Emotional Regulation

Emotional regulation is not a skill we are born with. Helping our kids learn to self-regulate is among parents’ most important tasks. The foundations are laid in the earliest years of life.

Emotional regulation or self regulation is the ability to monitor and modulate to an extent your emotions, when you have them, and how you experience and express them. Learning to self-regulate is a key milestone in child development. A child’s capacity to regulate their emotions affects their relationships with family and friends, academic performance, and long-term mental health. Emotional regulation creates the ability to cope and thrive in our ever more conflicted and stressful world.

Home and school are really no fun with a child who is constantly acting out. The strain at home and at school reinforces the other. Children may be rejected by school mates due to negative behavior. The inability to self-regulate emotions often leads to anger, aggression, withdrawal or anxiety. Those who are withdrawn and rejected by peers are also more likely to get bullied​. All this leads to an increased risk of dropping out of school, delinquency, substance abuse and other behavior problems​.

In contrast, good emotional regulation in children not only positively impacts relationships, but it is also a strong predictor of academic performance and success​.  Students who can self-regulate have better attention and problem-solving capabilities, and they perform better on tasks involving delayed gratification and long-term goals. Effective emotional management allows a student to focus on performing during tests and exams, rather than being impaired by anxiety.

This effect carries on throughout life. An adult who cannot master emotional regulation enjoys less job satisfaction, mental health or general well-being​. If that adult is a parent, they then model poor emotional regulation for their children.

Meanwhile, kids who have learned to regulate their emotions can also better handle and bounce back from trauma or adversity. They have a higher distress tolerance and more resilience. As adults they are better able to model these coping skills for their children.

Some kids have a hard time learning emotional regulation skills, while it comes more naturally to others. Researchers have found that some babies’ temperament is innately more capable of self-regulating than others​. But while genetics are important, the environment a child grows up in is just as important, if not more. Most children can learn to manage their feelings.

Human brains acquire some skills better or more easily during certain periods in life. These optimal times are called sensitive periods or critical periods. After the sensitive period of learning a skill has passed, there is a gradual decline in the ability to become proficient. It is still possible to acquire the new skill, but it will take longer and take more work

The sensitive period of emotional self-regulation is before a child turns two. This doesn’t mean that once a child passes that age, they’ve missed the opportunity to learn self-regulation. It only means it will be more challenging and will take more time and patience. Better to start when kids are young, but it is never too late. 

Parental (or caregiver) modeling is the number one way to teach children self-regulation and has long been recognized as crucial to  children's learning. Kids observe their parents’ every move, internalizing and then mimicking their behaviors. Emotional regulation in children comes from emotional regulation in their role models. Kids learn the “correct” reaction in different situations. They watch how parents master and struggle with intense feelings and impulses​​.

If a parent is reactive, screams or yells whenever something goes wrong, the child learns to be reactive and misbehave when things don’t go their way. If a parent is calm and thinks critically to solve problems, the child learns to stay calm and look for solutions instead of blames. Besides active observation, kids unconsciously sense their parents’ emotions and respond with similar feelings. The younger the child, the stronger is this imitation effect​.

Emotion regulation activities or tools geared towards children should be used as a supplement for kids who don’t have a good role model of emotional regulation to learn from. They should not be used as a replacement for good parental modeling. Whether it is a grandparent, teacher or coach children need at least one person to serve as their emotional role model.

As the child grows older, peer influence begins to join parental influence: Older kids learn about self-regulation through observing and mimicking their peers. However, the parent-adolescent relationship still plays a significant role in the adolescent’s self-regulation​

To help children learn effective emotional control, parents should work to adopt better emotion regulation strategies and to model positive emotions and emotional regulation. Expose kids to a positive environment and to people with good self regulatory skills. Responsive, warm and accepting parenting practices can help children develop good emotional self-regulation.

When parents are responsive, their children associate them with comfort and relief from stress. Kids of responsive parents tend to have a wider range of emotional regulation skills at their disposal. Parents who notice, accept, empathize with and validate their children’s negative feelings tend to affect them positively. They can then coach kids to verbalize how they feel and encourage them to problem-solve. 

But if parents are dismissive or disapprove of expressing emotions, especially negative ones, children may develop destructive emotional regulation methods​. These parents are usually uncomfortable expressing emotions and tend to coach the kids to suppress their feelings. Parents who respond negatively or punish children for their emotions can cause the child to get even more worked up, further activating their “fight-or-flight” nervous system and making it harder for them to calm down​​.

When this happens, it may seem like the child is being more defiant. However, their system is overstimulated. They have poorer self regulation skills to calm a more worked-up system.

Telling a child in the midst of a tantrum to “calm down” or threatening consequences may stimulate their systems to the point of meltdown. Punitive parenting practices are counterproductive in teaching emotional regulation. Avoid punishing emotions.

To effectively teach self-regulation, be warm, accepting and responsive to your child’s emotional needs. Talk about emotions and accept, support and show empathy to validate their negative feelings. Be patient. Do not ignore, dismiss, discourage, punish or react negatively to emotions, especially negative emotion.

The overall “climate” of the family is a good predictor of a child’s ability to self-regulate​. Factors that affect emotional climate include the parents’ relationship, their personalities, their parenting style, parent-child relationships, sibling relationships and the family’s beliefs about expressing feelings. When the emotional climate is positive, responsive and consistent, kids feel accepted and secure. When the emotional climate is negative, coercive or unpredictable, kids tend to be more reactive and insecure.

Parents who express positive emotions every day create a positive climate. Parents who express excessive or constant levels of negative emotions like sadness, anger, hostility or criticism, contribute to a negative situation and worse self-regulation in kids.

Young children rely on adults to learn self regulation. As they grow older, school age children’s executive function will play a bigger role​. Parents and teachers can then teach self help techniques.

When possible control your child’s environment and experiences to avoid triggers. Learn to assess the situation and options. Approach or avoid someone or some situations according to their likely emotional impact. Modify the environment to alter its emotional impact. 

It is not always possible to avoid situations in life. So learn to anticipate issues, redirect and use coping mechanisms. If a trigger cannot be avoided, redirect attention elsewhere. Attempt to alleviate the situation’s emotional significance by reframing. When reaction is anticipated, remind them of coping skills like counting, breathing or imagery. 

For older children, especially adolescents and teenagers, self-care in everyday lives is important in strengthening their internal resources to regulate emotions. Activities that enhance self-care include: regular exercise such as running, swimming or other aerobic activity, mindfulness​​ such as meditation and yoga, relaxing activities such as listening to music and adequate sleep and good sleep hygiene.

Help them to acknowledge that despite the intensity of an emotion, it does not last forever. For good or for bad, emotions are fleeting. Life is full of highs and lows. Negative emotions are as important as positive emotions in teaching and guiding us. But we do not want to get stuck in a cycle of shame or blame.  Avoid identifying them by the emotion. We want them to avoid becoming the emotion instead of feeling it and then dealing with it. For example “Tommy is feeling sad” Instead of “Tommy is sad”

Regulating our emotions is a life's work. We are emotional creatures. We do not want to squelch our children's emotions. Instead we want to teach them to feel what they feel, and sit with it. Then to evaluate it, work through it and make good decisions for themselves. Part of this is learning what people or situations affect them negatively and positively. This brings about informed problem solving and  emotional growth. 

Parents are responsible for creating a safe and structured environment for their child’s physical, cognitive, social and emotional development. Start preparing before birth. Build strong relationships. Be positive. Set simple unambiguous rules. Be clear. Model coping skills and humor. Be consistent.