ORCID ID

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1463-2637

Date Awarded

2020

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (M.Sc.)

Department

Psychology

Advisor

Janice L Zeman

Committee Member

Danielle H Dallaire

Committee Member

Joanna Schug

Abstract

Parental and peer emotion socialization as well as adolescent emotion regulation are significant predictors of adolescent psychopathology (Gaertner et al., 2010; Shortt et al., 2016). When a parent is unsupportive of their youth's emotional displays, the adolescent is at greater risk for internalizing disorders (Shewark & Blandon, 2015). During adolescence, friends are also socializers of youth's emotions and those peers who respond in validating ways may buffer against the development of internalizing disorders (Bowker & Rubin, 2009). Research analyzing these constructs has relied almost exclusively on one form of measurement (e.g., McKee et al., 2018) and often emotion regulation has been assessed as general negative affect (e.g., Silk et al., 2003). To fill these gaps in the literature, the present study examines negative parent emotion socialization's effect on adolescent internalizing symptoms as mediated by emotion regulation and moderated by friend emotion socialization. Guided by the functionalist theory of emotion (Barrett & Campos, 1987), we examined emotion regulation by emotion type (sadness/worry and anger) and used multiple methods and reporters. The present study sought to replicate and expand previous literature by constructing a conditional indirect effects model with latent variables and assessing discrete negative emotions. Gender effects were also examined. Participants were 132 adolescents (Mage = 16.30, 53.0% girls, 80.3% White, middle-class) and their parents (87.1% mothers). Youth completed the Multidimensional Anxiety Scale for Children (March, 1997), the Child Depression Inventory (Kovacs, 1992), the Children's Sadness, Worry and Anger Management Scales (Zeman et al., 2001), and the You and Your Friends Questionnaire (Klimes-Dougan et al., 2014; evaluated peer emotion socialization). Parents completed the Child Behavior Checklist (Achenbach, 1991). Parent-adolescent dyads engaged in an interaction task involving discussions about specific events with the adolescent's best friend. These video-taped interactions were coded for different aspects of parental emotion socialization.

DOI

http://dx.doi.org/10.21220/s2-z25v-d037

Rights

© The Author

Included in

Psychology Commons

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