Parental socialization of emotion: How mothers respond to their children's emotions in Turkey

Abstract

Several research studies suggest a link between par ents’ emotion socialization and children’s social competence and behavior problems. Parents contribute to their children’s emotion socialization, more directly, th rough responses to their children’s emotions. Early emotion socialization experiences w ith parents establish patterns of emotion experience, expression, and regulation that children carry into their broader social circles. Few scales exist to document parent s’ responses to children’s emotions. The aim of this study was to document mothers’ responses to their children’s sadness, anger, fear, and being overjoyed. A study sample of 868 mothers of preschoolers completed the questionnaire in Turkey. The validity and reliability properties of the Responses to Children’s Emotions (RCE) Questionnaire were also examined. We found that mothers in Turkey preferred to respond differe ntly to children’s different emotions. Mothers’ responses generally did not differ accordi ng to the gender of their children; the only difference was found for sadness. Mothers’ res ponses to their children’s emotions related to the children’s and mothers’ ages, monthl y family income, levels of mothers’ education, mothers’ employment status, birth order of children, and the city they lived in. This study is important in that it is the first to document mothers’ emotion socialization strategies for their children in term s of one positive and three negative emotions.