Elucidating mechanisms linking mothers' and fathers' mind-mindedness in infancy with children's self-regulation at early preschool age

Abstract

Extensive research has examined factors that contribute to individual differences in children's self-regulation (SR), a key social-emotional competence crucial to adjustment and mental health. Those differences become salient and measurable at late toddler age. In the CAPS (N = 200 community families), we examined mothers' and fathers' appropriate mind-mindedness (MM)-the ability to view the child as a psychological agent and correctly interpret his or her mental states-as a predictor of children's SR. MM was observed in parent-child interactions at 8 months, and SR was observed as the capacity for deliberate delay in standard tasks at 3 years. Reflecting a family system perspective, processes both within and across mother-child and father-child relationships were examined in one model. Parent-child mutual responsiveness, observed during interactions at 16 months, was modeled as a mediator of the paths from MM to SR. Fathers' MM had a significant, direct positive effect on SR; in addition, it enhanced mutual responsiveness in both father-child and mother-child dyads and promoted child SR through enhanced mother-child mutual responsiveness. The findings elucidate relatively poorly understood mechanisms linking parental MM in infancy with SR at early preschool age, highlight similarities and differences in the processes unfolding in mother-child and father-child relationships, and emphasize interparental dynamics in socialization.

Keywords: Child self-regulation; Family systems; Father-child relationship; Longitudinal studies; Parental mind-mindedness; Parent–child relationship.

Fig. 1.

Paths from mothers’ and fathers’ mind-mindedness (MM) at 8 months to mother–child and father–child mutual responsiveness at 16 months to children’s self-regulation at 3 years. The solid black lines represent significant paths, and the dashed lines represent nonsignificant paths. Reported are unstandardized coefficients. The child’s gender was included as a covariate for both mediators and the outcome variable (girls scored higher on self-regulation, B = −0.193, SE = 0.094, p =.041). Mothers’ and fathers’ responsiveness scores at 8 months were modeled as correlated and included as covariates for the respective parent’s MM (with significant effects for mother–child dyads, B = 0.316, SE = 0.061, p <.001, and father–child dyads, B = 0.365, SE = 0.073, p <.001), and for the respective parent–child mutual responsiveness at 16 months (with a significant effect for mother–child dyads, B = 0.166, SE = 0.064, p =.009). Child age in months at the assessment at age 3 years was included as a covariate for child self-regulation (with a significant effect, B = 0.061, SE = 0.024, p =.012). The covariates are not depicted.