Abstract
Difficulties regulating emotion have been linked to comorbid psychopathology in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but little empirical work has examined predictors of dysregulation in this population. Forty-six families of children with ASD participated in a laboratory visit that included direct measurement of children’s IQ, ASD symptoms, and psychophysiological reactivity. Child emotion regulation was observed during independent and co-regulatory tasks, and parental scaffolding was rated in the dyadic context. ASD symptom severity emerged as the strongest predictor of child emotion dysregulation across contexts. Child age and parental scaffolding also uniquely predicted child dysregulation in the dyadic task. Implications for conceptualizing intrinsic and extrinsic influences on emergent emotion regulation in children with ASD are discussed, as are applications to intervention.
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Acknowledgments
This project was supported by intramural funds awarded by the California State University, Fullerton and by a grant from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R15HD087877). Portions of these data were presented at the 2015 Gatlinburg Conference and the 2017 Convention of the American Psychological Association. We wish to thank the families who made this work possible. We also thank Audrey Rodriguez, Christopher Murakami, Mariann Howland, and Alyssa Bailey for their contributions to data collection and observational coding.
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RMF and JKB conceived of the study, participated in its design and coordination, performed statistical analyses and data interpretation, and drafted the manuscript; JM participated in the design and coordination of the study, performed aspects of the measurement, and contributed text to the manuscript.
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Fenning, R.M., Baker, J.K. & Moffitt, J. Intrinsic and Extrinsic Predictors of Emotion Regulation in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. J Autism Dev Disord 48, 3858–3870 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-018-3647-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-018-3647-1