Parents' Beliefs about Emotions and Children's Self-Construals in African American, European American, and Lumbee American Indian Families

Abstract

The authors investigated interrelations among parents' emotion-related beliefs and discourse and children's independent and interdependent self-construals within three ethnic groups in the United States. One hundred and thirteen nine to 10-year-old African American (AA), European American (EA), and Lumbee American Indian (LA) parent–child dyads participated. Parents self-reported beliefs about the value and danger of emotions. Dyads played a game involving discussion of family memories. Conversations were coded for emotion-related terms and for language use related to independence/interdependence. Children's self-descriptions were coded for independence and interdependence. A strength of the study was the use of both between-group and within-group analyses. LA children used more interdependent language than did AA or EA children. For all children, parents' belief that emotions can be dangerous was associated with less emphasis on both independence and interdependence in self-construals. For LA children, parents' stronger belief that negative emotions are valuable and greater use of negative emotion terms was associated with children's language use suggesting greater independence and less interdependence. Results suggest the importance of cultural context in emotion socialization processes.