Effortful control and depression in school-age children: The chain mediating role of emotion regulation ability and cognitive reappraisal strategy

BACKGROUND

Depression is one of the main mental health problems facing primary school students. Temperamental effortful control (EC) has received much attention as a protective factor to depression. The present study aimed to verify the association of effortful control and children's depression and explore the mediating roles of emotion regulation ability (ERA) and strategies (ERSs) in the relationship.

METHODS

A total of 449 valid primary school students in grades 3 to 6 were included in the study. Self-report and parent-report questionnaires were used to collect data on key variables, including EC, depression, ERA and ERSs.

RESULTS

Gender and whether-native-or-not had significant effects on children's depression. EC was significantly and negatively correlated with children's depression; EC and depression were significantly correlated with Emotion Regulation dimension of ERA and cognitive reappraisal; but there was no correlation between EC and Lability/Negativity, as well as between expression suppression and depression. EmotionRegulation and cognitive reappraisal played mediating effects in the relationship between EC and depression parallelly and sequentially.

LIMITATIONS

The study used cross-sectional design and the sample was restricted to Chinese primary school students. Additionally, the types and research perspectives of ERSs can be further expanded.

CONCLUSIONS

EC can reduce the level of children's depression by improving the abilities of Emotion Regulation and the use of cognitive reappraisal strategy, as well as the chain mediating effects of the two.

The unique relevance of executive functions and self-regulation behaviors for understanding early childhood experiences and preschoolers' outcomes in rural Pakistan

Performance-based measures of children's executive functions (EFs) do not capture children's application of these skills during everyday emotionally-laden and socially-mediated interactions. The current study demonstrates the value of using assessor report of self-regulation behaviors (inhibitory control and positive affect/engagement) in addition to EF tasks when studying early childhood experiences and development in a rural lower-middle-income country setting. In a sample of 1302 disadvantaged 4-year-olds living in rural Pakistan, we found that directly assessed EFs were significantly related to assessor observations of children's inhibitory control and positive affect/engagement during a structured assessment protocol. However, EFs and two types of self-regulation behaviors demonstrated unique associations with children's (1) contextual experiences, as indexed by family socio-economic resources, participation in parenting interventions, and children's physical growth; and (2) age-salient developmental outcomes, as indexed by direct assessment of pre-academic skills and maternal report of prosocial behaviors and behavior problems. First, family wealth uniquely predicted only observed positive affect/engagement, whereas maternal education uniquely predicted only EFs. Second, children's antecedent linear growth was a significant predictor of both EFs and positive affect/engagement, but exposure to an enhanced nutrition intervention during the first 2 years of life and preschoolers' hair cortisol concentration were associated only with observed self-regulation behaviors. Finally, both EFs and observed positive affect/engagement uniquely predicted children's pre-academic skills. In contrast, only assessors' ratings of positive affect/engagement uniquely predicted maternal report of prosocial behaviors and only assessors' ratings of inhibitory control uniquely predicted maternal report of behavioral problems.

Developmental Cascades of Preschoolers' Effortful Control, Externalizing Behaviors, and Parental Corporal Punishment in China

This research examined the interrelations among children's effortful control, externalizing behaviors, and parental corporal punishment in China. Two hundred and five father-mother dyads of preschoolers (initial M_age = 3.73 years, 50% boys) completed measures of children's effortful control, externalizing behaviors, and parental corporal punishment at three time points with 1-year intervals in between. In developmental cascade models, only unidirectional direct relations between variables were found: preschoolers' effortful control negatively predicted externalizing behaviors a year later, and preschoolers' externalizing behaviors positively predicted maternal and paternal corporal punishment a year later. Moreover, although no direct relations between preschoolers' effortful control and parental corporal punishment were found, a potential indirect pathway from effortful control to paternal corporal punishment through externalizing behaviors was observed. The findings are discussed in terms of their cultural basis and highlight the importance of efforts to strengthen children's self-regulation during early childhood.

Examining the associations between children's receptive language skills and developmental domains in the United States and Turkey

This study examined the relations between receptive language development and other developmental domains of preschoolers from low-income families, through an inter-cultural perspective involving the United States and Turkey. A total of 471 children and their caregivers participated in Turkey, while 287 participated in the United States. Children's development was assessed using the Ages and Stages Questionnaire for both samples. Different versions of the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test were used for Turkish and US samples, to measure receptive language development. Results revealed similar patterns, with some differences, between the two countries. Receptive language predicted only communication and personal-social scales in the Turkish sample, while the US children's receptive language skills were associated with communication, problem solving, personal-social, and fine and gross motor development scales. These results were discussed in the context of each country, and the comparative conclusions contribute to the extant literature by illustrating the importance of language for three domains.

Self-Regulation in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: Challenges and Future Directions

Self-regulation is developed early in life through family and parenting interactions. There has been considerable debate on how to best conceptualize and enhance self-regulation. Many consider self-regulation as the socio-emotional competencies required for healthy and productive living, including the flexibility to regulate emotions, control anger, maintain calm under pressure, and respond adaptively to a variety of situations. Its enhancement is the focus of many child and family interventions. An important limitation of the self-regulation field is that most empirical and conceptual research comes from high-income countries (HICs). Less is known about the manifestation, measurement and role of self-regulation in many collectivistic, rural, or less-developed contexts such as low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). This position paper aims to present an initial review of the existing literature on self-regulation in LMICs, with a focus on parenting, and to describe challenges in terms of measurement and implementation of self-regulation components into existing interventions for parents, children and adolescents in these settings. We conclude by establishing steps or recommendations for conducting basic research to understand how self-regulation expresses itself in vulnerable and low-resource settings and for incorporating components of self-regulation into services in LMICs.

The neural correlates of temperamental inhibitory control in toddlers

The current study examined the association between effortful control and a well-studied neural index of self-regulation, the N2 event-related potential (ERP) component, in toddlers. Participants included 107 toddlers (44 girls) assessed at 30, 36 and 42 months of age. Participants completed a Go/NoGo task while electroencephalography data were recorded. The study focused on the N2 ERP component. Parent-reported effortful control was examined in association with the NoGo N2 ERP component. Findings suggest a positive association between the NoGo N2 component and the inhibitory control subscale of the wider effortful control dimension, suggesting that the N2 component may index processes associated with temperamental effortful control.This article is part of the theme issue 'Diverse perspectives on diversity: multi-disciplinary approaches to taxonomies of individual differences'.

The mediational roles of harsh and responsive parenting in the longitudinal relations between socioeconomic status and Turkish children’s emotional development

This study examined the associations among the socioeconomic status (SES) of Turkish families when children ( N = 340, Mean age = 83 months, SD = 3.59, 50.3% boys) were approximately 7 years of age (Time 1) and their emotional lability and emotion regulation tendencies 3 years later (Time 3). We also examined the mediating roles of mothers’ harsh and responsive parenting behaviors when children were 9 years of age (Time 2). Results revealed that family SES was positively linked to parental responsiveness and negatively linked to harsh parenting; harsh parenting was positively linked to children’s emotion lability and negatively linked to children’s emotion regulation (after controlling for prior levels of emotion regulation and emotional lability at Time 2). Further, harsh parenting significantly mediated the associations between family SES and children’s emotional lability and emotion regulation tendencies. The pattern of associations did not vary by child gender or community (e.g., Istanbul, Ankara, Bolu) in Turkey. The findings highlight the interplay among family SES, maternal parenting behaviors, and children’s self-regulation outcomes in a non-Western, collectivist society.

Not just a sum of its parts: How tasks of the theory of mind scale relate to executive function across time

There is a well-established relationship between theory of mind (ToM) and executive function (EF) during the preschool years. However, less is known about the concurrent and longitudinal relations between EF and specific tasks tapping different aspects of ToM. The current study investigated the ToM-EF relationship across 1 year in 3- to 5-year-old Turkish children using the ToM battery of Wellman and Liu (2004), which measures understanding of diverse desires (DD), diverse beliefs (DB), knowledge access (KA), contents false belief (CFB), explicit false belief (EFB), and hidden emotion (HE). This battery has not yet been used in its entirety to test the predictive relations between ToM and EF. We used peg-tapping and day-night tasks to measure EF. Our sample comprised 150 Turkish preschool children (69 girls) aged 36-60 months at Time 1 (T1) and 49-73 months at Time 2 (T2). Using the ToM composite with all six tasks, when child's age, receptive language, and T1 ability level (EF or ToM) were controlled, T1 EF significantly predicted T2 ToM, whereas T1 ToM did not predict T2 EF. Among DD, DB, KA, false belief understanding (FBU: the composite score of CFB and EFB), and HE, only KA and FBU were significantly associated with EF at T1 and T2. Further regression analyses showed that KA did not have a predictive relationship with EF. Instead, FBU drove the predictive EF-ToM relationship across time. Thus, in Turkish children, earlier EF predicts later ToM, but especially the FBU component, in this well-validated battery.

Measuring the development of inhibitory control: The challenge of heterotypic continuity

Inhibitory control is thought to demonstrate heterotypic continuity, in other words, continuity in its purpose or function but changes in its behavioral manifestation over time. This creates major methodological challenges for studying the development of inhibitory control in childhood including construct validity, developmental appropriateness and sensitivity of measures, and longitudinal factorial invariance. We meta-analyzed 198 studies using measures of inhibitory control, a key aspect of self-regulation, to estimate age ranges of usefulness for each measure. The inhibitory control measures showed limited age ranges of usefulness owing to ceiling/floor effects. Tasks were useful, on average, for a developmental span of less than 3 years. This suggests that measuring inhibitory control over longer spans of development may require use of different measures at different time points, seeking to measure heterotypic continuity. We suggest ways to study the development of inhibitory control, with overlapping measurement in a structural equation modeling framework and tests of longitudinal factorial or measurement invariance. However, as valuable as this would be for the area, we also point out that establishing longitudinal factorial invariance is neither sufficient nor necessary for examining developmental change. Any study of developmental change should be guided by theory and construct validity, aiming toward a better empirical and theoretical approach to the selection and combination of measures.

The role of language ability and self-regulation in the development of inattentive-hyperactive behavior problems

Previous research has found associations but not established mechanisms of developmental linkage between language ability and inattentive-hyperactive (I-H) behavior problems. The present study examined whether self-regulation mediates the effect of language ability on later I-H behavior problems among young children (N = 120) assessed at 30, 36, and 42 months of age. Cross-lagged panel models tested the direction of effect between language ability and self-regulation and longitudinal effects of language ability on later I-H problems mediated by self-regulation. Language ability was measured by children's scores on the receptive and expressive language subtests of the Differential Ability Scales. Self-regulation was measured by three behavioral tasks requiring inhibitory control. I-H problems were reported by parents and secondary caregivers. Language ability predicted later self-regulation as measured by all three tasks. There was no association, however, between self-regulation and later language ability, suggesting that the direction of effect was stronger from language ability to later self-regulation. Moreover, the effect of language ability on later I-H behavior problems was mediated by children's self-regulation in one of the tasks (for secondary caregivers' but not parents' ratings). Findings suggest that language deficits may explain later I-H behavior problems via their prediction of poorer self-regulatory skills.

Social competence, theory of mind, and executive function in institution-reared Turkish children

This study had two aims. The first aim was to measure mental state understanding in institution-reared children by using a theory of mind (ToM) scale, and to examine the role of cultural context in sequencing of ToM acquisition. The other aim was to investigate ToM in relation to social competence and executive function (EF). Due to its pronounced role in mental state understanding and social interactions, we assessed receptive language as well. The participants were 107 institution-reared children aged 3 to 5 years in Turkey. Two visits were held within 2 days for behavioral assessments. In the first visit, the ToM scale was administered; in the second visit, the child was given the language test and the EF tasks. The social competence scales were completed by the child’s primary care provider in the institution. Guttman scaling analysis revealed that an understanding of diverse beliefs developed earlier than knowledge access, favoring the “individualistic pattern.” The regression analysis showed that EF was a significant predictor of ToM, but neither of them was associated with social competence when age was controlled. Receptive language predicted social competence and EF directly, and ToM indirectly through EF, pointing to the importance of this ability for early development.