We studied potential determinants of the development of children's emotion understanding (EU) from age 4 to 6 in a Norwegian community sample (N = 974) using the Test of Emotion Comprehension. Interpersonal predictors included the accuracy of parental mentalization, parental emotional availability, and teacher-reported child social skills. Intrapersonal child factors were child gender and verbal skills. Overall, children's EU increased significantly over time. After adjusting for child gender, age-4 EU, and parental socio-economic status, greater child verbal and social skills and greater parental mentalization each uniquely predicted growth in EU. Results are discussed in terms of theory and research on children's EU and parents' emotion socialization.
Parents' ability to estimate the level of their child's EC was characterized by a substantial overestimation. The more competent the child, and the more sensitive and structuring the parent was interacting with the child, the more accurate the parent was in the estimation of their child's EC.
Recent increase in children's screen activities has raised concerns that screen time may replace face-to-face interaction, and hence impair children's development of emotion understanding. This longitudinal community study of 960 Norwegian 4-yearolds, followed up at ages 6 and 8, examined bidirectional relations between screen use and emotion understanding. Results revealed that more screen time at age 4 predicted lower levels of emotion understanding at age 6. In addition, television in children's bedroom at age 6 forecasted lower levels of emotion understanding at age 8. The effect of TV watching on emotion understanding was gender moderated, with stronger effects of TV watching observed among girls, but no significant effects detected among boys. In contrast, gaming forecasted lower level of emotion understanding in boys, not girls. Results are discussed in the light of the importance of face-to-face interaction to preserve the development of social-emotional competence among young children.
Statement of contributionWhat is already known on this subject?We know that children's screen activities correlate with poorer social competence and with decrease of the quantity and quality of interaction with parents and siblings. The capacity to understand emotions in others is primarily learned through interaction with primary caregivers, but little is known how children's screen use influences development of emotion understanding.What the present study adds?We found that more TV watching among girls at age 4 predicted lower levels of emotion understanding at age 6. Furthermore, TV in child's bedroom at age 6 forecasted lower levels of emotion understanding at age 8.
Children's depressive symptoms in the transition from preschool to school are rarely investigated. We therefore tested whether children's temperament (effortful control and negative affect), social skills, child psychopathology, environmental stressors (life events), parental accuracy of predicting their child's emotion understanding (parental accuracy), parental emotional availability, and parental depression predict changes in depressive symptoms from preschool to first grade. Parents of a community sample of 995 4-year-olds were interviewed using the Preschool Age Psychiatric Assessment. The children and parents were reassessed when the children started first grade (n = 795). The results showed that DSM-5 defined depressive symptoms increased. Child temperamental negative affect and parental depression predicted increased, whereas social skills predicted decreased, depressive symptoms. However, such social skills were only protective among children with low and medium effortful control. Further, high parental accuracy proved protective among children with low effortful control and high negative affect. Thus, interventions that treat parental depression may be important for young children. Children with low effortful control and high negative affect may especially benefit from having parents who accurately perceive their emotional understanding. Efforts to enhance social skills may prove particularly important for children with low or medium effortful control.
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