Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Emotional Development: Cultural Influences on Young Children’s Emotional Competence

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Children’s Social Worlds in Cultural Context

Abstract

Children’s emotional development follows a complex trajectory, characterized by the interaction of nature and nurture. Although emotional development occurs across the lifespan, basic emotions appear at birth, and secondary or self-conscious emotions appear soon afterward. Children’s emotion socialization often begins with parents, but many others, including peers and teachers, serve as agents of socialization. The goal of emotion socialization is to develop emotional competence in children, setting them up for success within their cultural context. Interactions with parents, other family members, and peers teach children to recognize and understand their own and others’ emotions. Children also quickly learn culturally acceptable ways to express and regulate their emotions. Parental ethnotheories reflect cultural beliefs about emotions and subsequently influence the ways parents respond to and reminisce about emotional behaviors and events with their children. Though gender and socioeconomic differences also affect the emotion socialization of children, culture has a pervasive influence on emotional competence. Simply put, the study of emotional development cannot be separated from culture.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Adams, S., Kuebli, J., Boyle, P. A., & Fivush, R. (1995). Gender differences in parent-child conversations about past emotions: A longitudinal investigation. Sex Roles, 33(5–6), 309–323.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ahn, H. J. (2005). Child care teachers’ strategies in children’s socialization of emotion. Early Child Development and Care, 175(1), 49–61. https://doi.org/10.1080/0300443042000230320.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ahn, H. J., & Stifter, C. (2006). Child care teachers’ response to children’s emotional expression. Early Education and Development, 17(2), 253–270. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15566935eed1702_3.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bassett, H. H., Denham, S. A., Fettig, N. B., Curby, T. W., Mohtasham, M., & Austin, N. (2017). Temperament in the classroom: Children low in surgency are more sensitive to teachers’ reactions to emotions. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 41(1), 4–14. https://doi.org/10.1177/0165025416644077.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blankson, A. N., O’Brien, M., Leerkes, E. M., Marcovitch, S., Calkins, S. D., & Weaver, J. M. (2013). Developmental dynamics of emotion and cognition processes in preschoolers. Child Development, 84(1), 346–360. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2012.01841.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Brophy-Herb, H. E., Horodynski, M., Dupuis, S. B., Bockneck, E., Schiffman, R., Onaga, E., et al. (2009). Early emotional development in infants and toddlers: Perspectives of early Head Start staff and parents. Infant Mental Health Journal, 30, 203–222. https://doi.org/10.1002/imhj.20211.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brown, J. R., & Dunn, J. (1996). Continuities in emotion understanding from 3 to 6 years. Child Development, 67(3), 789–802. https://doi.org/10.2307/1131861.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bush, C. D. (2016). The socialization of emotion through negative emotional reminiscing with children (unpublished master’s thesis). Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC, USA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Camras, L. A., Chen, Y., Bakeman, R., Norris, K., & Cain, T. R. (2006). Culture, ethnicity, and children’s facial expressions: A study of European American, Mainland Chinese, Chinese American, and adopted Chinese girls. Emotion, 6, 103–114.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Carver, L. J., & Vaccaro, B. G. (2007). 12-month old infants allocate increased neural resources to stimuli associated with negative adult emotion. Developmental Psychology, 43, 54–69.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chaplin, T. M., & Aldao, A. (2013). Gender differences in emotion epression in children: A meta-analytic review. Psychological Review, 139, 735–765.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chen, X., Chang, L., He, Y., & Liu, H. (2005). The peer group as a context: Moderating effects on relations between maternal parenting and social and school adjustment in Chinese children. Child Development, 76(2), 417–434. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2005.00854.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Conger, R. D., & Dogan, S. J. (2007). Social class and socialization in families. In J. E. Grusec & P. D. Hastings (Eds.), Handbook of socialization: Theory and research (pp. 433–460). New York: Guilford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Coppola, G., Ponzetti, S., & Vaughn, B. E. (2014). Reminiscing style during conversations about emotion-laden events and effects of attachment security among Italian mother–child dyads. Social Development, 23(4), 702–718.

    Google Scholar 

  • Curby, T. W., Brock, L. L., & Hamre, B. K. (2013). Teachers’ emotional support consistency predicts children’s achievement gains and social skills. Early Education and Development, 24(3), 292–309. https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2012.665760.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Davidson, R. J., Fox, A., & Kalin, N. H. (2007). Neural bases of emotion regulation in non-human primates and humans. In J. J. Gross (Ed.), Handbook of emotion regulation (pp. 47–68). New York, NY: Guilford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Denham, S. A. (1989). Maternal affect and toddlers’ social-emotional competence. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 59(3), 368–376.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Denham, S. A., & Grout, L. (1992). Mothers’ emotional expressiveness and coping: Relations with preschoolers’ social-emotional competence. Genetic, Social, and General Psychology Monographs, 118(1), 73–101.

    Google Scholar 

  • Denham, S. A., Zoller, D., & Couchoud, E. A. (1994). Socialization of preschoolers’ emotion understanding. Developmental Psychology, 30(6), 928–936. https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.30.6.928.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Denham, S. A., Mitchell-Copeland, J., Strandberg, K., Auerbach, S., & Blair, K. (1997). Parental contributions to preschoolers’ emotional competence: Direct and indirect effects. Motivation and Emotion, 21(1), 65–86.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Denham, S. A., Blair, K. A., DeMulder, E., Levitas, J., Sawyer, K., Auerbach-Major, S., et al. (2003). Preschool emotional competence: Pathway to social competence. Child Development, 74(1), 238–256. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8624.00533.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Denham, S. A., Bassett, H. H., & Miller, S. L. (2017). Early childhood teachers’ socialization of emotion: Contextual and individual contributors. Child & Youth Care Forum, 46(6), 805–824. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10566-017-9409-y.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Diemer, M. A., Mistry, R. S., Wadsworth, M. E., Lόpez, I., & Reimers, F. (2013). Best practices in conceptualizing and measuring social class in psychological research. Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, 13, 77–113.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eisenberg, N., Cumberland, A., & Spinrad, T. L. (1998). Parental socialization of emotion. Psychological Inquiry, 9, 241–273.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eisenberg, N., Liew, J., & Pidada, S. U. (2001a). The relations of parental emotional expressivity with quality of Indonesian children’s social functioning. Emotion, 1, 116–136.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eisenberg, N., Pidada, S., & Liew, J. (2001b). The relations of regulation and negative emotionality to Indonesian children’s social functioning. Child Development, 72, 1747–1763.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eisenberg, N., Liew, J., & Pidada, S. U. (2004). The longitudinal relations of regulation and emotionality to quality of Indonesian children’s socioemotional functioning. Developmental Psychology, 40, 805–812.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eisenberg, N., Sadovsky, A., & Spinrad, T. L. (2005). Associations of emotion-related regulation with language skills, emotion knowledge, and academic outcomes. New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development, 2005(109), 109–118. https://doi.org/10.1002/cd.143.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Elfenbein, H. A., & Ambady, N. (2002). On the universality and cultural specificity of emotion regulation: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 128, 203–235.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Feinman, S. (1992). Social referencing and conformity. In S. Feinman (Ed.), Social referencing and the social construction of reality in infancy (pp. 229–267). New York, NY: Plenum Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Fivush, R. (1991). Gender and emotion in mother-child conversations about the past. Journal of Narrative & Life History, 1(4), 325–341.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fivush, R., & Wang, Q. (2005). Emotion talk in mother-child conversations of the shared past: The effects of culture, gender, and event valence. Journal of Cognition and Development, 6(4), 489–506.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Friedlmeier, W. (2005). Emotional development and culture: Reciprocal contributions of cross-cultural research and developmental psychology. In Friedlmeier, W., Chakkarath, P., & Schwarz, B. (Eds), The importance of cross-cultural research for the social sciences (pp. 125–152). Hove, England: Psychology Press/Erlbaum (UK) Taylor & Francis.

    Google Scholar 

  • Furukawa, E., Tangney, J., & Higashibara, F. (2012). Cross-cultural continuities and discontinuities in shame, guilt, and pride: A study of children residing in Japan, Korea, and the USA. Self and Identity, 11, 90–113.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Garner, P. W., & Spears, F. M. (2000). Emotion regulation in low-income preschoolers. Social Development, 9(2), 246–264. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9507.00122.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gunnar, M. R., & Davis, E. P. (2003). Stress and emotion in early childhood. In Handbook of psychology (pp. 113–134). American Cancer Society. https://doi.org/10.1002/0471264385.wei0605.

  • Gunnar, M. R., & Vazquez, D. (2006). Stress neurobiology and developmental psychopathology. In D. Cicchetti & D. Cohen (Eds.), Developmental psychopathology, vol. 1: Developmental neuroscience (2nd ed., pp. 522–577), New York, NY: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Holodynski, M., & Friedlmeier, W. (2012). Affect and culture. In J. Valsiner (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of culture and psychology (pp. 957–986). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hu, C., Wang, Q., Fu, G., Quinn, P. C., & Lee, K. (2014). Both children and adults scan faces of own and other races differently. Vision Research, 102, 1–10.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Izard, C. E. (2013). Human emotions. Springer Science & Business Media.

    Google Scholar 

  • Johnson, M. H. (2011). Developmental neuroscience, psychophysiology, and genetics. In M. H. Bornstein & M. E. Lamb (Eds.), Developmental science: An advanced textbook (pp. 201–239). New York, NY: Psychology Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Keller, H., & Otto, H. (2009). The cultural socialization of emotion regulation during infancy. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 40(6), 996–1011. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022022109348576.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kim, H. S., Sherman, D. K., & Taylor, S. E. (2008). Culture and social support. American Psychologist, 63(6), 518–526. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kuebli, J., & Fivush, R. (1992). Gender differences in parent-child conversations about past emotions. Sex Roles, 27(11–12), 683–698.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lamm, B., Keller, H., Telser, J., Gudi, H., Yovsi, R. D., Freitag, C., et al. (2018). Waiting for the second treat: Developing culture-specific modes of self-regulation. Child Development, 89, e261–e277.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lee, J. H., Eoh, Y., Jeong, A., & Park, S. H. (2017). Preschoolers’ emotional understanding and psychosocial adjustment in Korea: The moderating effect of maternal attitude towards emotional expressiveness. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 26(7), 1854–1864. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-017-0703-y.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, M. (2008). The emergence of human emotions. In M. Lewis, J. M. Haviland-Jones, & L. Barrett (Eds.), Handbook of emotions (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Guilford Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, M. (2014). The rise of consciousness and the development of emotional life. New York, NY: Guilford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, M., & Michalson, L. (1983). The socialization of emotion. In Children’s emotions and moods (pp. 193–230). Boston, MA: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-3620-4_7.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, M., Sullivan, M. W., Stanger, C., & Weiss, M. (1989). Self-development and self-conscious emotions. Child Development, 60(1), 146–156. https://doi.org/10.2307/1131080.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, M., Alessandri, S. M., & Sullivan, M. W. (1990). Violation of expectancy, loss of control, and anger expressions in young infants. Developmental Psychology, 26(5), 745–751. https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.26.5.745.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lutz, C. (1983). Parental goals, ethnopsychology, and the development of emotional meaning. Ethos, 11, 246–262.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ma, X., Tamir, M., & Miyamoto, Y. (2018). A socio-cultural instrumental approach to emotion regulation: Culture and the regulation of positive emotions. Emotion, 18(1), 138–152. https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0000315.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Matsumoto, D. (2001). Culture and emotion. In D. Matsumoto (Ed.), The handbook of culture and psychology (pp. 171–194). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Matsumoto, D., & Assar, M. (1992). The effects of language on judgments of universal facial expressions of emotion. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 16, 85–99.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McCord, B. L., & Raval, V. V. (2016). Asian Indian immigrant and White American maternal emotion socialization and child socio-emotional functioning. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 25, 464–474.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McCoy, D., & Raver, C. (2011). Caregiver emotional expressiveness, child emotion regulation, and child behavior problems among head start families. Social Development, 20, 741–761. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9507.2011.00608.x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McDowell, D. J., & Parke, R. D. (2000). Differential knowledge of display rules for positive and negative emotions: Influences from parents, influences on peers. Social Development, 9, 415–432.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Melzi, G., & Fernandez, D. (2004). Talking about past emotions: Conversations between Peruvian mothers and their preschool children. Sex Roles, 50, 641–657.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Min, M. C., Islam, M. N., Wang, L., & Takai, J. (2018). Cross-cultural comparison of university students’ emotional competence in Asia. Current Psychology: A Journal for Diverse Perspectives on Diverse Psychological Issues. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-018-9918-3.

  • Nolivos, V., & Leyva, D. (2013). Fun and frustrations: Low-income Chilean parents reminiscing with their children about past emotional experiences. Actualidades En Psicología, 27(115), 31–48.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Okur, Z. E., & Corapci, F. (2016). Turkish children’s expression of negative emotions: Intracultural variations related to socioeconomic status. Infant and Child Development, 25(5), 440–458. https://doi.org/10.1002/icd.1945.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Otto, H. (2014). Don’t show your emotions! Emotion regulation and attachment in the Cameroonian Nso. In H. Otto & H. Keller (Eds.), Different faces of attachment (pp. 215–229). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Otto, H., & Keller, H. (2015). A good child is a calm child: Mothers’ social status, maternal conceptions of proper demeanor, and stranger anxiety in one-year old Cameroonian Nso children. Psihologijske Teme, 24, 1–25.

    Google Scholar 

  • Oyserman, D., Coon, H. M., & Kemmelmeier, M. (2002). Rethinking individualism and collectivism: Evaluation of theoretical assumptions and meta-analyses. Psychological Bulletin, 128, 3–72.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Perry, N. B., Swingler, M. M., Calkins, S. D., & Bell, M. A. (2016). Neurophysiological correlates of attention behavior in early infancy: Implications for emotion regulation during early childhood. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 142, 245–261. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2015.08.007.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Raval, V. V., & Martini, T. S. (2009). Maternal socialization of children’s anger, sadness, and physical pain in two communities in Gujarat, India. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 33, 215–229.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rogoff, B. (2003). The cultural nature of human development. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Super, C. M., & Harkness, S. (1986). The Developmental Niche: A conceptualization at the interface of child and culture. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 9(4), 545–569. https://doi.org/10.1177/016502548600900409.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Taumoepeau, M., & Ruffman, T. (2006). Mother and infant talk about mental states relates to desire language and emotion understanding. Child Development, 77, 465–481. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2006.00882.x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Termine, N. T., & Izard, C. E. (1988). Infants’ responses to their mothers’ expressions of joy and sadness. Developmental Psychology, 24(2), 223–229.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thompson, R. A., Winer, A. C., & Goodwin, R. (2011). The individual child: Temperament, emotion, self, and personality. In M. H. Bornstein & M. E. Lamb (Eds.), Developmental science: An advanced textbook (6th ed., pp. 427–468). New York, NY: Psychology Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tobin, J. J., Wu, D. Y. H., & Davidson, D. H. (1991). Preschool in three cultures: Japan, China, and the United States. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tuminello, E. R., & Davidson, D. (2011). What the face and body reveal: In-group emotion effects and stereotyping of emotion in African American and European American children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 110, 258–274.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Unnithan, N. P. (1993). Review of preschool in three cultures: Japan, China and the United States, by J. J. Tobin, D. Y. H. Wu, & D. H. Davidson, Journal of Comparative Family Studies, 24(1), 153–155.

    Google Scholar 

  • Van Bergen, P., & Salmon, K. (2010). The association between parent-child reminiscing and children’s emotion knowledge. New Zealand Journal of Psychology, 39, 51–56.

    Google Scholar 

  • Voltmer, K., & von Salisch, M. (2017). Three meta-analyses of children’s emotion knowledge and their school success. Learning and Individual Differences, 59, 107–118. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lindif.2017.08.006.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wang, Q. (2003). Emotion situation knowledge in American and Chinese preschool children and adults. Cognition and Emotion, 17(5), 725–746. https://doi.org/10.1080/02699930302285.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wang, Q., & Fivush, R. (2005). Mother-Child conversations of emotionally salient events: Exploring the functions of emotional reminiscing in European-American and Chinese families. Social Development, 14(3), 473–495.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wang, Q., Hutt, R., Kulkofsky, S., McDermott, M., & Wei, R. (2006). Emotion situation knowledge and autobiographical memory in Chinese, immigrant Chinese, and European American 3-year-olds. Journal of Cognition and Development, 7(1), 95–118. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327647jcd0701_5.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Whiting, B. B., & Edwards, C. P. (1988). Children of different worlds: The formation of social behavior. Cambridge, MA, USA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wörmann, V., Holodynski, M., Kärtner, J., & Keller, H. (2014). The emergence of social smiling: The interplay of maternal and Infant imitation during the first three months in cross-cultural comparison. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 45, 339–361.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Yang, Y., & Wang, Q. (2016). The relation of emotion knowledge to coping in European American and Chinese immigrant children. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 25(2), 452–463. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-015-0224-5.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA

    Nicole B. Capobianco

  2. Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC, USA

    Caitlin D. Bush & Deborah L. Best

Authors
  1. Nicole B. Capobianco
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Caitlin D. Bush
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Deborah L. Best
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Deborah L. Best .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia

    Tiia Tulviste

  2. Department of Psychology, Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC, USA

    Deborah L. Best

  3. Department of Psychology, Saint Louis University, Saint Louis, MO, USA

    Judith L. Gibbons

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Capobianco, N.B., Bush, C.D., Best, D.L. (2019). Emotional Development: Cultural Influences on Young Children’s Emotional Competence. In: Tulviste, T., Best, D., Gibbons, J. (eds) Children’s Social Worlds in Cultural Context. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27033-9_5

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation