Title

Gender Differences In Elaborative Parent-Child Emotion And Play Narratives

Keywords

Autobiographical memory; Emotion talk; Parent-child interaction; Play

Abstract

Reminiscing about the past is an everyday activity that has implications for children's developing memory and socioemotional skills. However, little research has systematically examined how mothers and fathers may differentially elaborate and engage their daughters and sons in reminiscing. In this study, we asked 42 broadly middle-class, highly educated U. S., mostly Caucasian mothers and fathers from the same families, living in the southeastern U. S., to reminisce about a happy, sad, peer conflict, parental conflict, playground and special outing experience with their 4-year-old child. Narratives were coded for parental styles of cognitive elaboration and joint engagement. Results indicated that mothers are both more elaborative and engaged with children than fathers are, especially about negative emotional and positive play experiences. Thus, mothers appear to be helping children recount and understand their personal past more than fathers, and specifically, in working through difficult emotions that may facilitate emotion regulation skills. © 2013 Springer Science+Business Media New York.

Publication Date

5-1-2013

Publication Title

Sex Roles

Volume

68

Issue

9-10

Number of Pages

591-604

Document Type

Article

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-013-0270-7

Socpus ID

84876435034 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/84876435034

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