Children's appraisal of moderately stressful situations

Abstract

This study investigated 2 questions: (1) do children show consistent styles of appraisal across a range of moderately stressful events?, and (2) what are the adjustment and parenting correlates of individual differences in children's appraisal style? Ninety-nine 3rd though 5th grade children and their mothers participated. For each of 6 vignettes involving moderately stressful situations, children responded to 10 items assessing children's appraisal of these events. Mothers completed a self-report measure of parenting practices and children reported on their psychological adjustment. Participants showed moderate levels of consistency in their appraisal of the events across situations, and 6 appraisal styles were identified that reflected the nature of appraisal aggregated across situations. These styles showed meaningful patterns of association with child psychological symptoms and parenting practices. Children showing the victim appraisal style reported the highest levels of anxiety and school dislike, whereas children showing the inconvenience and take responsibility styles reported the lowest level of conduct problems. Parenting style was associated with the appraisal style of boys but not girls. Specifically, boys of authoritative mothers were more likely than other boys to show the inconvenience and take responsibility appraisal styles and less likely to show the victim style.