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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2021 Aug 1.
Published in final edited form as: Emotion. 2019 Mar 14;20(5):793–803. doi: 10.1037/emo0000600

Maternal Comforting Behavior, Toddlers’ Dysregulated Fear, and Toddlers’ Emotion Regulatory Behaviors

Elizabeth J Kiel 1, Natalee N Price 2, Julie E Premo 3
PMCID: PMC6745000  NIHMSID: NIHMS1037918  PMID: 30869939

Abstract

Developmental theories of emotion regulation suggest that influences from both extrinsic (e.g., from caregivers) and intrinsic (i.e., temperament) sources contribute to children’s displays of emotion regulatory behaviors. Very few studies have examined specific caregiver behaviors in relation to specific regulatory behaviors. Further, few empirical investigations have tested theoretical notions that temperament may be an important context in which to understand the nature of the relation between caregiver behavior and toddlers’ regulatory behaviors. The current study examined the specific maternal behavior of physical comfort in relation to three regulatory strategies exhibited by toddlers (attention-shifting, caregiver-focused behavior, and self-focused behavior) in 117 pairs of mothers and their 24-month-old toddlers. Further, we tested the temperament dimension of dysregulated fear, a more recent derivation of behavioral inhibition, both in relation to regulatory efforts and as a moderator of relations between maternal comforting and toddler regulatory behaviors. Dysregulated fear related directly and positively to attention-shifting, and it moderated the relation between maternal comforting and both caregiver-focused and self-focused behaviors. This study provides new evidence of the importance of both extrinsic and intrinsic correlates of emotion regulation in early childhood.

Emotion regulation refers to the various ways in which individuals monitor, evaluate, and modify their emotional experiences and expressions (Kopp, 1989; Thompson, 1994). The construct has been conceptualized as reflecting dispositional capacities for responding to emotional events, as well as specific regulatory strategies (Cole, Martin, & Dennis, 2004; Gratz & Roemer, 2004). By early toddlerhood, children exhibit a range of emotion regulation behaviors that are influenced by both extrinsic (i.e., caregiver interactions and regulation efforts) and intrinsic (i.e., child temperament) sources (Calkins & Hill, 2007; Cassidy, 1994; Gross, Sheppes, & Urry, 2011). In other words, toddlers’ early and continued external aid from caregivers, coupled with their own temperament, contribute to toddlers’ early displays of emotion regulation behaviors (Calkins, 1994; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2004; Kiel & Kalomiris, 2015). A large theoretical foundation exists for how the coordination of these forces may influence toddler emotion regulations strategies, but less is known about whether specific aspects of temperament provide a context within which specific maternal regulatory behavior correlates with emotion regulation behaviors. This area of study may be particularly important for understanding emergence of risk within the context of socioemotional development. As such, the current study examined relation between mother and toddler emotion regulation efforts, particularly as it may depend on child temperamental anxiety risk. Specifically, we sought to assess the interaction between mothers’ comforting behaviors and toddlers’ dysregulated fear in predicting toddlers’ emotion regulation strategy use during interactions with novelty.

Toddler Emotion Regulation

Toddlerhood is a transition and foundational period for the examination of emotion regulation abilities, given the substantial gains in very young children’s emotion-related capabilities (Bridges & Grolnick, 1995; Calkins, 2007; Thompson & Goodvin, 2007). It is during this developmental period that toddlers progress from near-exclusive dependence on their caregivers for any emotion regulation to purposefully engaging in their own emotion regulation strategy use (Calkins & Hill, 2007; Kopp, 1989). Thus, toddlerhood provides a salient developmental period to assess how both caregiver behavior and temperamental individual differences relate to children’s emotion regulation attempts.

As typically-developing infants approach toddlerhood, they undergo a variety of emotional, cognitive, linguistic, and motor changes that support emotion regulation (Bridges & Grolnick, 1995; Calkins, 2007; Kopp, 1989). Additionally, many neurobiological (e.g., prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, anterior and posterior attentional system development) and physiological (e.g., cardiac vagal regulation, HPA axis maturation) processes influence toddler emotion regulation development, in part because of maturation and integration of processes (Gratz, Dixon, Kiel, & Tull, 2018; Thompson & Goodvin, 2007; Thompson, Lewis, & Calkins, 2008). With the advent of these important developmental changes, and deriving in part from caregivers’ early scaffolding actions, young children exhibit greater control over and independence in their emotion regulation efforts over time (Calkins, 1994; Calkins & Hill, 2007; Diener & Mangelsdorf, 1999; Grolnick, Bridges, & Connell, 1996; Thompson & Calkins, 1996). That is, toddlers develop to be more purposeful and active participants in regulating their emotional arousal in different contexts (Calkins, 2007; Diener & Mangelsdorf, 1999).

During and beyond this transition, toddlers engage in a variety of self-initiated emotion regulation behaviors (Calkins & Hill, 2007; Cole et al., 2004; Grolnick et al., 1996), three classifications of which we focus on presently. First, toddlers may regulate their visual attention by briefly averting their gaze from distressing stimuli or by distracting themselves from the stimuli by visually focusing on something else for longer periods of time (Bridges & Grolnick, 1995; Calkins, 2007; Mangelsdorf, Shapiro, & Marzolf, 1995). These attention-shifting behaviors have been shown to occur contingently with decreases in distress (Buss & Goldsmith, 1998; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2004; Stifter & Braungart, 1995), and deficits in attention-shifting domains are associated with greater negative arousal (Calkins, 2007). Second, toddlers may exhibit regulation efforts by looking towards their caregiver or seeking contact with them during discomforting situations (Buss, Brooker, & Leuty, 2008; see also Kopp, 1989). Such caregiver-focused behaviors may be especially prevalent when children are highly distressed, and they do appear to be effective (at least in part) in alleviating such distress (Buss & Goldsmith, 1998; Calkins, Gill, Johnson, & Smith, 1999; Diener & Mangelsdorf, 1999). Third, infants and toddlers also begin to engage in self-soothing emotion regulation behaviors that may involve fidgeting (e.g., tapping/wiggling feet or hands) or rhythmically stroking or touching one’s self, a caregiver, or nearby objects (Bridges & Grolnick, 1995; Calkins & Hill, 2007; Stifter & Braungart, 1995). Self-focused strategies appear to be relatively effective for and even preferred by young children (Calkins, 2007; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2004; Stifter & Braungart, 1995). Although other regulatory behaviors exist, these behaviors have been some of the most well-studied. Importantly, these emotion regulation behaviors are distinct from more highly avoidant behaviors that may be elicited by and serve to maintain extreme levels of toddler fear, such as freezing and withdrawal (Buss, 2011).

Emotion regulation strategies undergo much development in the first few years of life, so toddlerhood is an ideal developmental period to start assessing the interacting sources of putative influence on child emotion regulation behaviors. Although it is established that various broad aspects of the parent-child relationship (e.g., attachment, parental presence or absence) influence children’s emotion regulation (for reviews, see Bridges & Grolnick, 1995; Calkins, 1994; Cassidy, 1994; Dadds & Roth, 2001; Mikulincer & Shaver, 2018), much less is known about specific caregiver behaviors. We examined the association between one such behavior, maternal physical comfort, and toddlers’ emotion regulation behaviors.

Extrinsic Emotion Regulation Influences in Toddlerhood

Children’s early emotion regulation development involves transactional processes with environmental sources, such as caregivers (Calkins, 1994; Cassidy, 1994; Cole et al., 2004). Extrinsically, toddlers’ emotions may be regulated through their parents’ actions and through the consequential relationship that forms between the child and parent (Calkins, Smith, Gill, & Johnson, 1998; Grolnick, Kurowski, McMenamy, Rivkin, & Bridges, 1998; Kiel & Kalomiris, 2015; Thompson & Goodvin, 2007). During infancy, these external sources of emotion regulation are highly active, with young children almost exclusively relying on their parents’ interventions in emotional situations (Calkins, 2007; Calkins & Hill, 2007; Kopp, 1989). As children grow older, parents frequently employ various strategies to calm their toddlers, including physical comfort and soothing (Grolnick et al., 1998; Spinrad, Stifter, Donelan-McCall, & Turner, 2004). Although parents may have different goals for engaging in comforting behaviors (e.g., to convey messages about acceptability of emotion expressivity, to reduce child distress) and may engage in the behaviors at different rates (Kopp, 1989), it appears that this extrinsic regulatory process indeed reduces distress for infants and toddlers (Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2003, 2004; Jahromi, Putnam, & Stifter, 2004; Mangelsdorf, Gunnar, Kestenbaum, Lang, & Andreas, 1990). If frequent, this immediate dampening of distress may also aid children’s own regulatory strategy repertoire development and positively contribute to their understanding of emotion expressivity (Calkins, 1994; Root, Byrne, & Watson, 2015). For instance, some studies have shown that mothers’ soothing behaviors predict their children’s greater use of attention-oriented emotion regulatory behaviors (Spinrad et al., 2004). More generally, mothers’ warmth and responsiveness predict their toddlers’ specific utilization of more attention- and caregiver-oriented regulatory behaviors (Calkins & Hill, 2007; Calkins & Johnson, 1998). Similarly, parents’ supportive attempts to respond to and regulate their toddlers’ emotion displays likely contribute to children’s concurrent and later emotion regulation abilities (e.g., Cassidy, 1994; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2003; Gratz et al., 2018; Spinrad et al., 2004).

Importantly, parent and child emotion regulation attempts co-occur and are transactional (Calkins, 1994; Cole et al., 2004; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2004; Thompson & Calkins, 1996). Toddlers’ strategies differ as a function of context and parental involvement (Calkins & Johnson, 1998; Diener & Mangelsdorf, 1999; Kiel & Kalomiris, 2015), and parents tailor strategies to their perceptions of their children’s capabilities and distress levels (Grolnick et al., 1998; Jahromi et al., 2004). For example, Crockenberg and Leerkes (2004) found that when young children redirect their attention and withdraw from disconcerting stimuli, mothers are more likely to engage with and soothe them. As such, we should expect to see a positive relation between maternal comforting and toddler emotion regulation behaviors. However, the typical coordination of caregiver and child emotion regulation efforts may be disrupted by the extent to which toddlers display temperamental risk for anxiety. In line with recommendations for future research on how children’s emotion-related temperament characteristics may impede this synchronization (e.g., Calkins & Johnson, 1998; Calkins et al., 1998; Thompson & Goodvin, 2007), we examine the role of toddlers’ dysregulated fear on the association between mothers’ and toddlers’ emotion regulation strategies.

Intrinsic Emotion Regulation Influences in Toddlerhood: The Role of Dysregulated Fear

Intrinsic, temperamental factors encompass broad emotion-related capacities that are integral to toddlers’ emotion regulation efforts (Bridges & Grolnick, 1995; Calkins, 1994; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2003; Gratz et al., 2018; Gross et al., 2011). Most theories consider temperament to be an organizing framework for children’s interactions with the environment and incorporate an emotional reactivity dimension (e.g., the tendency to become aroused or distressed by emotional experiences) that dynamically influences emotion regulation (Cole et al., 2004; Goldsmith et al., 1987; Rothbart, 2007; Thompson & Goodvin, 2007). Infants and toddlers vary in their reactivity to emotion-eliciting stimuli, and their early patterns of reactivity affect the types and frequencies of emotion regulation strategies that they use later in development (Bridges & Grolnick, 1995; Calkins et al., 1998; Penela, Walker, Degnan, Fox, & Henderson, 2015; Thompson & Calkins, 1996). Strategies may be more or less effective at diminishing distress (Calkins, 2007; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2004), depending on intrinsic influences (Braungart & Stifter, 1991; Buss & Goldsmith, 1998; Grolnick et al., 1996).

One such intrinsic factor—namely, behavioral inhibition—is a well-established aspect of temperament relevant to children’s emotion regulation strategies and anxiety development. Behavioral inhibition broadly refers to wariness, withdrawal, and fear to novel objects, contexts, and individuals (Kagan, Reznick, Clarke, Snidman, & Garcia-Coll, 1984; Kagan, Reznick, & Gibbons, 1989). Behavioral inhibition has multiple biological correlates (e.g., higher and less variable heart rate, greater hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activation, right frontal EEG asymmetry; Fox, 1989; Kagan et al., 1984; Kagan et al., 1989; Thompson & Calkins, 1996) and is relatively stable over time (Chronis-Tuscano et al., 2009; Coll, Kagan, & Reznick, 1984; Fox, Henderson, Marshall, Nichols, & Ghera, 2005; Hirshfeld et al., 1992). Behavioral inhibition has been theorized to be a manifestation of both emotional reactivity and emotion regulation (Cole et al., 2004; Rothbart & Derryberry, 1981), with a number of empirical studies corroborating these links (Calkins & Fox, 1992; Feng, Shaw, Kovacs, Lane, O’Rourke, & Alarcon, 2007; Penela et al., 2015). Moreover, behavioral inhibition is a consistent predictor of child anxiety (Biederman et al., 1993; Chronis-Tuscano et al., 2009; Fox et al., 2005; Hirshfeld et al., 1992; Rapee & Coplan, 2010). Certain conceptualizations and operationalizations of behavioral inhibition elucidate this child anxiety risk trajectory. Dysregulated fear, a component of the behavioral inhibition concept, has emerged as one such avenue. The current study focuses on the role of this intrinsic factor in the relation between maternal and child-initiated emotion regulation efforts.

Dysregulated fear shares some commonalities with the broader behavioral inhibition construct but is distinguished in that it more specifically considers the context in which fear is shown (Buss, 2011; Buss et al., 2013). Dysregulated fear encompasses distress, inhibition, and/or shyness in low-threat situations such that children may have deficits in adapting their fear response to the threat-level of the eliciting context (Buss, 2011; Buss, Davidson, Kalin, & Goldsmith, 2004; Buss et al., 2013). Although it may be adaptive to show fear in objectively- threatening situations (e.g., approach by an angry animal), children high in dysregulated fear also show fear responses to situations that are novel and perhaps uncertain, but less threatening (e.g., interaction with a friendly clown; Buss, 2011). Dysregulated fear predicts anxiety symptoms concurrently and later in childhood, above and beyond other traditional measures of behavioral inhibition (Buss, 2011; Buss et al., 2004; Buss et al., 2013; Phelps, Brooker, & Buss, 2016).

Little is known about how toddler dysregulated fear relates to particular emotion regulation strategies employed by toddlers and their mothers. Given that dysregulated fear involves heightened emotional reactivity, there may be more emotion to be regulated. Therefore, we may expect that toddlers characterized by higher dysregulated fear would generally engage in more emotion regulatory strategies. The few studies examining the relation between infant/toddler fearfulness and emotion regulatory behaviors support this notion. In comparison with bold infants, infants who are warier of strangers are more likely to engage in attention-, self-, and caregiver-oriented behaviors (i.e., gaze aversion, self-soothing, increasing proximity to caregiver; Mangelsdorf et al., 1995). Additionally, Buss and Goldsmith (1998) found that infants with more intense fear exhibit more looks to their mothers and are more likely to withdraw from the stimulus, compared to infants with lower levels of fear. Penela et al. (2015) also found a link between behavioral inhibition and less engaged, more withdrawn strategies. Therefore, at a bivariate level, we expected dysregulated fear to relate to more attention-shifting, caregiver-focused, and self-soothing behaviors.

A number of studies show that temperament and parenting interaction to predict toddlers’ socioemotional outcomes. In the context of temperamental inhibition, oversolicitous and overprotective parenting, which are often characterized by high levels of comfort and warmth, predict children’s risk for anxiety (Degnan, Henderson, Fox, & Rubin, 2008; Rubin, Coplan, & Bowker, 2009). This may be because comforting affects regulation differently depending on children’s temperaments. When toddlers are less inhibited, caregivers’ comforting behaviors may decrease distress and facilitate children’s greater self-efficacy and -regulation. However, when child dysregulated fear is coupled with a high level of caregiver comfort, it may negatively impact children’s emotion regulation efforts. As theorized by Thompson and Calkins (1996), for temperamentally inhibited toddlers, withdrawal and reliance on the caregiver may be effective in attenuating distress in-the-moment, but continued use of these strategies may serve to foster maladaptive behavioral cycles. Along these lines, children with high dysregulated fear and maternal comfort may be less likely to engage in an occasional “check-in” look with their mother, instead more likely seeking total avoidance of the stimuli. Indeed, there is a theorized anxious-coercive cycle in which temperamentally fearful/anxious children may seek their parents’ comfort and reassurance, which may then serve to reinforce children’s dependency on their parents during fearful contexts (Bogels & Brechman-Toussaint, 2006; Dadds & Roth, 2001; Thompson & Calkins, 1996). In line with this theory, other studies suggest that toddlers’ temperamental anxiety risk may influence parents to provide more comfort and be more protective (Fox et al., 2005;Kiel & Buss, 2014; Tiwari, Podell, Martin, Mychailyszyn, Furr, & Kendall, 2008). Children who participate in these cycles, which would also require mothers to be engaging in physical comfort, may subsequently employ fewer of their own emotion regulation strategies in favor of more passively waiting for parental intervention (Thompson & Calkins, 1996). Thus, given that dysregulated fear is a strong predictor of child anxiety, which relates to this cycle, it may be expected that maternal comforting would relate to lower use of independent, self-focused strategies, but only for toddlers high in dysregulated fear. Further, although more temperamentally fearful toddlers may rely on their caregivers more than less fearful toddlers, they may do so more passively. Therefore, rather than actively seeking proximity to their mothers, toddlers showing dysregulated fear may more passively allow their caregivers to manage their regulation. That is, children’s heightened temperamental anxiety risk may potentially interact with mothers’ comforting behaviors to relate to toddlers’ under-reliance on their own emotion regulation strategies.

The Current Study

Researchers have called for studies examining the association between specific caregiver behaviors and toddler emotion regulation efforts (Calkins, 1994; Calkins et al., 1998; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2004; Gratz et al., 2018; Kopp, 1989). Given the additional demonstrated need for investigations of how temperamental factors (e.g., dysregulated fear) may moderate the relationship between parent and toddler emotion regulation efforts (e.g., Calkins & Johnson, 1998; Cassidy, 1994; Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2003; Thompson & Goodvin, 2007), it is critical that we further our understanding of these associations. In doing so, we hope to lay the groundwork for future work examining how emotion regulatory processes may unfold for children who are at temperamental risk for anxiety problems. We presently seek to address this gap in the literature through two main study aims.

First, we aimed to understand associations among the specific maternal behavior of physical comforting, toddler dysregulated fear, and toddlers’ specific emotion regulatory strategies (attention-shifting, caregiver-focused behaviors, and self-soothing behaviors). We hypothesized that greater toddler dysregulated fear would relate to higher levels of maternal physical comfort and to toddlers’ greater use of regulatory strategies. Second, we tested the moderating role of toddlers’ dysregulated fear on the association between maternal physical comfort and toddlers’ emotion regulation strategy use. We hypothesized that maternal comforting and toddlers’ emotion regulation behaviors would be positively related at low levels of dysregulated fear and less related or negatively related at higher levels of toddler dysregulated fear. We included several considerations to strengthen results from this aim. We investigated toddlers’ biological sex, given that female toddlers may be exposed to more extrinsic emotion regulation from their mothers (Grolnick et al., 1998), may be more likely to engage in certain emotion regulation behaviors themselves (Buss et al., 2008; Premo & Kiel, 2014; Zimmermann & Stansbury, 2003), and may be at heightened risk for emotion dysregulation predicting anxiety (Bender, Reinholdt-Dunne, Esbj0rn, & Pons, 2012), as compared to male toddlers. In order to better isolate the unique effects of dysregulated (context-inappropriate) fear, we also measured normative (context-appropriate) fear. We acknowledge that it is difficult to disentangle the reactivity component of temperament from regulation efforts. It is possible, for example, that caregiver-focused regulation could be an aspect of the fear response rather than distinct from it. Controlling for normative fear helps (albeit imperfectly) remove shared variance between these constructs. Further, in line with the majority of studies examining mothers as the caregiver of focus, we also concentrate on mothers.

Method

Participants

Participants included 117 24-month-old toddlers (46.2% female) and their mothers, who were recruited by mail from birth announcements published in local newspapers and meetings of the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program. WIC is a program aimed at providing resources to mothers who have a low income and are pregnant or have young children. Mothers identified themselves and their toddlers, respectively, as European American (87.2%, 81.2%, African American (2.6%, 6.8%), Asian American (6.0%, 7.7%), American Indian (0.9%, 0.9%), multiracial (0%. 1.7%) or another racial background (3.5%, 1.7%). Approximately one-quarter (27.4%) of mothers had less than a college education, with 28.2% graduating from college and 36.8% reporting post-graduate work (nine mothers [7.6%] did not report their education). According to the Hollingshead Four-Factor Index (Hollingshead, 1975), which can range from scores of 8 to 66, a wide range of socioeconomic backgrounds were represented, with the average being approximately middle-class (M = 49.74, SD = 11.93, Range = 17 to 66).

Procedure

All procedures were approved by the university’s IRB. Mothers expressed interest in participating by sending in a response postcard from a mailing or by signing up in person at a WIC meeting. Laboratory staff called the mother to provide additional details about participation and to schedule a laboratory visit. In the interim, staff mailed the mother a packet containing a consent form and a packet of questionnaires to be returned at the visit. At the laboratory, a primary experimenter (E1) greeted the mother and toddler and brought them to the laboratory for a brief acclimation period. E1 explained all of the laboratory procedures that would occur over approximately an hour and a half. This study focuses on three standardized tasks (Buss, 2011; Buss & Goldsmith, 2000; Nachmias et al., 1996) that occurred in the same order for all participants, with additional breaks and tasks in between.

In the Clown episode (5 minutes), E1 showed the mother and toddler into an empty room and stated that a game would be starting shortly. A few seconds later, a secondary experimenter (E2) entered the room, dressed in a clown costume, colorful wig, and red nose. In a friendly and inviting tone, she introduced herself and stated she had toys and games in her bag. She then invited the child to play three games (blowing bubbles, catch with beach balls, musical instruments), which each lasted approximately 1 minute. After the games, E2 invited the child to help her clean up, said goodbye, and left the room. For the Puppet Show episode (4 minutes), E1 led the mother and child into the room and then excused herself. In the far corner, E2 sat behind a wooden stage and controlled two plush animal puppets. The puppets emerged from behind the curtain of the stage, introduced themselves in a friendly manner, and invited the child to play two 1-minute games (catch and a magnetic fishing game) according to a standardized script. The puppets then presented the child with a sticker and asked the child to retrieve it from them. After the puppet show ended, E2 emerged from behind the stage and invited the child to try on the puppets. Finally, in the Spider episode (2.5 minutes), E1 asked the mother to sit in a chair with her child on her lap until the episode started. On the opposite side of the room sat a plush spider affixed to a remote-controlled truck hidden under a box. After E1 left the room, the spider, controlled from behind a one-way mirror, approached half-way towards the child, paused for 10 seconds, then retreated to its starting place. After another 10-second pause, it approached all the way to the child, paused another 10 seconds, and retreated to its starting place. E1 then came back into the room and invited the child to touch the spider with up to three friendly prompts. All episodes were recorded for offline behavioral coding. At the end of the visit, mothers were provided a nominal payment ($10) for their time and toddlers received a small gift (worth < $5).

Separate teams of research assistants were trained in the coding of toddlers’ emotion regulatory behaviors, toddler dysregulated fear, and maternal behaviors. Coders reached a minimum inter-rater reliability standard (intraclass correlation coefficient or kappa > .80) with a master coder prior to coding independently. Within each team, different coders scored each episode. The master coder double-scored approximately 20% of cases to assess inter-rater reliability throughout coding. The master coder discussed discrepancies with coders to prevent coder drift. Final reliability estimates were estimated as percent-agreement (due to the large number of “absent” scores) prior to the resolution of discrepancies and are reported in the description of each measure.

Measures

Toddler emotion regulatory behaviors.

Coders scored toddlers for the presence/absence of a number of putative emotion regulatory behaviors each second of each of the three episodes according to a previously established coding scheme (Buss, 2011). Inter-rater reliability was calculated on a second-by-second basis as percent agreement. We did not expect strong correlations among behaviors across episodes (see online supplemental materials), as toddlers may change regulatory strategies according to context-specific demands, but observing them across the three contexts allowed for longer observation periods. Therefore, behaviors were summed across all episodes. Results from principal components analyses support these composites. Attention regulation (% agreement = .98) represented the frequency (number of discrete instances) of either gaze aversion (brief glances away from the stimulus without an apparent focus) or distraction (attention focused away from the stimulus on a target for 2 or more seconds). These behaviors loaded on a single component explaining 38.30% of their variance (loadings = .54 to .68). Caregiver-focused regulation represented the summed frequencies of looks to the mother (% agreement = .95) and toddler-directed efforts to increase proximity to the mother (e.g., walking towards, leaning into, reaching for her; % agreement = 1.00). These behaviors loaded on a single component explaining 49.22% of their variance (loadings = .66 to .74). Self-focused regulation (% agreement = .91) represented the duration (number of seconds) of fidgeting (quick, nervous movements of the hands/arms, feet, or whole body), self-stimulation (rhythmic and repetitive physical movements such as caressing oneself or the mother, sucking thumb/fingers, twirling hair), or self-touching (non-moving contact with oneself, such as placing the hand on the face). These behaviors loaded on a single component explaining 50.08% of their variance (loadings = .22 to .85).

Toddler dysregulated fear and normative fear.

In each of the episodes, toddlers received one score each for distress/negative affect and shyness/withdrawal on a 5-point scale. Inter-rater reliability was calculated as an ICC. Distress/negative affect (ICC = .84) was scored for overall levels of negative facial expressions and distress vocalizations (1 = none, 2 = one or two brief displays of low intensity distress, 3 = many or long displays of low intensity distress, 4 = a few displays of high intensity distress or consistent displays of low intensity distress, 5 = distress that lasts the whole episode, is very intense, or results in the episode being terminated). Shyness/withdrawal (ICC = .86) was scored for the extent to which the toddler hesitated in, avoided, and/or withdrew from interaction with the stimulus (1 = none, 2 = one instance of withdrawal or generally reduced activity, 3 = tense in posture, instances of hiding face or putting head down, 4 = very tense, inactive, froze, requests to leave, or avoidant for most of episode, 5 = extreme shyness, freezing, never leaves mother’s lap, totally avoidant/resistant for entire episode). Following results from the validation of the dysregulated fear construct (Buss, 2011), distress/negative affect and shyness scores from the Spider episode (r = .62, p < .001) were averaged to yield the measure of normative fear, and the four scores from Clown and Puppet Show (rs = .29 to .63, all ps < .01) were averaged to yield dysregulated fear.

Maternal physical comforting behavior.

Mothers were scored each 10-second epoch of each of the three episodes for the extent to which they engaged in physical comfort of the toddler on a 4-point scale (0 = none; 1 = physical contact such as having a hand on the toddler; 2 = active rubbing or stroking, 3 = full embrace). Inter-rater reliability was calculated as an ICC and found to be adequate (ICC = .93). Epoch scores were averaged across each episode. Episode scores were modestly correlated (rs = .14 to .42, ps = .13 to < .001), so we submitted them to a principal components analysis (PCA) to determine the appropriate course for data reduction. The PCA suggested that they loaded on one component (loadings = .57 to .82) explaining 52.09% of their shared variance. Thus, the three scores were averaged across episodes for the final score.

Results

Descriptive Statistics and Bivariate Associations

In order to detect medium effect sizes with power of .80, alpha of .05, and up to seven predictors in multiple regression models, power analyses suggested a minimum of 103 participants. Our sample of 117 is thus adequately powered for our most complex models. We conducted several preliminary tests in preparation for the primary analyses. First, we investigated the validity of designating scores from the Spider episode as normative fear and scores from the Clown and Puppet Show episodes as dysregulated fear. Indeed, a paired sample t-test revealed that normative fear was significantly higher than dysregulated fear (t[116] = 9.72, p < .001; Cohen’s d = 1.08). Descriptive statistics for primary variables are presented in Table 1. All primary variables showed reasonable adherence to normal distributions (skew < |2.00| and kurtosis < |4.00|), so no statistical transformations were employed. All participants were able to be scored for primary variables, so handling of missing data was not required.

Table 1.

Descriptive Statistics and Bivariate Correlations for Primary Study Variables

Variable Mean (SD) Range 2 3 4 5 6
1. Attention regulation 5.78 (4.55) 0.00–23.00 .15 .14 .18t .30** .13
2. Caregiver-focused regulation 17.06 (9.88) 1.00–54.00 — .15 .10 .23* .13
3. Self-focused regulation 133.02 (86.40) 6.00–397.00 — .01 .29** −.03
4. Maternal comforting 0.42 (0.27) 0.00–1.14 — .50*** .58***
5. Dysregulated fear 1.92 (0.73) 1.00–3.75 — .31**
6. Normative fear 2.97 (1.16) 1.00–5.00 —
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Note. Attention regulation and caregiver-focused regulation represent the sum of frequencies of relevant behaviors across three laboratory tasks. Self-focused regulation represents the sum of durations of relevant behaviors across the three tasks.

t

p < .10,

*

p < .05,

**

p < .01,

***

p < .001

T-tests were examined to determine whether toddler biological sex should be included as a covariate. Attention regulation and self-focused regulation did not differ by toddler biological sex (ts < 1.60, ps > .10), but caregiver-focused regulation was higher in girls (M = 19.35, SD = 10.68) than in boys (M = 15.10, SD = 8.75; t[115] = −2.37, p = .020; Cohen’s d = 0.44).

Therefore, toddler biological sex was included in the analysis for caregiver-focused regulation.

Correlations among primary variables (Table 1) revealed that, in line with the first hypothesis, dysregulated fear was positively related to each of the emotion regulatory strategies. Dysregulated fear was also related to maternal comforting behavior.1 See the online supplemental materials for bivariate scatterplots. Thus, both mothers and toddlers engaged in higher regulatory efforts as toddlers showed increased dysregulated fear.

Moderation Analyses

We used multiple linear regression to test three moderation models. In each model, one of the toddler regulatory behaviors acted as the dependent variable. Predictors included maternal comforting, dysregulated fear, and their cross-product. Predictors were centered at their means prior to creating the interaction term. In order to understand the unique aspects of each regulatory behavior, the other two behaviors were included as covariates in the model. Further, in order to isolate effects unique to dysregulated fear, rather than fear more generally, we controlled for normative fear. All covariates were also centered at their means. Finally, toddler biological sex was related to caregiver-focused regulatory behaviors, so we controlled for toddler biological sex in that analysis only. Toddler biological sex was dummy coded with males = 0 and females = 1. If the interaction was non-significant, we dropped it and examined main effects of maternal comforting and dysregulated fear in relation to the emotion regulatory behavior. In the case of a significant interaction, we probed by examining the simple slopes of maternal comforting within the model, with dysregulated fear centered at standard values (−1 SD, mean, +1 SD). We also examined the region of significance, which determines the precise value of dysregulated fear at which the relation between maternal comforting and the regulatory behavior shifts from non-significance to significance. We provide squared semi-partial correlations (sr2) as effect sizes for individual regression coefficients.

In the first model, maternal comforting behavior did not interact with dysregulated fear to predict toddler attention regulatory behaviors (Table 2). After dropping the interaction and rerunning the analysis, the model was significant (R2 = .10, F[5,111] = 2.54, p = .032). The only individual coefficient to reach significance was dysregulated fear (b = 1.53, SE = 0.70, 95% CI [0.15, 2.91], β = 0.25, t = 2.20, p = .03, sr2 = .039). Thus, higher dysregulated fear related to higher frequency of attention regulatory behaviors above and beyond normative fear, maternal comforting behavior, and shared variance with other regulatory behaviors. A post-hoc follow-up analysis suggested that gaze aversion may be driving this result more than distraction, although the composite yielded a higher standardized beta and squared semi-partial correlation than either of its components. More information is available from the authors upon request.

Table 2.

Moderation Analyses Predicting Toddlers’ Attention Regulatory Behavior

Variable b (SE) 95% CI β t p Sr2
DV: Attention regulation
Normative fear 0.13 (0.44) [−0.74, 1.01] 0.03 0.30 .762 .001
Caregiver-focused regulation 0.04 (0.04) [−0.05, 0.13] 0.08 0.88 .380 .006
Self-focused regulation 0.00 (0.01) [−0.01, 0.01] 0.06 0.61 .541 .003
Maternal comforting 0.37 (2.1l) [−3.81, 4.55] 0.02 0.18 .862 .000
Dysregulated fear 1.46 (0.73) [0.01, 2.92] 0.24 2.00 .048 .033
Comforting x Dysregulated Fear 0.67 (2.30) [−3.88, 5.22] 0.03 0.29 .771 .001
DV: Caregiver-focused regulation
Toddler biological sex 3.56 (1.82) [−0.05, 7.16] 0.18 1.95 .053 .030
Normative fear 0.31 (0.95) [−1.57, 2.92] 0.04 0.33 .745 .001
Attention regulation 0.19 (0.20) [−0.21, 0.60] 0.09 0.95 .343 .007
Self-focused regulation 0.00 (0.01) [−0.02, 0.02] −0.00 −0.03 .978 .000
Maternal comforting −0.46 (4.51) [−9.39, 8.47] −0.01 −0.10 .919 .000
Dysregulated fear 3.08 (1.57) [−0.03, 6.18] 0.23 1.97 .052 .030
Comforting x Dysregulated Fear −10.83 (4.82) [−20.40, −1.26] −0.23 −2.24 .027 .040
DV: Self-focused regulation
Normative fear −10.10 (7.81) [−25.57, 5.38] −0.14 −1.29 .199 .012
Attention regulation 1.04 (1.70) [−2.32, 4.40] 0.06 0.61 .541 .003
Caregiver-focused regulation 0.18 (0.79) [−1.38, 1.74] 0.02 0.23 .818 .000
Maternal comforting −11.39 (37.57) [−85.83, 63.06] −0.04 −0.30 .762 .001
Dysregulated fear 49.75 (12.41) [25.16, 74.33] 0.42 4.01 .000 .116
Comforting × Dysregulated Fear −136.36 (38.83) [−213.30, −59.42] −0.33 −3.51 .001 .088
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Note. Attention regulation model fit: R2 = .10; F[6, 110] = 2.12, p = .057. Caregiver-focused regulation model fit: R2 = .14; F[7, 109] = 2.56, p = .018. Self-focused regulation model fit: R2 = .21; F[6, 110] = 4.91, p < .001. All predictor variables were centered at their means. sr2 = squared semi-partial correlation.

In the second model (Table 3), the hypothesized interaction was significant: maternal comforting behavior interacted with dysregulated fear to predict caregiver-focused regulation. Probing this interaction (Figure 1) revealed that maternal comforting behavior did not relate to caregiver-focused regulation at low (b = 7.47, SE = 6.32, 95% CI [−5.04, 19.99], β = 0.21, t = 1.18, p = .239, sr2 = .011) or mean (b = −0.46, SE = 4.51, 95% CI [−9.38, 8.47], β = −0.01, t = - 0.10, p = .919, sr2 = .000) dysregulated fear. The relation became increasingly negative but did not reach significance at high dysregulated fear (b = −8.39, SE = 5.07, 95% CI [−18.44, 1.67], β = −0.23, t = −0.65, p = .101, sr2 = .022). Given this pattern, we chose to also probe at +2 SD above the mean of dysregulated fear, which we confirmed was a value within the observed range of dysregulated fear. At +2 SD, the relation between maternal comforting behavior and toddler caregiver-focused regulation was negative and statistically significant (b = −16.32, SE = 7.94, 95% CI [−31.17, −1.47], β = −0.45, t = −2.18, p = .032, sr2 = .037). The region of significance suggested that the relation between maternal comforting behavior and toddler caregiver-focused regulation shifted to significance at 1.45 SD above the mean of dysregulated fear. Thus, as dysregulated fear became more extreme, a negative relation existed between maternal comforting behavior and toddler caregiver-focused regulation.

Figure 1.

Figure 1.

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Interactions between maternal comforting and toddler dysregulated fear (DF) in relation to toddler caregiver-focused (top) and toddler self-focused (bottom) regulatory behaviors. Each interaction was significant. Simple slopes were significant at high (+2 SD, +1 SD, respectively) dysregulated fear. Regions of significance were found to be 1.45 SD below the mean for caregiver-focused regulation and 0.63 SD below the mean for self-focused regulation.

*p < .05, **p < .01.

In the final model (Table 3), the interaction between maternal comforting behavior and toddler dysregulated fear was significant in relation to toddler self-focused regulation. Probing of the interaction (Table 2) revealed that maternal comforting did not relate to toddler self-focused regulation at low (b = 88.45, SE = 52.23, 95% CI [−15.06, 191.97], β = 0.28, t = 1.69, p = .093, sr2 = .020) or mean (b = −11.39, SE = 37.57, 95% CI [−85.83, 63.06], β = −0.04, t = −0.30, p = .762, sr2 = .001) dysregulated fear, but the simple slope did reach significance at high dysregulated fear (b = −111.22, SE = 41.36, 95% CI [−193.18, −29.26], β = −0.35, t = −2.69, p = .008, sr2 = .052). The region of significance suggested that the relation between maternal comforting and toddler self-focused regulation shifted to a significance negative relation at 0.63 SD above the mean of dysregulated fear. Thus, at high levels of dysregulated fear, increased maternal comforting related to decreased self-focused regulation.

Discussion

Theory and previous empirical literature support the idea that both extrinsic and intrinsic factors influence children’s emotion regulation. This suggests that both caregiver behavior and toddler temperament would relate to toddlers’ displays of specific regulatory behaviors, although surprisingly few studies consider both sources of regulation simultaneously. Further, in line with several developmental theories, intrinsic factors such as toddler temperament may determine the extent to which caregiver behaviors relate toddler behavior, but this has also not previously been investigated. To this end, the current study examined whether caregiver comforting behavior and toddler temperament (dysregulated fear) interacted in their relation to toddlers’ displays of three types of emotion regulatory behaviors: attention regulation, caregiver-focused regulation, and self-focused regulation. We measured maternal comforting behavior during a laboratory novelty task and assessed a component of toddler inhibited temperament, dysregulated fear, which specifically involves fear responses in low-threat contexts. We accounted for normative fear, shared variance among emotion regulatory behaviors, and toddlers’ biological sex when appropriate. Results supported some, but not all, hypotheses.

In line with our first hypothesis, we found positive associations among dysregulated fear, maternal comforting behavior, and each of the regulatory behaviors. This is consistent with previous studies showing positive relations between other measures of fear and inhibited temperament, on the one hand, and specific regulatory behaviors, on the other (Buss & Goldsmith, 1998; Mangelsdorf et al., 1995). One possible interpretation of these results is that, as toddlers demonstrate more dysregulated fear, both mothers and toddlers engage in more behavior to manage this fear. It is also possible that, rather than regulation, some of these behaviors (particularly caregiver-focused strategies) represent the fear response itself. Given the concurrent nature of these data, it is not possible to determine whether temperament drives these relations, or whether the opposite direction of effects may be occurring. Future studies employing longitudinal designs may be better able to disentangle the directionality of these relations.

Contrary to our hypothesis, maternal comforting behavior did not interact with dysregulated fear in relation to attention regulatory behaviors. However, dysregulated fear related to toddlers’ use of attention regulation behaviors above and beyond normative fear, maternal comforting behavior, and other regulatory behaviors. Thus, dysregulated fear seems to have a unique relation to this specific regulatory strategy. Within the components of our attention regulation composite, results were upheld with gaze aversion, but not distraction. Given that distraction may be a more mature strategy in samples slightly older than ours (30–36 months; Cole, Bendezú, Ram, & Chow, 2017), it is possible different results would emerge with an older sample. A pattern of heightened attention away from novel stimuli in children high in dysregulated fear may be somewhat inconsistent with previous literature showing that temperamentally inhibited children show vigilance towards threatening stimuli (Pérez-Edgar et al., 2010). However, the relation between inhibited temperament and attention is complex, with studies finding that both high and low levels of attention bias (or bias both towards and away from threat) may indicate anxiety risk (Morales, Pérez-Edgar, & Buss, 2015; Morales, Taber- Thomas, & Pérez-Edgar, 2017). If attention patterns are assumed to be maladaptive in toddlers characterized by dysregulated fear, this might suggest that the attention “regulation” observed in the current study (gaze aversion and distraction) actually represents avoidance, which perpetuates the maladaptive nature of dysregulated fear and predicts anxiety-related outcomes. On the other hand, the heightened reactivity associated with dysregulated fear may necessitate increased regulation, and the positive association between dysregulated fear and attention regulation could indicate that, for the most part, children high in dysregulated fear are engaging in more adaptive regulation. Temperament (i.e., behavioral inhibition and, by extension, dysregulated fear) is not synonymous with anxiety (Pérez-Edgar & Guyer, 2014) so it could be that, at this stage of development, most children are still reverting to adaptive regulation. Finally, attention regulation may not, by itself, indicate an adaptive or maladaptive response but rather provide a context in which dysregulated fear predicts outcomes. Attention-shifting, an aspect of effortful control, is thought to appropriately regulate negative affect. When inhibited children are high in effortful control, they are less likely to develop anxiety (Lonigan & Vasey, 2009). We cannot conclude whether increased attention regulation from toddlers high in dysregulated fear is adaptive or maladaptive. Future studies examining the outcomes of such regulation for these children, such as whether in the context of high dysregulated fear, attention regulation behaviors predict lessened or heightened anxiety risk, would be able to shed light on this issue.

It was surprising that maternal comforting behavior did not also show a relation to toddlers’ attention regulation in the context of dysregulated fear. If more fearful toddlers engage in more attention regulation, regardless of maternal behavior, this would indicate that they are engaging in attention regulation whether or not they are being comforted by their mothers. Perhaps attention regulation does not play a role in the transactional mother-child interactions that shape children towards or away from anxiety. Rather, it could be a more uniformly child-driven behavior, in contrast to caregiver-focused regulation behaviors, which rely on parent-child interaction and the presence of a caregiver. Because attention regulation is less physical and likely occurs in situations both with and without the presence of a caregiver, it may not as affected by maternal behavior as are caregiver-focused or self-focused regulation.

As expected, maternal comforting behavior did interact with dysregulated fear in relation to both caregiver-focused and self-focused regulation. As dysregulated fear became more extreme, there were negative associations between maternal physical comfort and each of these regulatory behaviors. The direction of these relations may indicate that, for children who exhibit more dysregulated fear, a reliance on their mothers’ comforting decreases children’s active engagement in looking to and seeking contact from their mothers, as well as engagement in self- soothing. It is also possible that these toddlers are engaging in other behaviors (freezing and/or attending vigilantly towards the stimulus) instead of these regulatory strategies (see online supplemental materials). Toddlers who are high in context-inappropriate fear may have a history of receiving their mothers’ comfort, whether enacted spontaneously by mothers or elicited directly by the toddlers, so they may come to expect it. Over time, this expectation may reduce the need to either cue their mothers for support or soothe themselves. Perhaps this is an early indication of the anxious-coercive cycle, in which anxiety-prone children and their mothers have reinforced each other to allow the mother to take over regulation processes (Dadds & Roth, 2001). Previous studies have shown that inhibited temperament and parenting characterized by high levels of comfort (e.g., overprotection) interact to predict children’s anxious outcomes (Degnan et al., 2008; Rubin et al., 2009). If a negative effect of the combination of dysregulated fear and parental comforting on children’s repertoire of regulatory strategies is the underlying mechanism and it continues over time, these toddlers may be at risk for deficits in independent coping. Future studies may be able to further elucidate these transactional processes by studying contingencies between infant and maternal behaviors leading up to and beyond toddlerhood, and determining if they do indeed predict anxiety-relevant outcomes. The nature of the interactions suggests that the negative relation between comforting and toddlers’ caregiver-focused strategies requires a more extreme level of dysregulated fear than comforting’s negative relation to selffocused strategies. Thus, caution should be taken in interpreting these regulatory behaviors together. It may be that decreased caregiver-focused regulation is a more integral aspect of parent-child dynamics leading to children’s risk for anxiety, but longitudinal studies assessing these constructs in relation to anxiety outcomes would be required to support this idea. We suggest that attempting to understand the clinical implications for the subset of dyads in which toddlers are characterized by high dysregulated fear, high attention regulation, and low levels of caregiver-focused and self-focused regulatory behaviors, and in which mothers are characterized by a high level of comforting behavior, would be of particular importance.

The current study had several strengths, including the use of observation for all primary measures, and the simultaneous consideration of both extrinsic and intrinsic factors as correlates of toddlers’ emotion regulatory behaviors. The results of the current study point towards additional future directions as well. We studied an unselected community sample. It is important to determine whether similar relations occur in populations of toddlers known to be at risk for anxiety (e.g., when parents have been diagnosed with anxiety disorders). We focused on mothers; future studies may elucidate how temperament and paternal behaviors interact in relation to toddlers’ emotion regulatory behaviors. Physical play may be additionally relevant for fathers. Future work may also expand this type of investigation into more diverse populations that differ on parents’ typical beliefs about and responses to children’s emotions, as the homogeneity of our sample should be considered a limitation. Our concurrent design prohibits conclusions about developmental processes. Of note, the effect sizes in the current study were in the small to medium range, suggesting that other variables not measured in the current study are also important to the emotion regulatory behaviors. Finally, although the use of the two low-threat episodes is consistent with previous establishment and validation of the dysregulated fear construct (Buss, 2011), it is possible that important nuances exist between different low threat contexts, as viewing a clown may be more novel and potentially overwhelming than playing with puppets. Future work may examine features of these episodes more specifically.

Conclusion

The literature has called for investigations of specific parenting behaviors and the simultaneous examination of these behaviors and child temperament in relation to children’s emotion regulatory behaviors. The current study found that maternal comforting behavior and toddler dysregulated fear each related to attention regulation, caregiver-focused regulation, and self-focused regulation. However, when toddlers were higher in dysregulated fear, more maternal comforting related to toddlers’ lower use of caregiver- and self-focused regulatory behaviors. These results point to the need to consider the interacting influences of both maternal and child characteristics on children’s behavioral emotion regulation strategies.

Supplementary Material

Supplemental Material

Acknowledgments

The project from which these data were derived was supported, in part, by a National Research Service Award from the National Institute of Mental Health (F31 MH077385–01) and a University of Missouri Department of Psychological Sciences Dissertation Grant granted to Elizabeth Kiel, and a grant to Kristin Buss from the National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH075750). Elizabeth Kiel was additionally supported by R15 HD076158 from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development during the writing of the manuscript. We express our appreciation to the families and toddlers who participated in this project. Data are available via Miami University’s Scholarly Commons: http://hdl.handle.net/2374.MIA/6332

Footnotes

1

To examine whether low-fear children are not receiving comfort simply because they approached the stimulus, we examined scores of toddler approach behavior. Across episodes, a pattern of correlations suggested that faster and greater approach related to lower dysregulated fear and less physical comfort, so approach related to both toddler and maternal characteristics. Approach did not appear to interfere with caregiver-focused regulation, as these behaviors were either not related or positively related. In the Clown episode, toddlers who showed a longer latency, in seconds, to approach and had lower frequencies and durations (in seconds) of approach behavior had higher dysregulated fear scores (rs = 0.53, −.51, −.50, respectively, all ps < .001), and received more comforting in that episode (r = .61, −.37, −.40, respectively, all ps < .001). Approach did not, however, relate to caregiver-focused regulation (rs = −.10 to .13, all ps > .10). In Puppet Show, toddlers who showed longer latency and less frequency and duration in approach were higher on dysregulated fear (rs = .40, −.33, −.18, ps = .056 to < .001, respectively) and received more maternal comforting (rs = .30, −.33, −.25, ps < .01, respectively). In this case, more frequent (r = .28, p = .002) and higher-duration (r = .35, p < .001) approach related to greater caregiver-focused regulation. In Spider, children who took longer to approach and engaged in less frequent and less duration of approach were higher in dysregulated fear (rs = .19, −.16, −.24, ps = .041, .079, −.241, respectively) and received more comforting (r = .50, −.44, −.47, ps < .001, respectively). Less caregiver-focused regulation was related to longer latency to approach (r = −.24,p = .008) and marginally related to higher frequency of approach (r = .16, p = .084).

Contributor Information

Elizabeth J. Kiel, Miami University

Natalee N. Price, Miami University

Julie E. Premo, University of Michigan

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