Emotion Regulation of Preschoolers with ASD During Dyadic Interaction with Mother and Father: Behavioral and Physiological Markers

Background:  

Emotion regulation (ER), defined as the ability to cope with increased levels of emotion by manipulation of internal arousal and external social environment, is a main developmental task in early childhood. Clinical and preliminary empirical evidence reveal ER difficulties in young children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD).  However, the ability of individuals with ASD to regulate their emotions during emotionally challenging situations has received little empirical attention.

Alongside constitutional factors, parental environment was shown to play a central role in the development of ER strategies in typically developing children and in children with developmental difficulties. Studies have demonstrated that despite the primary deficits in ASD, parents can enhance developmental processes in children with ASD. However, behavioral and physiological aspects of ER in young children with ASD, during interaction with their parents have not been previously explored. 

Objectives:  

To examine emotional expression patterns and behavioral and physiological aspects of ER in young children with ASD and typically developing (TD) controls, during dyadic interaction with their mothers and with their fathers.

Methods:  

15 pre-school children with ASD and 15 TD controls, matched on mental age, were videotaped during play activities, while interacting with their mothers and (separately) with their fathers. The interaction included free-play and play procedures eliciting mild frustration and fear. Videos underwent global and micro analyses, yielding measures of emotional expression, ER behaviors, and interaction. In addition, cardiac vagal tone was measured during the interaction, as a measure of physiological ER.

Results:  

During the frustrating activity, children with ASD used more simple ER strategies (e.g., protest, withdrawal, idiosyncratic behavior) and fewer sophisticated ER strategies (e.g., distraction, play) than the TD group. During the fear eliciting activity, higher levels of vagal tone were measured in the ASD group, suggesting their ER was less efficient than that of the TD group. No group differences were found in emotional expression. An analysis of parent-child interaction measures revealed that although children with ASD were less involved and less compliant the TD children during the interactions, there were no group differences in parental measures of sensitivity, intrusiveness and limit-setting, or in dyadic measures of reciprocity and negative dyadic states. In the ASD group’s father-child dyads, child compliance and dyadic reciprocity are positively correlated with the use of sophisticated ER strategies, and negatively correlated with the use of simple ER strategies. No correlations between interaction measures and ER behaviors were found in the TD group.

Conclusions:  

This study supports previous descriptions of emotion regulation difficulties in preschoolers with ASD, demonstrating them both behaviorally and physiologically. Furthermore, this study supports previous findings about the parenting qualities of mothers and fathers of children with ASD, which are equivalent to those of parents to typically developing children. Lastly, this study emphasizes the central role of fathers in the development of ER strategies amongst children with ASD.