- Children become increasingly sophisticated interpreters of emotions.
From the early days of infancy, children respond to emotional states of others this is known as emotional contagion. Ex. If one baby starts crying the other babies also cry.
During the first two years, children are able to monitor the others emotions particularly on parents and trust care givers, this is known as social referencing. With age, children become able to read the people’s facial expressions.
Later they become more thoughtful about emotions. They talk about the emotional states that they and others experienced and they realize that emotions are connected to the people’s desires.
By middle childhood, they realize that their thoughts and interpretations determine how they feel about a particular situation and that other people have different interpretations or different feelings.
By upper elementary grades, children begin to realize that emotional expressions do not always reflect people’s true feelings.
By the end of middle childhood or at the beginning of adolescence , they appreciate that people have ambivalent feelings towards people and events.
- Children expand their repertoire of basic emotions to include self –conscious emotions
During infancy the children are able to detect basic emotions in others. By preschool age children show self conscious emotions- affective states that reflect awareness of social standards and other people’s concerns about adherence to these standards. These include guilt, shame, embracement and pride.
- Children and adolescents gradually learn to regulate their emotions.
Emotional regulation refers to the strategies children use to manage stressful situations. As children grow older they observe role models around them and they acquire an increasing number of coping strategies for dealing with the difficult situations. They are also able to become better apprise of advantage and disadvantages of particular coping strategies and they seek social support from others.
Gradually children are able to crub their emotional reactions to protect themselves and other people.
- Adolescence brings new anxieties and pressures.
Despite gains in emotional regulation, adolescents can be more volatile than younger children. They more often report feeling lonely, embarrassed or anxious and they have more extreme mood swings (Arnett, 1999). The hormonal changes that accompany may count for some of these volatility, but environment factors probably may have a more significant effect.
Adolescents face many new situations and problems that children have not encountered before. As they undergo rapid uncontrollable physical changes, they may feel self-conscious and awkward
As peer relationships become important, their interpersonal problems become an increasing source of anxiety and inner turmoil.
School provides additional pressures: worries about completing homework, getting along with teachers, achieving good grades and fitting in with classmates are the common source of stress for secondary school students. Some of them may have additional challenges like living in poverty, experiencing ongoing family conflict or being abused by family member etc. many adolescents perceive their lives as a being quite stressful. They may seek guidance from peer group. Some adolescents believe that the problems they face exceed their capabilities to cope effectively. The suicidal rate is more in adolescence than the earlier years.
Participants