Parental Emotion Socialisation and Blame in children with emotional and behavioural difficulties

Difficulties with Emotion Regulation (ER) has been linked to the expression of emotional and behavioural difficulties in children in the literature. Self-blame and blaming others have been conceptualised as two specific maladaptive cognitive ER strategies, which previous research has suggested are significantly related to psychopathology in children and adults. Despite this, and in comparison to other maladaptive cognitive ER strategies, relatively little investigation specifically focusing on these putative strategies has been carried out. Therefore, this thesis examines a synthesis of the current literature in relation to self-blame and other blame and their role in emotional and behavioural difficulties in children, as well as an empirical study assessing the role of parental emotion socialisation on blame ER strategies in children with emotional and behavioural difficulties. (i) A systematic review and meta-analysis assessing the use of self-blame and blaming others and their relationship with internalising and externalising behaviour in normative middle childhood was carried out. Ten studies assessing self-blame and internalising and externalising behaviour were examined. No studies assessing blaming others in this population met the search parameters. A positive correlation with a small-to-medium effect was found between self-blame and internalising and externalising behaviour. While not an intended outcome, all studies included in the meta-analysis examined self-blame in the context of interparental conflict. Implications of this are discussed in the thesis. (ii) . Sixty three parents of children with and without clinical diagnoses participated in a cross-sectional assessment study examining the role of parental emotion socialisation on blame ER strategies in children with emotional and behavioural difficulties. Findings suggested parents with parenting styles which included Punish and Override were more likely to identify that their children blamed others as an emotion regulation strategy. Males were also more likely to be identified as children who primarily blamed others. Potential implications of the research are discussed.