For decades, research has supported the commonly held belief that parenting behaviors influence the development of young children. "Parental sensitivity," often defined as correctly interpreting children's cues for assistance and responding promptly and appropriately to children's distress, has been linked to a range of positive child outcomes, including children's social skills and emotional well-being.
However, as every parent with multiple children knows, parenting can be quite different depending on the child's personality and behavior. Some children struggle to manage their emotions and as a result tend to get upset easily, have difficulty calming down, and have a hard time transitioning from one task to another. Parenting this type of child requires a great deal of patience, and responding sensitively is likely more challenging than when parenting a child who is more flexible, can soothe him- or herself, and is not as easily frustrated.
Therefore, although sensitive parenting behaviors are associated with the development of adaptive outcomes, it could be that specific child characteristics elicit more or less parental sensitivity.
Children's characteristics include both their overt behavior and their underlying biological responses to situations. When individuals encounter emotionally arousing situations, their bodies react at a biological level. For example, the heart starts beating faster, pupils dilate, and attention is focused.
The ability to control or regulate these biological processes influences how an individual actually behaves. That is, children's biological control of arousal contributes to their ability to behaviorally control their negative emotions, and the ability to control negative emotions is a skill necessary for a host of social behaviors.
Research shows that sensitive parenting behaviors contribute to the development of young children's biological regulation. What is unclear is whether the link between parental sensitivity and biological regulation is bidirectional. That is, does children's ability to biologically regulate arousal also influence the type of parenting that they receive? If so, what does this association look like across early childhood, a time of rapid development in social and emotional functioning?
To investigate this question, Perry, Mackler, Calkins, and Keane (2014) observed children and their mothers in a laboratory setting when children were 2, 4, and 5 years old. Children's biological regulation was measured during a frustrating situation. Mothers' sensitivity was measured during situations designed to mimic what they would normally do at home, such as pretend play or cleaning up toys. Then, the investigators looked at the associations between maternal sensitivity and children's biological regulation across early childhood.
Results revealed that greater maternal sensitivity when children were toddlers predicted children's increased ability to biologically regulate during preschool. In contrast, maternal sensitivity when children were preschoolers was not associated with children's ability to biologically regulate at age 5 years. In addition, children's biological regulation during toddlerhood did not predict how sensitive mothers were during preschool. Children's biological regulation during preschool, however, did predict how sensitive mothers were at age 5 years.
These findings suggest that maternal sensitivity may be more strongly related to the development of biological regulation earlier in childhood, when children's internal regulatory abilities are rapidly maturing, rather than at later ages, when biological systems are more developed. This finding leads to questions about whether and how parents can be taught to manage their children's biological functioning during the early years.
The study also highlights the importance of children's biological regulation for the type of parenting that they receive. It may be that parents have lower expectations for children's behavior when they are toddlers. So a decreased ability to biologically regulate and difficult behaviors that may arise as a result of being less biologically regulated may be considered typical at age 2 years and tax parents' patience to a lesser degree, resulting in a greater likelihood that parents respond sensitively.
However, by preschool, greater behavioral control may be expected: Children who are unable to biologically regulate arousal may not be able to control their emotions and behavior in a way that meets parental expectations and therefore may be more likely to elicit less sensitive parent responses. This study highlights the role that children's own characteristics, including their biological characteristics, play in their parents' ability to parent effectively throughout early childhood.
Citation:
Perry, N. B., Mackler, J. S., Calkins, S. D., & Keane, S. P. (2014). A transactional analysis of the relation between maternal sensitivity and child vagal regulation.
Developmental Psychology
,
50
, 784–793.
doi:10.1037/a0033819
Note: This article is in the Developmental Psychology topic area. View more articles in the Developmental Psychology topic area.