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Caregivers’ Positive Emotional Expression and Children’s Psychological Functioning after Parental Loss

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Abstract

The death of a loved one, particularly a parent, has been identified as not only the most common, but also the most distressing form of adversity youth may experience in their lifetime. Surviving caregivers’ communication with their children may play a critical role in shaping bereaved children’s psychological functioning. However, few studies have examined the specific content (e.g., word usage) of caregivers’ verbal communication as a predictor of psychological functioning in bereaved youth. In a sample of 39 parentally-bereaved children and their surviving caregivers, we investigated whether the frequency of caregivers’ use of positive emotion words (e.g., “love”, “happy”, “hope”) during a reminiscing task about the deceased was associated with children’s psychological functioning and coping. In a cross-sectional analysis, we specifically examined whether these associations were moderated by the amount of time passed since children lost their parents. The Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count Program (LIWC) was used to code and evaluate the percentage of positive emotion words caregivers used during the discussion. When caregivers used more positive emotion words, children were less likely to experience depression, anxiety, and avoidant coping. Those associations were present for children who had experienced parental loss at least 105 days prior to the study.

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Acknowledgements

This article was based on work supported in part by grant NIMH (K08 MH76078), the Michigan Institute for Clinical and Health Research Grant, the Todd Ouida Clinical Scholars Award, the Rachel Upjohn Clinical Scholars Award, the Laurence Polatsch Memorial Fund, and the Lynn Wilson Memorial Fund – Dr. Julie Kaplow received these awards and funds. Britney Wardecker is partially supported by National Institute on Aging Grant T32 AG049676 to The Pennsylvania State University. We thank Michelle Belke, Alena Grieser, Heather Hammerstrom, Harriett Jones, Georgia Stamatopoulos, and Amanda Tarantowski for their assistance with conducting interviews as well as the Gilda’s Club of Grand Rapids staff for their support. We also wish to thank Amanda Burnside, Hayley Goldenthal, and Emilie Lerner for their assistance with project coordination. Additionally, we greatly appreciate the help of Monica Arkin, Jerri Bamberger, Damia December, Valerie Elsesser, Joanna Gross, Kara Koppinger, Madison Kraus, Mirele Mann, Meredith Merlanti, Maggie O’Reilly Treter, Megan Ramthun, Michael Shain, and Hannah Wolfson for their assistance with data management and data entry. We are especially grateful to all participating families who shared their stories with us.

Funding

This study was funded in part by grant NIMH (K08 MH76078).

Author Contributions

B.M.W.: analyzed the data and wrote the paper. J.B.K.: designed the study and collaborated in the writing and editing of the paper. C.M.L: contributed theoretical insight and edited the final manuscript. R.S.E: collaborated in the editing of the final manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biobehavioral Health, Center for Healthy Aging, The Pennsylvania State University, 428 Biobehavioral Health Building, University Park, PA, 16802, USA

    Britney M. Wardecker

  2. Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Health Science Center, 1941 East Rd., Houston, TX, 77054, USA

    Julie B. Kaplow

  3. UCLA/Duke University National Center for Child Traumatic Stress, & UCLA Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, 11150 W. Olympic Blvd., Los Angeles, CA, 90064, USA

    Christopher M. Layne

  4. Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, 530 Church St., Ann Arbor, MI, 48109, USA

    Robin S. Edelstein

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  1. Britney M. Wardecker
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  2. Julie B. Kaplow
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  3. Christopher M. Layne
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  4. Robin S. Edelstein
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Correspondence to Britney M. Wardecker.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Wardecker, B.M., Kaplow, J.B., Layne, C.M. et al. Caregivers’ Positive Emotional Expression and Children’s Psychological Functioning after Parental Loss. J Child Fam Stud 26, 3490–3501 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-017-0835-0

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