Parental reactions to children’s negative affect: The moderating role of parental GAD

Publication date: Available online 31 October 2017
Source:Journal of Anxiety Disorders
Author(s): Brenda Arellano, Colette Gramszlo, Janet Woodruff-Borden
The impact of parental anxiety disorders has been explored in broad categories of parenting behaviors; however, less is known about the impact of parental anxiety on emotion socialization behaviors. The current study tested the conditional effect of parental Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) on one aspect of emotion socialization, parents' reactions to their child's negative affect. Participants were 89 children between ages 3 and 12 and their parents, from a community sample. Parents completed the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule-IV (ADIS-IV), an interaction task with their child, and the Beck Anxiety Inventory-II (BAI-II). Overall, the data supported study hypotheses. Parental GAD moderated the relationship between child's negative affect and parental over control and emotional discouragement. Additionally, this relationship was unique to GAD, as self-reported anxiety symptoms did not moderate this relation. These findings suggest parents diagnosed with GAD are discouraging of their children's emotional experiences and fail to adjust their level of guidance throughout situations which induce negative affect, leaving children to cope with negative emotions on their own.



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