An emotional security hypothesis that builds on attachment theory is proposed to account for recent empirical findings on the impact of marital conflict on children and to provide directions for future research. Children's concerns about emotional security play a role in their regulation of emotional arousal and organization and in their motivation to respond in the face of marital conflict. Over time these response processes and internalized representations of parental relations that develop have implications for children's long-term adjustment. Emotional security is seen as a product of past experiences with marital conflict and as a primary influence on future responding. The impact and interaction of other experiential histories within the family that affect children's emotional security are also examined, with a focus on parent-child relations.

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Understanding of the impact of marital conflict on children as a function of time-related processes remains a gap in a process-oriented conceptualization of effects. Based on this review, a revised model for a process-oriented approach on the effects of marital discord on children is proposed and suggestions are made for future research directions.

Marital problems may be especially reactive to parental depressive symptomatology, so that mediational processes affecting child functioning become evident even in family contexts of relatively low risk.

Emotional security is a central concept in many accounts of normal development and the development of psychopathology. However, the construct has rarely been subject to precise explication, and the conceptualization of emotional security as deriving from qualities of family functioning as a whole requires development. Emotional security as a regulatory system is defined and related to current approaches to emotions as regulatory processes. Although our model is built upon attachment theory, the emphasis is shifted from the evolutionary/ethological origins of attachment theory to the regulation of emotional well being and security as a goal in itself. Emotional security is conceptualized from a contextualistic perspective, emphasizing the interplay between sodoemotional and biological processes. Felt-security as a goal is defined from an organizational perspective, reflecting the entire pattern of the individual's reactions to events in relation to emotional security as a goal, as opposed to simply those reactions that are "conscious" or reported as "feelings." Component regulatory systems are specified (e.g., processes of emotion regulation, regulation of exposure to family affect), with illustrations centering on the impact of marital and parentchild relations on children's security. Mark. Cummings, Department of Psychology, Oglebay . ° ' J Hail, west Virginia University, Morgamown, wv also advance its cogency as an explanatory 26506-6040. construct for the study of normal develop-123 124 E. M. Cummings and P. Davies

Relations among maternal depressive symptoms, family discord, and adolescent psychological adjustment were examined in a sample of 443 middle adolescents and their mothers. Histories of maternal depressive symptoms, gathered at 3 occasions with 6-month intervals, were related to subsequent adolescent reports of depressive symptoms, conduct problems, and academic difficulties for girls but not for boys. Mediational tests indicated that girls' greater vulnerability to family discord (e.g., marital discord, low family intimacy, parenting impairments) accounted for the impact of maternal depressive symptoms on their social and emotional adjustment. Analyses suggest that family discord is a strong mediator in the development of girls' conduct disturbances and a modest mediator of girls' depressive symptoms. Results are discussed within a framework that integrates interpersonal models of parental depressive symptoms with the gender intensification hypothesis.

Advancing the process-oriented study of links between interparental discord and child adjustment, 2 multimethod prospective tests of emotional security as an explanatory mechanism are reported. On the basis of community samples, with waves spaced 2 years apart, Study 1 (113 boys and 113 girls, ages 9-18) identified emotional security as a mediator in a 2-wave test, whereas Study 2 (105 boys and 127 girls, ages 5-7) indicated emotional security as an intervening mechanism in a 3-wave test. Relations between discord and emotional security increased as children moved into adolescence in Study 1. Emotional security was identified as an explanatory mechanism for both internalizing and externalizing problems in children.

Guided by the emotional security hypothesis, this study reports on the development of a new self-report measure that assesses children's strategies for preserving emotional security in the context of interparental conflict. Participants were 924 sixth, seventh, and eighth graders and a subset of their mothers, fathers, and teachers. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses of the Security in the Interparental Subsystem (SIS) Scale supported a seven-factor solution, corresponding well to the three component processes (i.e., emotional reactivity, regulation of exposure to parent affect, and internal representations) outlined in the emotional security hypothesis. The SIS subscales demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency and test-retest reliability. Support for the validity of the SIS Scale is evidenced by its significant links with parent reports of children's overt reactivity to conflict, children's responses to interparental conflict simulations 6 months later, and children's psychological maladjustment and experiential histories with interparental conflict across multiple informants (i.e., child, mother, father, and teacher). Results are discussed in the context of developing recommendations for use of the SIS and advancing the emotional security hypothesis.