FAMILY
It's not just that marital disagreements influence the emotional
development of the children. Some fighting strategies couples use are
particularly bad for kids.
When couples are mutually hostile, hurling contempt at each other,
attacking each other's beliefs, feelings, and character, their children
grow up showing antisocial behavior, finds a team of
psychologists.
And when partners are locked in a pattern in which the husband
withdraws in anger, the kids are apt to develop internalizing problems
such as anxiety and social withdrawal. Children respond with increased
distress, shame, and self-blame.
It's possible that kids are modeling the powerful negative
behaviors of their parents, reports John M. Gottman, Ph.D., of the
University of Washing-ton. Or they sense that their parents' marriage is
fraying and act out their fears of divorce, or sacrifice themselves to
distract their feuding folks.
Gottman and Lynn Fainsitber Katz, Ph.D., looked at 56 families over
three years. They first evaluated the children between ages four and
five, when the ability to regulate emotion develops. Three years later,
the children of withdrawing men appeared to be modeling their father's
withdrawal. The children of mutually hostile parents had developed
externalizing behaviors. Antisocial behavior showed in an inability to
wait their turn, a tendency to disobey or break rules, and an expectation
that others should conform to their wishes.
There's a gender twist as well, the team reports in Developmental
Psychology (Vol 29, No. 6). A parent's marital conflict style plays out
hardest on the opposite-sex child, perhaps because kids may ally
themselves with the same-sex parent.
Tags:
antisocial behavior,
behavior,
children,
contempt,
disagreements,
emotional development,
Fears,
gender,
hostility,
john m gottman,
katz,
marital conflict,
negative behaviors,
sex child,
sex parent,
social withdrawal,
tendency
