Abstract
Objectives: Adults with a history of childhood maltreatment report problems with emotion regulation (ER) and parenting, which can contribute to maladaptive outcomes in offspring. The following narrative review consists of a theoretical and empirical synthesis of the literature examining child maltreatment, emotion regulation, and parenting, with an emphasis on parental emotion socialization. Method: Building upon the literature contained in the review, we developed a novel conceptual model that elucidates some of the mechanisms involved in the intergenerational transmission of emotion dysregulation among mothers with a history of childhood maltreatment. Taking into account risk and protective factors (e.g., socio-economic status, polyvictimization, teenage motherhood, access to social supports), our conceptual model highlights both direct (e.g., social learning) and indirect (e.g., ER difficulties) mechanisms through which child maltreatment contributes to problems with parental emotion socialization and ER difficulties in the next generation. Implications: Directions for future research and implications for intervention will be discussed with an emphasis on preventing the continuity of maladaptive parenting by promoting the development of parents’ ER abilities in a trauma-informed, resilience-focused framework.
Highlights
Child maltreatment is defined as any act of commission or omission by a parent or caregiver that results in harm, potential for harm, or threat of harm to a child under the age of 18
Reports of childhood physical (26%) and sexual (8%) abuse are prevalent among Canadian adults, 93% of those surveyed indicated that they did not report the abuse to police or child protective services before age 15 and the majority (67%) indicated that they never reported the abuse to anyone (Burczycka, 2017)
A conceptual model of the intergenerational transmission of emotion dysregulation in mothers with a history of childhood maltreatment women who become teenage mothers may experience more environmental and developmental stressors that make it challenging to regulate their emotions, which in turn, could compromise their ability to engage in sensitive parenting
Summary
Child maltreatment is defined as any act of commission or omission by a parent or caregiver that results in harm, potential for harm, or threat of harm to a child under the age of 18. A conceptual model of the intergenerational transmission of emotion dysregulation in mothers with a history of childhood maltreatment women who become teenage mothers may experience more environmental and developmental stressors that make it challenging to regulate their emotions, which in turn, could compromise their ability to engage in sensitive parenting In support of this notion, McCullough and colleagues (2015) found that mothers who reported a history of emotional maltreatment in childhood were at an increased risk for engaging in unsupportive parenting behaviours, when they were younger at childbirth (i.e., average age of childbirth = 17.5) and had moderate to high levels of emotion dysregulation. Despite increasing recognition of the detrimental effects of exposure to IPV in childhood (e.g., Roustit et al, 2009), this subtype of maltreatment was not included in the present review because it is not perpetrated against the child per se
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