Ivanna K. Guthrie

Dispositional Emotionality and Regulation: Their Role in Predicting Quality of Social Functioning

Individual differences in emotionality and regulation are central to conceptions of temperament and personality. In this article, conceptions of emotionality and regulation and ways in which they predict social functioning are examined. Linear (including additive) and nonlinear effects are reviewed. In addition, data on mediational and moderational relations from a longitudinal study are presented. The effects of attention regulation on social functioning were mediated by resiliency, and this relation was moderated by negative emotionality at the first, but not second, assessment. Negative emotionality moderated the relation of behavior regulation to socially appropriate/prosocial behavior. These results highlight the importance of examining different types of regulation and the ways in which dispositional characteristics interact in predicting social outcomes.

Coping with Stress

Our goals for this chapter are threefold. Our first goal is to consider coping within the larger framework of regulation, thereby broadening our perspective to include work on aspects of regulation that are relevant to an understanding of coping but frequently have not been considered by coping theorists. A second related goal is to present a preliminary heuristic model in which the roles of various modes of regulation in the coping process are considered. Finally, we use our heuristic model as a framework for briefly reviewing the developmental literature concerning factors related to coping and regulation.

Parental Reactions to Children's Negative Emotions: Longitudinal Relations to Quality of Children's Social Functioning

Relations between self-reported parental reactions to childrens negative emotions (PNRs) and childrens socially appropriate/problem behavior and negative emotionality were examined longitudinally. Evidence was consistent with the conclusion that relations between childrens externalizing (but not internalizing) emotion and parental punitive reactions to childrens negative emotions are bidirectional. Reports of PNRs generally were correlated with low quality of social functioning. In structural models, mother-reported problem behavior at ages 10-12 was at least marginally predicted from mother-reported problem behavior, childrens regulation, and parental punitive or distress reactions. Moreover, parental distress and punitive reactions at ages 6-8 predicted reports of childrens regulation at ages 8-10, and regulation predicted parental punitive reactions at ages 10-12. Father reports of problem behavior at ages 10-12 were predicted by earlier problem behavior and parental distress or punitive reactions; some of the relations between regulation and parental reactions were similar to those in the models for mother-reported problem behavior. Parental perceptions of their reactions were substantially correlated over 6 years. Some nonsupportive reactions declined in the early to mid-school years, but all increased into late childhood/early adolescence.

Consistency and Development of Prosocial Dispositions: A Longitudinal Study

The issue of whether there is consistency in prosocial dispositions was examined with a longitudinal data set extending from ages 4 to 5 years into early adulthood (N = 32). Spontaneous prosocial behaviors observed in the preschool classroom predicted actual prosocial behavior, other- and self-reported prosocial behavior, self-reported sympathy, and perspective taking in childhood to early adulthood. Prosocial behaviors that were not expected to reflect an other-orientation (i.e., low cost helping and compliant prosocial behavior) generally did not predict later prosocial behavior or sympathy. Sympathy appeared to partially mediate the relation of early spontaneous sharing to later prosocial dispositions. The results support the view that there are stable individual differences in prosocial responding that have their origins in early childhood.

Regulation, Emotionality, and Preschoolers' Socially Competent Peer Interactions.

In this study, the relations of regulatory control to the qualities of childrens everyday peer interactions were examined. Effortful control (EC) and observations of peer interactions were obtained from 135 preschoolers (77 boys and 58 girls, mean ages = 50.88 and 50.52, respectively). The results generally confirmed the prediction that children who are high in EC were relatively unlikely to experience high levels of negative emotional arousal in response to peer interactions, but this relation held only for moderate to high intense interactions. Socially competent responding was less likely to be observed when the interaction was intense or when negative emotions were elicited. Moreover, when the interactions were of high intensity, highly regulated children were likely to evidence socially competent responses. The relation of EC and intensity to social competence was partially mediated by negative emotional arousal. The results support the conclusion that individual differences in regulation interact with situational factors in influencing young childrens socially competent responding.

Relation of emotion-related regulation to children's social competence: a longitudinal study.

The differential relations of childrens emotion-related regulation (i.e., effortful control and impulsivity) to their personality resiliency, adult-rated popularity, and social competence were examined in children who were 4.5-7.9 years old and who were remeasured 2 years later. Parents and teachers reported on all constructs, and childrens attentional persistence was observed. Structural equation modeling was used to test the mediating role of resiliency on the relations between regulation/control and popularity using two-wave longitudinal data. The results provide some evidence of the mediating role of resiliency in the relations between effortful control and popularity, provide some evidence of bidirectional effects, and also buttress the view that emotional regulation should be differentiated into effortful and reactive forms of control.

The Relations of Effortful Control and Ego Control to Children's Resiliency and Social Functioning.

The relations of effortful control and ego control to childrens (mean age = 137 months) resiliency, social status, and social competence were examined concurrently (Time 3) and over time. Adults reported on the constructs, and a behavioral measure of persistence was obtained. At Time 3, resiliency mediated the unique relations of both effortful and reactive control to social status, and effortful control directly predicted socially appropriate behavior. Negative emotionality moderated the relations of ego and effortful control to socially appropriate behavior. When levels of the variables 2 years prior were accounted for, all relations held at Time 3 except that effortful control did not predict resiliency (even though it was the stronger predictor at Time 3) and ego control directly predicted socially appropriate behavior.

Contemporaneous and Longitudinal Relations of Dispositional Sympathy to Emotionality, Regulation, and Social Functioning

Individual differences in 10-through 12-year-olds’sympathetic tendencies were examined in relation to their regulation, negative emotionality, and social functioning contemporaneously as well as 2, 4, and 6 years earlier. Information was obtained for 33 girls and 31 boys from the school and home context. In general, adults’(teachers and parents) reports of young adolescents’sympathetic tendencies were associated with high regulatory abilities, low negative emotionality, and constructive social behaviors contempora-neously and, to some degree, 2, 4, and 6 years previously. Furthermore, in regression analyses, regulatory abilities during early adolescence as well as 2 years earlier uniquely predicted young adolescents’sympathetic tendencies after controlling for the effects of negative emotionality. Although findings were fairly similar across contexts, the majority of findings at school were for girls, whereas the pattern of findings at home was somewhat more consistent for boys than for girls.