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Promoting healthy emotional development in children

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Abstract

This paper considers the fact that the literature on childrearing has traditionally not dealt with children's emotional processes. Developmental research has moved from a focus on permissive vs. authoritarian parenting attitudes toward a concern with promoting competence and coping skills in children; the prevention literature on effective parenting has been from a behavioral management or communication skills perspective. The argument is presented here that children's emotional expressiveness is a natural coping mechanism which serves a positive function in the prevention of psychopathology and the promotion of mental health, and that mental health professionals need to begin incorporating this information both into the primary prevention literature and training programs in effective parenting.

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Reference notes

  1. A more detailed description of this process can be found in Scheff (1979), Chapter 3.

  2. This discharge is to be distinguished from the persistent high-pitched, irritating cry of the infant “at risk” which, in addition to being a response to present and past discomforts, may also be an adaptive attempt to communicate the need for special attention (Zeskind & Lester, 1978).

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  1. the Department of Psychology, University of Vermont, 05405, Burlington, Vermont

    Phyllis Bronstein

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Bronstein, P. Promoting healthy emotional development in children. J Primary Prevent 5, 92–110 (1984). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01326644

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