Introduction
Harmonious development of the child’s personality is possible while maintaining and strengthening health, defined as a state of physical, mental, and social well-being. Mental health includes a child’s emotional and cognitive well-being, character development, and personality formation (Norona & Baker, 2017). In this regard, the parents – children interaction is critical. Children learn certain behaviors from their parents by adopting specific patterns of behavior (Zhou & Yi, 2014; Wang et al., 2021).
Parents influence a child’s behavior by encouraging or condemning a particular type of behavior, as well as by applying punishment or allowing an acceptable degree of freedom in the child’s behavior (Gökçe & Yılmaz, 2018). Thus, the experience of family relationships plays a vital role for children in forming their personality, certain patterns of behavior, and relationships with others.
Parenting Styles
Parenting style is a critical aspect, first of all, for the children themselves, as it influences their formation and development. Parenting style as a child’s family relationship style is characterized by the degree of caring, control, and guardianship (Wang et al., 2021), as well as attitudes towards children’s development and their abilities, and the possibility of corporal punishment (Zhou & Yi, 2014). The literature contains quite a lot of works describing the styles of family relationships.
Zhou and Yi (2014) distinguish four types of parenting styles, including training priority (when the parent has the role of a coach rather than a caretaker), relationship precedence (when the role of caretaker prevails over the role of a coach), alternating (when the parent, depending on the situation, takes either caretaker or coach), and letting alone (when the parent is indifferent and does not adhere to any role).
According to Zhou and Yi (2014), the training priority parenting style is characterized by the exactingness and severity of parents, up to physical punishment, while the relationship – precedence pattern is based on taking into account the importance of children’s emotions, tolerance for their imperfections and a gentle approach to the child. In turn, in an alternating parenting style, typical parenting emotions are fear, anxiety, and confusion. Zhou and Yi (2014) note that parents using this pattern have the least self-efficacy in parenting. The fourth type of parenting identified by Zhou and Yi (2014) is characterized by the indifference and disinterest of the parents, and powerlessness and hopelessness are their typical emotions. Thus, Zhou and Yi (2014) emphasize the significance of balancing these two roles. Intense training and disproportionate emphasis on the coach’s position can improve specific skills, but it can harm the emotional relationship between parents and children.
Furthermore, the study by Wang et al. (2021) explores the parenting styles of depressed parents. Thus, researchers distinguish four parenting styles: care-autonomy parenting, overprotection-indifference parenting, indifference parenting, and undifferentiated parenting. The first pattern is characterized by a high degree of caring and autonomy, as well as the second is characterized by extreme care and a low rate of autonomy. In turn, the third is characterized by a high degree of indifference, lack of attention, and autonomy, and the fourth is the average level of all the above indicators. According to Wang et al. (2021), each parenting style affects children’s depression and anxiety levels. Care-autonomy parenting style implies a lower hazard of children’s depression and disturbance, whereas children with indifferent parenting are more prone to depression than children with undifferentiated parenting.
Child Emotion Regulation
Of particular scientific and practical interest is the study of the characteristics of the family environment that affect the ability to regulate the child’s emotions. Parent-child relationships are one of the most critical factors contributing to the development of ER (Norona & Baker, 2017). Parents influence the development of ER in children from birth in many ways, including both direct and indirect influences.
Gökçe and Yılmaz (2018), in the context of studying the correct regulation of emotions in children, pay special attention to such a parental quality as emotional availability. If interaction with parents does not meet the emotional needs of the child, it can lead to negative consequences for the child’s psyche (Gökçe and Yılmaz, 2018). Norona and Baker (2017) note that sensitivity, consistency, and support from parents and caregivers are critical to the healthy development of emotional regulation skills. Thus, the skills of emotional regulation of children depend on parental involvement and their emotions.
In turn, Gökçe and Yılmaz (2018) assert that parental responses such as sensibility, emotional participation, lack of hostility, compromise, and control of correct emotional expressions, influence the enhancement of skills for the proper children’s emotional regulation. According to Norona and Baker (2017), adequate strategies support the development of self-control in a child by modeling desired behavior rather than requiring it.
An overly demanding or unpredictable adult interaction style can disrupt the development of ER (Norona & Baker, 2017). The researchers state that positive parenting softens the link between developmental status and child self-regulation. It has also been noted that a positive mother-child relationship helps reduce problem behaviors in young children with developmental delays (Norona & Baker, 2017). All of the above confirms the importance of parental behavior concerning children for their adequate emotional regulation.
Parental Distress
Researchers are trying to understand the consequences of stress for parents and their children. They studied depression and anxiety, as well as stress and coping mechanisms among parents. For example, emotional support and caring for children decrease with increasing parental stress (Gavita et al., 2014). As causes of parental distress, Gavita et al. (2014) highlight factors such as child disobedience, child abuse, and increased guilt, as well as various emotional problems in childhood. In turn, Zhou and Yi (2014) note that parents of autistic children become anxious and irascible due to the diagnosis of their child, the absence of progress in children, and the inability to accept children as they are. Therefore, parental stress harms the adequate development of their children.
Gavita et al. (2014) concluded that parental distress and psychopathology harm child development. This is because parental distress and depression reduce parental self-efficacy and hurt a sense of parental competence. Moreover, parental depression is a factor in the internalization of symptoms in their children (Wang et al., 2021). In Wang et al.’s (2021) research, which included 245 children of depressed parents, more than half of them suffered from depression (about 50%) and anxiety (about 57%). Thus, children’s psychopathology and anxiety are directly related to parental stress.
In this regard, parents’ knowledge is of particular importance, the possession of which can regulate the level of parental distress. Thus, according to Gavita et al. (2014), irrational parenting knowledge contributes to the development of parental distress. However, when parents have a high level of acceptance of themselves and their child, it helps to reduce parental stress, even if the parent is characterized by low parental self-efficacy. Therefore, the unbiased attitude of the parents, the unconditional acceptance of the child, and the avoidance of global assessments of the child’s behavior and abilities can act as a factor of resistance to negative affect.
Negative parenting emotions cause stress in children, whose symptoms intensify, which becomes a trigger for the parents (Zhou & Yi, 2014). Conversely, in families where positive parenting is applied to children, this encourages children whose condition improves, which further relaxes the parents. Zhou and Yi (2014) argue that in this regard, it is important for parents with children with ASD to be able to correct their psychoemotional state. If parents support their child and retain a positive attitude, the child feels their unconditioned love, which helps to reduce the impact of autism on them and decrease parental disturbance.
Zhou and Yi (2014) highlight that social support is a crucial resource for diminishing parental stress. The researchers note that aid from parents of autistic children is vital for sharing information, reducing stress, and gaining support. Moreover, these parents will also benefit from family therapy to help them cope with their emotions (Zhou & Yi, 2014). Thus, a parent should use various tools to adjust their attitude towards children so as not to harm their psychoemotional development.
Influence of Parent-Child Relationships on a Child’s Interpersonal Skills
According to Norona and Baker (2017), the child’s interaction with the parents is the first, most important experience of interaction with the outside world. This experience reinforces and shapes specific behaviors with others and interpersonal skills (Norona & Baker, 2017). Thus, a higher level of parent emotional availability contributes to forming a vastly positive style of interpersonal relationships (Gökçe & Yılmaz, 2018).
Moreover, the effect of parents’ emotional availability on interpersonal relationships is reflected in the perception of social support. A study by Gökçe and Yılmaz (2018) found that those who perceive their parents as unsupportive also experience less endorsement from their environment, including teachers, relatives, and friends. Moreover, the relationship established with the parent retains its significance both in childhood and adulthood (Gökçe & Yılmaz, 2018). Thus, researchers present overwhelming evidence that parent-child relationships affect a child’s interpersonal skills.
Conclusion
Therefore, in the context of the influence of parents on the psychoemotional development of children, such aspects as parenting style, emotion regulation, parental distress, as well as the consequences for interpersonal communication are vital. The family parenting style plays an essential role in the personal formation and development of the child (Wang et al., 2021; Zhou & Yi, 2014). Moreover, parent-child relationships significantly affect the adequacy of children’s emotional regulation ability (Norona & Baker, 2017), as well as interpersonal skills (Gökçe & Yılmaz, 2018). In turn, parental distress can lead to negative consequences for the child’s psyche (Gavita et al., 2014; Wang et al., 2021). Based on this, the researchers presented rather exhaustive conclusions about the influence of parental attitudes on the psycho-emotional development of their children.
However, despite all the merits and breadth of the issues studied, it is crucial to recognize the limitations of these studies. First, the study by Gökçe and Yılmaz (2018) uses a methodology developed in Western society, which creates restrictions for parents of other cultures. Second, some studies (Norona & Baker, 2017; Gavita et al., 2014) apply only to mothers, so the findings cannot be completely generalized to parents and other additional adults. Third, in the study by Zhou and Yi (2014), the participants were relatively highly educated parents, which may affect the generalization of conclusions for families with different social backgrounds. Fourth, the study by Wang et al. (2021) focused only on depressed parents attending treatment, leading to selection bias. Nevertheless, the discoveries of all of the above authors expand the research on parenting by providing a detailed specification of parenting styles and studying the effect of parental emotions and behavior on the psychoemotional state of children, as well as their abilities.
References
Gavita, O., David, D., & DiGiuseppe, R. (2014). You are such a bad child! Appraisals as mechanisms of parental negative and positive affect. Journal of General Psychology, 141(2), 113–129. Web.
Gökçe, G., & Yılmaz, B. (2018). Emotional availability of parents and psychological health: What does mediate this relationship? Journal of Adult Development, 25(1), 37–47. Web.
Norona, A. N., & Baker, B. L. (2017). The effects of early positive parenting and developmental delay status on child emotion dysregulation. Journal of Intellectual Disability Research, 61(2), 130–143. Web.
Wang, Y., Shi, H., Wang, Y., Zhang, X., Wang, J., Sun, Y., Wang, J., Sun, J., & Cao, F. (2021). The association of different parenting styles among depressed parents and their offspring’s depression and anxiety: A cross-sectional study. BMC Psychiatry, 21(1), 1–10. Web.
Zhou, T., & Yi, C. (2014). Parenting styles and parents’ perspectives on how their own emotions affect the functioning of children with autism spectrum disorders. Family Process, 53(1), 67–79. Web.