Investigating the relationships between meta-emotion approaches, parental stress, outside support, and education levels

Parenting literature has been extensively investigated throughout the years (Baumrind, 1967; Hawk & Holden, 2006; Lewis, 1981; Stettler & Katz, 2014). However, research about parents’ meta-emotion approaches is lacking (Gottman & Declaire, 1997; Norman & Furnes, 2016). The purpose of this current study was to fill gaps in the literature about meta-emotion. Specifically, parental stress, outside parental support, and education levels were investigated in terms of how they influenced parents’ metaemotion approaches. Variables of interest that were also assessed included child’s age, child’s gender, and the number of children in the family. A total of 143 participants completed respective surveys on PsychData. Their responses were analyzed using linear regression. Results indicated that low levels of parental stress were associated with high use of an emotion coaching (EC) meta-emotion approach, while high levels of stress were associated with parents reporting high uses of the parental rejection of negative emotion (PR) and feelings of uncertainty/ineffectiveness in emotion socialization (UI) meta-emotion approaches.