The developmental costs and benefits of children’s involvement in interparental conflict.

Abstract

Building on empirical documentation of children’s involvement in interparental conflicts as a weak predictor of psychopathology, we tested the hypothesis that involvement in conflict more consistently serves as a moderator of associations between children’s emotional reactivity to interparental conflict and their psychological problems. In Study 1, 263 early adolescents (M age = 12.62 years), mothers, and fathers completed surveys of family and child functioning at two measurement occasions spaced two years apart. In Study 2, 243 preschool children (M age = 4.60 years) participated in a multi-method (i.e., observations, structured interview, surveys) measurement battery to assess family functioning, children’s reactivity to interparental conflict, and their psychological adjustment. Across both studies, latent difference score (LDS) analyses revealed that involvement moderated associations between emotional reactivity and children’s increases in psychological (i.e., internalizing and externalizing) problems. Children’s emotional reactivity to interparental conflict was a significantly stronger predictor of their psychological maladjustment when they were highly involved in the conflicts. In addition, the developmental benefits and costs of involvement varied as a function of emotional reactivity. Involvement in interparental conflict predicted increases in psychological problems for children experiencing high emotional reactivity and decreases in psychological problems when they exhibited low emotional reactivity. We interpret the results in the context of the new formulation of emotional security theory (e.g. Davies & Martin, 2013) and family systems models of children’s parentification (e.g., Byng-Hall, 2002).

Enduring Effects of Infant Emotional Security on Preschooler Adaptation to Interparental Conflict

“…Furthermore, infants' distress levels were later heightened when exposed to higher levels of destructive marital conflict. Their findings are congruent with sensitization, which suggests that differences in children's responses to conflict, particularly destructive, lead to different capabilities in the child's emotional regulation and the child's response to conflict [23,24]. As for regulation of exposure to conflict, although infants and toddlers may not directly interject themselves into the conflict, avoidance and withdrawal as well as ameliorating behaviors, such as self-soothing or gaze aversion, were observed [22].…”

Family cohesion and enmeshment moderate associations between maternal relationship instability and children’s externalizing problems.

“…The potentiating effect may assume two primary forms within moderator models of developmental psychopathology (Davies, Coe, Martin, Sturge-Apple, & Cummings, 2015; Luthar et al, 2000). On the one hand, the vulnerable-reactive form of risk (see Figure 1c) proposes that high enmeshment amplifies the risk of maternal relationship instability.…”

Characteristics of Childhood Parentification and Its Effects on the Individual

“…Evlilik çatışmasının, diğer bir deyişle anne-baba arasındaki çatışmaların, çocuklardaki ebeveynleşme ile ilişkili olduğu bilinmektedir (Davies, Coe, Martin, Sturge-Apple ve Cummings, 2015;Macfie, Houts, Pressel ve Cox, 2008;Peris, 2006). Bu ailelerdeki çocukların ebeveynleşme davranışları farklı şekillerde ortaya çıkabilir.…”