W., Barnett, M.A., & Curran, M.A. (2017). Patterns of interparental conflict, parenting, and children’s emotional insecurity: A person-centered approach. Journal of Family Psychology 31(7), 922-932. Krantz, D.S., & Manuck, S.B. (1984). Acute psychophysiologic reactivity and risk of cardiovascular disease: A review and methdologic critique. Psychological Bulletin 93(3), 435-464. Lansbury, J. Unruffled Parenting. Author. Retrieved from http://www.janetlansbury.com/2015/08/respectful-parenting-podcasts-janet-lansbury-unruffled/ Laurenceau, J.P., Barrett, L.F., & Pietromonaco, P.R. (1998). Intimacy as an interpersonal process: The importance of self-disclosure, partner disclosure, and perceived partner responsiveness in interpersonal exchanges. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 75(5), 1238-1251. Meeren H.K.M., van Heijnsbergen, C.C.R.J., & de Gelder, B. (2005). Rapid perceptual integration of facial expression and emotional body language. PNAS 102(45), 16518-16523. Pennebaker, J.W. (1989). Confession, inhibition, and disease. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology 22, 211-244. Rutherford, H.J.V., Wallace, N.S., Laurent, H.K., & Mayes, L.C. (2015). Emotion regulation in parenthood. Developmental Review 36, 1-14. Tiedens, L.Z. (2001). Anger and advancement versus sadness and subjugation: The effect of negative emotion expressions on social status conferral. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 80(1), 86-94. Tromssdorff, G., & Heikamp, T. (2013). Socialization of emotions and emotion regulation in cultural context. In S. Barnow & N. Balkir (Eds.), Cultural variations in psychopathology: From research to practice (pp.67-92). Cambridge, MA: Hoegrefe Publishing. Rime, B., Mesquita, B., Boca, S., & Philippott, P. (1991). Beyond the emotional event: Six studies on the social sharing of emotion. Cognition and Emotion 5(5-6), 435-465. Roomer, L., Williston, S.K., & Rollins, L.G. (2015). Mindfulness and emotion regulation. Current Opinion in Psychology 3, 52-57. Wang, M-T., & Kenny, S. (2015). Longitudinal links between fathers’ and mothers’ harsh verbal discipline and adolescents’ conduct problems and depressive symptoms. Child Development 85(3), 908-923.