The influence of parent perceived stress on the relation between co-regulation strategies and infant emotion regulation skills

Abstract

A positive parent-child relationship plays a key role in early emotion development. Part of the parent-child relationship is the process of co-regulation, which is an essential for infant emotion regulation development. Existing research indicates that parents’ stress has a negative influence on co-regulation and therefore is suggested to have a negative influence on the early development of emotion regulation as well. In this study, it is examined if there is an association between co-regulation strategies and infant emotion regulation and if this relation is moderated by the level of parent perceived stress. A sample of 225 infants and their parents was studied. Parent report questionnaires were used to examine parent perceived stress, infant emotion regulation and co-regulation. Six co-regulation strategies were analysed separately. Ignoring the child is negatively correlated with emotion regulation skills. This can be explained by age dependent effects of co-regulation strategies. Expressing the emotions of the child is positively correlated with emotion regulation skills, which is in line with existing literature and the concept of mind-mindedness. Parent perceived stress moderates the relation between using calm voice and emotion regulation skills as well as the relation between distracting and emotion regulation skills. Recommendations for clinical practice are to teach parents to perform less ignoring and more articulation of emotions for two-year old children. Future research must include more lower educated parents and more fathers. Also, longitudinal design is recommended to further study the age specific effects of active versus passive co-regulation strategies.