Mothers’ preparation for bias and responses to children’s distress predict positive adjustment among Black children: an attachment perspective

Dunbar, Angel S.; Lozada, Fantasy T.; Ahn, Lydia HaRim; Leerkes, Esther M.

doi:10.1080/14616734.2021.1976922

Cited by 28 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…For example, more daily hassles have predicted less sensitive parenting only for parents with genetic predispositions toward inefficient dopamine processing ( van IJzendoorn et al, 2008 ). While some studies report elevated authoritarian parenting in Black/African American mothers, especially those in low-SES contexts, other studies have found this parenting to be adaptive in Black/African American samples (whereas it is maladaptive for White European Americans), likely because it is intended to protect the child from dangers of racism, especially those they might face when experiencing externalizing problems in front of authority figures like teachers and police ( Pearl et al, 2012 ; Dunbar et al, 2021 ). Thus, additional research is needed to understand mediators, moderators, and complex dynamics that are likely to causally connect parenting hassles to child externalizing problems and later psychosocial adjustment, both generally and in African American families living in under-resourced urban areas.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Frontal Alpha Asymmetry in Response to Stressor Moderates the Relation Between Parenting Hassles and Child Externalizing Problems

Mulligan

Palopoli²,

Heuvel³

et al. 2022

Front. Neurosci.

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Inequitable urban environments are associated with toxic stress and altered neural social stress processing that threatens the development of self-regulation. Some children in these environments struggle with early onset externalizing problems that are associated with a variety of negative long-term outcomes. While previous research has linked parenting daily hassles to child externalizing problems, the role of frontal alpha asymmetry (FAA) as a potential modifier of this relationship has scarcely been explored. The present study examined mother-child dyads, most of whom were living in low socioeconomic status households in an urban environment and self-identified as members of racial minority groups. Analyses focused on frustration task electroencephalography (EEG) data from 67 children (mean age = 59.0 months, SD = 2.6). Mothers reported the frequency of their daily parenting hassles and their child’s externalizing problems. Frustration task FAA moderated the relationship between parenting daily hassles and child externalizing problems, but resting FAA did not. More specifically, children with left frontal asymmetry had more externalizing problems as their mothers perceived more hassles in their parenting role, but parenting hassles and externalizing problems were not associated among children with right frontal asymmetry. These findings lend support to the motivational direction hypothesis and capability model of FAA. More generally, this study reveals how individual differences in lateralization of cortical activity in response to a stressor may confer differential susceptibility to child behavioral problems with approach motivation (i.e., left frontal asymmetry) predicting externalizing problems under conditions of parental stress.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Frontal Alpha Asymmetry in Response to Stressor Moderates the Relation Between Parenting Hassles and Child Externalizing Problems

Mulligan

Palopoli²,

Heuvel³

et al. 2022

Front. Neurosci.

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show abstract

“…Children, especially around ages 2–3, are highly susceptible to parental emotion-related beliefs and socialization practices as they gain emotional knowledge and regulatory skills (Hastings & De, 2008; Perkins et al, 2022). Among 3- to 4-year-old preschoolers, Black parents may use different emotion socialization strategies in the context of the racism they experience, and these strategies are associated with diverging levels of behavioral problems and self-regulation among their children (Caughy et al, 2004; Dunbar, Lozada, et al, 2022; Hooper et al, 2018). As such influences can begin as early as the preschool age, the present study focuses on the transition into this age, when parents may increase emotion socialization to prepare their children for more public settings and interactions with other people (Dunbar, Lozada, et al, 2022).…”

Section: Racial Adaptations In Emotion Socializationmentioning

confidence: 99%

White and Black parents’ emotion coaching beliefs: Differential associations with preschooler’s behavioral problem tendencies.

Wu¹,

Hooper²

2023

Journal of Family Psychology

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Parents' emotion coaching beliefs, a validated construct in majority White samples emphasizing the value of expressing and teaching about emotion, generally predict positive outcomes among White children. However, a racially and culturally sensitive emotion socialization model suggests a need for further understanding of this construct and potential differential outcomes among different racial groups. This study investigated three-way interactions among parental emotion coaching beliefs, toddlers' baseline respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), and child race (Black or White), in predicting preschoolers' behavioral problem tendencies 1 year later. Participants included 204 children (140 White and 64 Black) and their families, recruited from low-income, rural areas. When children were 2, child baseline RSA was collected, and both parents answered questionnaires concerning their emotion coaching beliefs. When children were 3, mothers answered questions about child behavioral problem tendencies. Path analyses revealed a three-way interaction among paternal emotion coaching beliefs, child baseline RSA, and race, in predicting child internalizing tendencies 1 year later. In particular, among Black children, paternal emotion coaching beliefs showed a double-edged effect. It predicted lower internalizing tendencies when child baseline RSA was low, but higher internalizing tendencies when child baseline RSA was high. These associations were not found among White children. Maternal emotion coaching beliefs predicted lower internalizing tendencies regardless of child race and RSA. Findings were discussed in the context of an expanded emotion socialization model, with significant implications for furthering conceptualization and clinical practices.

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“…This hypothesis construes parents’ suppression of children’s negative emotions as a marker of the preparation for bias dimension of racial socialization (Dunbar, Leerkes, Coard, Supple, & Calkins, 2017 ). Although the hypothesis that concern about racial bias underlies race differences in emotion suppression awaits direct mediational testing, there is some evidence that Black mothers’ suppression of preschoolers’ negative emotions is less likely to predict externalizing behaviors when mothers talk to child about the potential of experiencing racial bias (Dunbar, Lozada, Ahn, & Leerkes, 2021 ; Dunbar, Zeytinoglu, & Leerkes, 2021 ).…”

Section: Emotional Development and Socializationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spotlighting Black Adolescent Development in the Shadow of Racism: A Commentary

McLoyd

2022

J of Research on Adolesc

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The special issue brings together scholarship that expands our understanding of the adverse effects of interpersonal, online, and vicarious racial discrimination on Black adolescents’ psychosocial well‐being and sociocultural factors (e.g., racial socialization and positive racial identity) that mitigate these effects. It also focuses attention on ways that adolescents’ behavior and characteristics shape racial socialization. Some of the critical tasks that lie ahead include elevating a developmental perspective, documenting developmental pathways, directly assessing proximal mediating processes, giving more attention to the robustness and replicability of findings, and expanding levels of analyses and outcomes to include both macro‐structural indicators and indicators of physiological and neuropsychological functioning.

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Mothers’ preparation for bias and responses to children’s distress predict positive adjustment among Black children: an attachment perspective

Cited by 28 publications

References 24 publications

Frontal Alpha Asymmetry in Response to Stressor Moderates the Relation Between Parenting Hassles and Child Externalizing Problems

Frontal Alpha Asymmetry in Response to Stressor Moderates the Relation Between Parenting Hassles and Child Externalizing Problems

White and Black parents’ emotion coaching beliefs: Differential associations with preschooler’s behavioral problem tendencies.

Spotlighting Black Adolescent Development in the Shadow of Racism: A Commentary

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