Parental psychological factors of mother-child and father-child reminiscing about negative and positive emotional past experiences

Abstract

Little is known about the significance of parent factors, including attachment representations, depressive symptoms, and personality, in shaping parental elaborative reminiscing, as research has primarily examined child factors for parental reminiscing. Moreover, the majority of research comprises samples of mothers and children, and thus, little is known about the predictors of father-child reminiscing. The current study therefore examined the significance of parent predictors of mothers' (N = 60) and fathers' (N=47) elaboration about past emotional experiences. Mothers higher on deactivation were less elaborative during the hurt event, whereas mothers higher on hyperactivation exhibited more emotion elaboration and greater levels of elaboration when reminiscing the hurt event. Mothers higher on depressive symptoms were more elaborative during the scared event. Fathers higher on positive personality exhibited more emotion elaboration and greater levels of elaboration when reminiscing the scared event. These findings indicate that attachment history and current mood are linked with mothers' (but not fathers') elaboration, whereas more stable personality characteristics are linked with fathers' (but not mothers') elaboration. Findings advance knowledge of the significance of parent factors for their elaboration styles, by indicating that maternal elaboration might be more nuanced to child and contextual cues, whereas paternal elaboration, by contrast, might be more heavily influenced by stable trait characteristics, such as personality.