Robert N. Emde

Maternal emotional signaling: Its effect on the visual cliff behavior of 1-year-olds.

Facial expressions of emotion are not merely responses indicative of internal states, they are also stimulus patterns that regulate the behavior of others. A series of four studies indicate that, by 12 months of age, human infants seek out and use such facial expressions to disambiguate situations. The deep side of a visual cliff was adjusted to a height that produced no clear avoidance and much referencing of the mother. If a mother posed joy or interest while her infant referenced, most infants crossed the deep side. If a mother posed fear or anger, very few infants crossed. If a mother posed sadness, an intermediate number crossed. These findings are not interpretable as a discrepancy reaction to an odd pose: in the absence of any depth whatsoever, few infants referenced the mother and those who did while the mother was posing fear hesitated but crossed nonetheless. The latter finding suggests that facial expressions regulate behavior most clearly in contexts of uncertainty.

EMOTIONS AS BEHAVIOR REGULATORS: SOCIAL REFERENCING IN INFANCY

This chapter deals with three broad issues: Whether emotions are epiphenomenal, how emotions play a crucial role in determining appraisal processes, and what the mechanisms are by which emotions may influence interpersonal behavior. We present evidence from studies indicating that emotions play a crucial role in the regulation of social behavior. Social regulation by emotion is particularly clear in a process we call social referencing—the active search by a person for emotional information from another person, and the subsequent use of that emotion to help appraise an uncertain situation. Social referencing has its roots in infancy, and we propose that it develops through a four-level sequence of capacities to process emotional information from facial expression. We discuss whether the social regulatory functions of emotion are innate or socially learned, whether feeling plays an important role in mediating the effects of emotional expressions of one person on the behavior of another, and whether stimulus context is important in accounting for differences in reaction to the same emotional information.

Temperament, Emotion, and Cognition at Fourteen Months: The MacArthur Longitudinal Twin Study

200 pairs of twins were assessed at 14 months of age in the laboratory and home. Measures were obtained of temperament, emotion, and cognition/language. Comparisons between identical and fraternal twin correlations suggest that individual differences are due in part to heritable influences. For temperament, genetic influence was significant for behavioral observations of inhibition to the unfamiliar, tester ratings of activity, and parental ratings of temperament. For emotion, significant genetic influence was found for empathy and parental ratings of negative emotion. The estimate of heritability for parental report of expression of negative emotions was relatively high, whereas that for expression of positive emotions was low, a finding consistent with previous research. For cognition and language, genetic influence was significant for behavioral indices of spatial memory, categorization, and word comprehension. Shared rearing environment appears influential for parental reports of language and for positive emotions, but not for other measures of emotion or for temperament.

Representations of self and other in the narratives of neglected, physically abused, and sexually abused preschoolers

The MacArthur Story Stem Battery was used to examine maternal and self-representations in neglected, physically abused, sexually abused, and nonmaltreated comparison preschool children. The narratives of maltreated children contained more negative maternal representations and more negative self-representations than did the narratives of nonmaltreated children. Maltreated children also were more controlling with and less responsive to the examiner. In examining the differential impact of maltreatment subtype differences on maternal and self-representations, physically abused children evidenced the most negative maternal representations; they also had more negative self-representations than nonmaltreated children. Sexually abused children manifested more positive self-representations than neglected children. Despite these differences in the nature of maternal and self-representations, physically and sexually abused children both were more controlling and less responsive to the examiner. The investigation adds to the corpus of knowledge regarding disturbances in the self-system functioning of maltreated children and provides support for relations between representational models of self and other and the self-organizing function that these models exert on childrens lives.

Emotion regulation in mother-child narrative co-construction : Associations with children's narratives and adaptation

The associations were studied between early mother-child co-construction of a separation-reunion narrative and childrens concurrent and later (a) emotion narratives and (b) behavior problems. Fifty-one children and their mothers were observed during a co-construction task when the children were age 4 1/2. At ages 4 1/2 and 5 1/2, childrens narratives were elicited using the MacArthur Story-Stem Battery (MSSB), and mothers completed the Child Behavior Checklist. Results showed that children who were more emotionally coherent during the co-constructions had MSSB narratives that were more coherent, had more prosocial themes, and had fewer aggressive themes at ages 4 1/2 and 5 1/2. Moreover, such children had fewer behavior problems at both ages. The relations between narrative processes and emotion regulation are discussed.

Facial patterning and infant emotional expression: happiness, surprise, and fear.

Although recent studies have convincingly demonstrated that emotional expressions can be judged reliably from actor-posed facial displays, there exists little evidence that facial expressions in lifelike settings are similar to actor-posed displays, are reliable across situations designed to elicit the same emotion, or provide sufficient information to mediate consistent emotion judgments by raters. The present study therefore investigated these issues as they related to the emotions of happiness, surprise, and fear. 27 infants between 10 and 12 months of age (when emotion masking is not likely to confound results) were tested in 2 situations designed to elicit hapiness (peek-a-boo game and a collapsing toy), 2 to elicit surprise (a toy-switch and a vanishing-object task), and 2 to elicit fear (the visual cliff and the approach of a stranger. Dependent variables included changes in 28 facial response components taken from previous work using actor poses, as well as judgments of the presence of 6 discrete emotions. In addition, instrumental behaviors were used to verify with other than facial expression responses whether the predicted emotion was elicited. In contrast to previous conclusions on the subject, we found that judges were able to make all facial expression judgments reliably, even in the absence of contextual information. Support was also obtained for at least some degree of specificity of facial component response patterns, especially for happiness and surprise. Emotion judgments by raters were found to be a function of the presence of discrete facial components predicted to be linked to those emotions. Finally, almost all situations elicited blends, rather than discrete emotions.

Effect of Maltreatment on Preschoolers' Narrative Representations of Responses to Relieve Distress and of Role Reversal.

A total of 80 low-socioeconomic status maltreated preschoolers were contrasted with 27 nonmaltreated preschoolers on their narrative representations. The children completed story stems, taken from the MacArthur Story-Stem Battery (MSSB; I. Bretherton, D. Oppenheim, H. Buchsbaum, R. N. Emde, & the MacArthur Narrative Group, 1990), that introduced stressful family situations. Using the MacArthur narrative coding manual (J. Robinson, L. Mantz-Simmons, J. Macfie, & the MacArthur Narrative Group, 1992), coders rated portrayals of parental and child character responses, as well as participant responses, to relieve childrens distress. They also rated role reversal (children caretaking their parents) from the narrative emotion coding manual (S. L. Warren, L. Mantz-Simmons, & R. N. Emde, 1993). Maltreated preschoolers portrayed parents and children as responding less often--yet themselves as stepping into the story more often to relieve childrens distress--than did nonmaltreated preschoolers. Abused children (sexually, physically, or both) portrayed the most participant responses, and neglected children (with no abuse) portrayed the fewest child responses. Role reversal was associated with physical abuse.

Can Emotions and Themes in Children's Play Predict Behavior Problems?

OBJECTIVE To empirically test whether systematic examination of emotions and themes in childrens play can provide useful information about childhood problems. METHOD Using the MacArthur Story-Stem Battery and coding system, distress and destructive themes (aggression, personal injury, and atypical negative responses) were coded from the play of 51 children at ages 3, 4, and 5 years, in a low-risk, nonclinical volunteer sample. To measure behavior problems, both parents completed the Child Behavior Checklist at all ages, and teachers completed the Teachers Report Form when the children reached 5 years of age. RESULTS Both distress and destructive themes in the play of 4- and 5-year-olds were found to correlate with externalizing behavior problems as rated by parents and teachers. CONCLUSIONS Children who display more distress during play at 4 and 5 years of age and who demonstrate destructive themes at 4 and 5 years of age appear to have more externalizing behavior problems, as rated by their parents and teachers. These results provide empirical support for the use of play as an assessment tool in young children. The findings suggest approaches to and limitations of play interpretation.

The use of a narrative story stem technique with maltreated children: Implications for theory and practice

Maltreatment can impact the earliest stages of development during which time patterns of emotion regulation and attachment begin to be established (Carlson, Cicchetti, Barnett, & Braunwald, 1989b; Cicchetti, Ganiban, & Barnett, 1991). These disruptive patterns are problematic for early moral development and are likely to play a role in the development of conduct disorders (Aber & Cicchetti, 1984). Thus, maltreated children are clearly in a high-risk situation. To examine emotion regulation, internal representations of relationships, and early moral development, the use of a play narrative story stem technique (Bretherton, Ridgeway, & Cassidy, 1990; Buchsbaum & Emde, 1990) with maltreated children and a nonmaltreated disadvantaged comparison group of children is described. Representative case examples from each group are used to illustrate the effectiveness of this technique for eliciting themes about family relationships, conflicts, and their resolution or lack thereof as well as defenses and coping styles. The potential usefulness of this paradigm for clinical assessment and intervention are discussed.

Mobilizing Fundamental Modes of Development: Empathic Availability and Therapeutic Action

A positive developmental thrust becomes mobilized by virtue of therapeutic action. This thrust is specified in terms of a set of fundamental modes of development that are biologically prepared and have been identified through recent research. The modes are first apparent in infancy and continue throughout life. The setting conditions which allow for the fundamental modes of development to be reactivated are provided by the therapeutic relationship. It is hypothesized that the empathic availability of the therapist enables these modes to operate as powerful background influences. Developmental aspects of empathy and of availability highlight the importance of adult regulatory functions and the construction of shared meaning.