Sammendrag
Background:
Symptoms of anxiety and depression are prevalent and highly comorbid in children, contributing to
considerable impairment even at a subclinical level. Difficulties with emotion regulation are potentially related to
both anxious and depressive symptoms. Research looking at maternal contributions to children
’
s mental health
dominates the literature but ignores the potentially important contributions of fathers.
Method:
The present study is part of the Coping Kids study in Norway, a randomized controlled study of a new
indicated preventive intervention for children, EMOTION. EMOTION aims to reduce levels of anxious and depressive
symptoms in children aged 8
–
12 years. Using cross sectional data and multiple regression analyses, we investigated
the relations between anxious and depressive symptoms and emotion regulation in
n
= 602 children. Symptoms
were reported by the child, mothers and fathers. Emotion regulation was reported by mothers and fathers.
Results:
Symptoms of anxiety, as reported by parents, were associated with poorer emotion regulation. This
association was also demonstrated for depressive symptoms as reported by both parents and children. When
analyzing same gender reports, parental gender did not differentiate the relationship between anxiety symptoms
and emotion regulation. For depressive symptoms, we did find a differentiating effect of parental gender, as the
association with dysregulation of emotion was stronger in paternal reports, and the association with adaptive
emotion regulation was stronger in maternal reports. When using reports from the opposite parent, the emotion
regulation difficulties were still associated with depressive and anxiety symptoms, however exhibiting somewhat
different emotional regulation profiles.
Conclusion:
Problems with emotion regulation probably coexists with elevated levels of internalizing symptoms in
children. In future research, both caregivers should be included.
Trial registration:
The regional ethics committee (REC) of Norway approved the study. Registration number: 2013/
1909; Project title: Coping Kids: a randomized controlled study of a new indicated preventive intervention for
children with symptoms of anxiety and depression. ClinicalTrials.gov; Protocol ID
228846/H10.
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