Attachment, Parental Meta-Emotion, and Emotion Regulation in Adoptive Mother–Child Dyads

Abstract

Adopted children are at risk for a number of unfavorable environmental factors and thus have an increased likelihood of developing social, emotional, cognitive, and attachment issues that can stunt the child’s ability to build intimate relationships and regulate emotion. These potential issues may make it difficult for adoptive parents to emotionally connect with their adopted child. Through the theories of parental meta-emotion philosophy (PMEP) and attachment, the researchers explored how adoptive mothers’ level of emotion coaching (the ideal PMEP) and their attachment impacted the adoptive child’s ability to emotionally regulate. Findings indicated that emotion coaching is an effective method of aiding adopted children’s ability to emotionally regulate. The researchers also found that adoptive mothers struggling with attachment may still be able to learn emotion coaching and positively impact her adopted child’s emotion regulation development.