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Cited by 151Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional DevelopmentEarly Childhood Education and DevelopmentChild and Animal Learning Development

Emotional reactivity and regulation in infancy interact to predict executive functioning in early childhood.

Ursache, Alexandra, The Family Life Project Investigators, Blair, Clancy, Stifter, Cynthia, Voegtline, Kristin·2013·Developmental Psychology
DOI 10.1037/a0027728PMC PMC12108904
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Abstract

The relation of observed emotional reactivity and regulation in infancy to executive function in early childhood was examined in a prospective longitudinal sample of 1,292 children from predominantly low-income and rural communities. Children participated in a fear eliciting task at ages 7, 15, and 24 months and completed an executive function battery at age 48 months. Results indicated that the relation of child negative emotional reactivity at 15 months of age to executive functioning at 48 months of age was dependent on observed emotion regulation. High levels of executive function ability were observed among children who exhibited high levels of emotional reactivity and high levels of the regulation of this reactivity. In contrast, low levels of executive function ability were observed among children who exhibited high levels of reactivity but low levels of regulation. Among children exhibiting low levels of emotional reactivity, emotion regulation was unrelated to executive functioning. Moreover, emotionally reactive infants exhibiting high levels of emotion regulation were more likely to have primary caregivers who exhibited high levels of positive parenting behavior in a parent-child interaction task. Results provide support for a neurobiologically informed developmental model in which the regulation of emotional arousal is one mechanism whereby supportive environments are associated with higher levels of self-regulation ability for highly reactive infants. Findings are discussed with implications for differential susceptibility and biological sensitivity theories of child by context interaction.

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  • Studies demonstrate that young children's exposure to supportive versus negative interactions with parents, teachers, and peers shapes individual differences in emotional reactivity and regulation, attention control, and higher-order cognitive functions, partly through stress physiology.

    “Increasingly, studies have also demonstrated that young children’s exposure to supportive versus negative interactions with parents, teachers, and peers shapes individual differences in emotional reactivity and regulation, in the control of attention, and in higher-order cognitive functions, in part through the mechanism of stress physiology”

    From School Readiness and Self-Regulation: A Developmental Psychobiological Approach (2015) · cites this paper as Ursache et al. 2013

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  • The stressful nature of low-quality care may become biologically embedded for some children, with cascading effects on emotion regulation and executive functions.

    “These child-care studies suggest that the stressful nature of low-quality care may get under the skin for some children, with cascading influences on child emotion regulation and executive functions”

    From School Readiness and Self-Regulation: A Developmental Psychobiological Approach (2015) · cites this paper as Ursache et al. 2013

    The Differential susceptibility and biological sensitivity theories section proposes that adverse environments can shape stress responses, affecting regulation and executive functioning. The Discussion links emotional regulation and executive functioning to environmental quality. However, this study assessed maternal caregiving, not child-care quality, and did not establish that low-quality child care becomes biologically embedded. (LLM, conf=0.86)

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Cited by

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Authors
Ursache, A., The Family Life Project Investigators, Blair, C., Stifter, C., & Voegtline, K.
Affiliations
  • New York University (US)
  • University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (US)
  • Pennsylvania State University (US)
  • Johns Hopkins University (US)
ORCID
Venue
Developmental Psychology
Publisher
American Psychological Association (APA)
Published
2013
Volume
49
Issue
1
Pages
127-137
ISSN
  • 0012-1649 (ISSN-L)
  • 1939-0599
DOI
10.1037/a0027728
PMC
PMC12108904
OpenAlex
W2097879664
Cited by
151
References
6
Citations by year
2026: 6 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 13 · 2022: 15 · 2021: 9 · 2020: 12 · 2019: 9 · 2018: 7 · 2017: 18 · 2016: 20 · 2015: 9 · 2014: 9 · 2013: 7
FWCI
9.09
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
  • Developmental Psychology (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Funders
  • National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01 HD51502, P01 HD39667)
  • National Institute on Drug Abuse
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
  • Social Sciences › Education › Early Childhood Education and Development
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
Keywords
emotional reactivity, emotion regulation, executive function, infancy, early childhood, differential susceptibility, parental behavior, parent-child interaction
MeSH terms
Age Factors, Child Behavior, Child Development, Child, Preschool, Emotions, Family, Female, Humans, Infant, Male, Mother-Child Relations, Neuropsychological Tests, Predictive Value of Tests, Regression Analysis, Parenting, Executive Function

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