Development of Emotion Regulation Dynamics Across Early Childhood: a Multiple Time-Scale Approach

Abstract

Children should become more effective at regulating emotion as they age. Longitudinal evidence of such change, however, is scarce. This study uses a multiple-time scale approach to test the hypothesis that the self-regulation of emotion-the engagement of executive processes to influence the dynamics of prepotent emotional responses-becomes more effective as children move through early childhood. Second-by-second time-series data obtained from behavioral observation of 120 children (46% female) during an 8-min frustration-eliciting wait task completed at four ages (24 months, 36 months, 48 months, 5 years) were modeled using bivariate coupled differential equation models designed to capture age-related changes in the intrinsic dynamics and bidirectional coupling of prepotent and executive processes. Results revealed indirect influences of executive processes on the intrinsic dynamics of children's desire and frustration increased with age but also revealed complex and non-linear age-related changes in how specific aspects of the dynamic interplay between prepotent responses and executive processes influence the effectiveness of regulation at different ages. The findings illustrate the utility of using a dynamics system approach to articulate and study how specific aspects of emotion regulation change with age.

The effect of mothers’ emotion‐related responses to adolescent disclosures and adolescent perspective taking on the timing of future disclosures

“…Finally, although the present study examined temporal contingencies between parental responses and future adolescent disclosures, a study that combines micro‐level and longer timescales is needed to determine whether these patterns change over adolescence (Cole, Lougheed, & Ram, ).…”

Active emotion regulation mediates links between shyness and social adjustment in preschool

“…Emotion regulation strategies are intentional or automatic behaviors that serve to modulate an emotional response (Eisenberg et al, ). Generally, emotion regulation strategies become increasingly intentional (i.e., top‐down) and less reactive (i.e., bottom‐up) as children’s executive functioning develops (Cole, Lougheed, & Ram, ; Feldman, ; Kopp, ). For example, toddlers use more self‐soothing and physical comfort seeking strategies whereas preschoolers use more effortful strategies, such as distraction and problem‐solving (Cole et al, ).…”

Developmental Methods for Emotion Dynamics

“…To examine developmental changes in micro time scale dynamics, multiple burst designs can involve repeating the same behavioral observation tasks at different ages (Cole, Lougheed, & Ram, 2018). Examples include repeated observations of mothers soothing infants during immunizations, a challenging emotional experience (Benson, Ram, & Stifter, 2018;Stifter & Rovine, 2015); young children during laboratory tasks that challenge their self-regulation (Helm, Ram, Cole, & Chow, 2016;Morales et al, 2018); children and parents during structured and unstructured observations (Stoolmiller, 2016;Stoolmiller & Snyder, 2014); and of parents and adolescents during conflict discussions (van der Giessen et al, 2013).…”

“…Dynamical systems approaches (Boker, 2001;Molenaar, 2004;Cole, Lougheed, Chow, & Ram, 2020;Yang, Ram, Lougheed, Molenaar, & Hollenstein, 2019) are also gaining momentum as methods for examining individual emotion dynamics. Statistical approaches using ordinary differential equations are one example, and this method can be used to examine temporal processes such as fluctuations, damping, and amplification of emotions (Boker, 2001).…”