Children’s Responses to Interparental Conflict: A Meta‐Analysis of Their Associations With Child Adjustment

Abstract

A meta-analysis examined the relations between children's adjustment and children's cognitive, affective, behavioral, and physiological responses to interparental conflict. Studies included children between 5 and 19 years of age. Moderate effect sizes were found for the associations between cognitions and internalizing and externalizing behavior problems and self-esteem problems, negative affect and behavioral responses and internalizing behavior problems, and behavioral responses and self-esteem problems. Small to moderate effect sizes were found for the associations between cognitions and relational problems, negative affect and behavioral responses and externalizing behavior problems, and physiological reactions and internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. Effect sizes were, with one exception, larger for internalizing than for externalizing behavior problems. Age significantly moderated the majority of effect sizes.The link between interparental conflict (IPC) and children's behavioral and emotional dysfunction is well established in both intact and divorced families (Amato & Keith, 1991;Buehler et al., 1997;Davies and Cummings, 1994;Emery, 1982;Grych & Fincham, 2001; Ingolsby, Shaw, Owens, & Winslow, 1999). However, not all children who witness IPC display behavior problems (Jouriles, Murphy, & O'Leary, 1989). More recent research efforts have focused on identifying the characteristics of children exposed to IPC, their coping responses to conflict, and contextual factors of IPC that may relate to adjustment problems (e.g., .Ultimately, it is not the conflict itself but rather more proximal processes that must account for the relation between IPC and child behavior problems. Children's responses to IPC are one possible proximal variable. Such responses are indicators of how children process and make meaning of IPC in relation to their own needs, desires, and goals. Of course, children's responses to IPC are not the only variables relevant to the association between IPC and child dysfunction. This meta-analysis focuses on children's responses to conflict because: 1) children's own responses to IPC are most proximal to their own psychosocial and physical adjustment, 2) these responses provide an index of how children interpret and cope with IPC, which should ultimately mediate the relation between IPC and child adjustment, and 3) the literature on children's reactions to IPC is sufficiently large to warrant a systematic, quantitative review and provides an established theoretical background. This meta-analysis focuses on four broad categories of child responses to IPC: cognitions, emotional responses, behavioral responses, and physiological responses. These four categories represent the full spectrum of possible child responses to conflict; when children are exposed to IPC they can think, feel, act, and physiologically respond to the situation. The first three of these Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Kimberly A. Rhoades, Department of Psychology, Stony Brook Uni...

The role of skin conductance level reactivity in the impact of children’s exposure to interparental conflict on their attention performance

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